NATCHEZ, Miss. – The city budget for the upcoming year totals nearly $40 million with pay raises for essential Natchez public works employees and fire fighters while the tax millage remains the same as it’s been the past 10 years.
The Natchez Board of Aldermen voted 4-2 Tuesday for the budget funding city operations in the fiscal year starting Oct. 1. Its dissenters said it left too little money for unexpected expenses or shortfalls that could occur in the coming year.
Much of the budget discussion Tuesday among aldermen and Mayor Dan Gibson focused on a possible $300,000 grant Natchez could receive for renovating the century-old Ritz Theater.
The dilapidated downtown building on North Commerce Street – with its distinctive Art Deco marquee and façade – was built in 1935. It could become an event venue, according to plans the mayor outlined. Converting the building’s gutted interior into an open-air amphitheater is among the possibilities, Gibson said.
The Downtown Natchez Alliance is applying for a grant from the Mississippi Main Street Association. Gibson said negotiations have been underway for the privately owned structure to eventually be conveyed to the city. While not a done deal, Gibson expressed hopes this “longstanding eyesore on Commerce Street” can be refurbished.
The city’s overall budget includes money for pay raises that the board will bring up for approval next week. Plans have been to increase salaries by about 3 percent for the Natchez Fire Department and Public Works Department. The Natchez Police Department got pay raises last year.
The mayor and aldermen in recent weeks have closed the public out of discussions about salary hikes for a select group of other municipal employees.
The overall budget for funding city operations and payrolls totals $39.8 million for the next fiscal year – up from the $38.5 million that was budgeted for the past 12 months. The newly adopted budget does contain federal funds earmarked for various construction-related projects.
The fiscal blueprint includes $1.2 million for the city’s “Forks to Freedom” project that involves various enhancements along the corridor stretching from Devereaux Drive and St. Catherine Street through downtown Natchez to the city’s scenic bluff overlooking the Mississippi River. The expenditure is part of the $24 million federal grant Natchez received in 2024 that’s being spent over the course of several years.
Another $435,000 is set aside for the coming year to develop landscaped monuments honoring Black Civil War Union soldiers and Hiram Revels, a former Natchez alderman who in 1870 became the first Black member of the U.S. Congress.
There’s also $609,000 itemized for demolishing the city-owned Fry building that just got underway. Plans are to make the space a parking lot to help accommodate the adjacent Eola hotel that developers are planning to renovate.
Gibson has recited a long list of various projects and programs the city is able to fund. “Everything I just described has been accomplished without an increase in taxes even though (economic costs) have gone up,” he said.
The budget does call for spending most of the $39 million in expected revenues for the upcoming year, which the mayor conceded is a “smaller margin than we would like” as a financial cushion.
Voting Tuesday for the fiscal 2027 budget: Aldermen Valencia Hall, Billie Joe Frazier, Felicia Bridgewater-Irving and Ben Davis. Voting against: Aldermen Sarah Carter Smith and Curtis Moroney.
“I’m not comfortable with the small amount of breathing room that we’ve got,” Moroney said of the $76,000 left unallocated for a rainy day.
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