NATCHEZ, Miss. – City officials’ plan to sell the old Armstrong tire plant with hopes it can be rehabilitated by a food processor is being countered by calls for the polluted albatross to be torn down.
Meeting Tuesday for a public hearing to discuss what to do about the city-owned industrial facility, Natchez Mayor Dan Gibson, city aldermen and interested citizens heard three options for the asbestos-riddled structures:
— Leave them standing to further deteriorate and pose a greater environmental and financial liability for the city;
— Tear down the former tire-making factory, a costly option Gibson estimated could cost the city at least $8 million as asbestos-abatement measures are needed to ensure the demolition’s airborne particles don’t harm the environment and residents’ health;
— Continue city officials’ negotiations to sale to an unnamed “green industry” that’s expressed interest in cleaning up the plant, retrofitting it to produce food with medicinal benefits and employing at least 50 people.
Skeptics said the old factory is unfeasible for any new industry, with its pockets of contaminated groundwater still there from the tire plant’s operations and the cancer-causing asbestos embedded in its long-vacant buildings.
“It needs to be torn down and everything gotten rid of,” James Gavette told the mayor and city aldermen. “We need to get rid of that eyesore…. We need to clean it up.”
Gavette and others said the city could get outside funds, such as federal grants, to demolish the 84-year-old factory that occupies a large city block on Kelly Avenue in north Natchez and once employed more than 1,000 people.
However, “tearing the buildings down presents more hazards.” Gibson said.
The most realistic hope is to get the nutraceuticals companyto refurbish the facility and “bring business and jobs in a safe way” to Natchez, he said. “This community deserves more than this vacant monster.”
The tire plant, which closed in 2001, was built for Armstrong Rubber Co. in 1939 with state financing and then deeded to the city.
While negotiations continue with the food maker to buy the property, it would take a majority of the six-member Board of Aldermen to consummate a deal. Two board members have expressed opposition. Aldermen Billie Joe Frazier and Felicia Irving have questioned the probability and safety of a new industry rehabbing the buildings amid the environmental concerns.
“Why this building? It’s not worth the health of our community,” Irving said. “We don’t want this to be known as cancer alley.”
After Armstrong left, the property was used by successor tire-making tenants Fidelity, Condere and Titan. Titan took over in 1998 but shuttered the factory three years later. The company continued to lease the dormant buildings and land from the city until 2017.
The contamination there has been monitored for years by state and federal environmental regulators, and they’ll continue close oversight if the new industry does locate there.Natchez-Adams County officials have been using federal funds to analyze the pollution and determine costs for revamping the blighted property.
Tuesday’s public hearing was moderated by the mayor, who formatted it to provide information about the prospective industry’s plans and the tire plant’s environmental issues before taking questions or comments from the public. However, many attendees walked out early — led by a dissident who insisted on asking questions and expressing his views only and not sit through a presentation.
As questions and comments were fielded throughout the two-hour hearing – at times emotionally heated — Gibson pointed to the importance of the public being informed and objective.
“I think we need to look at what’s actually proposed and not rumors,” said the mayor. “I appreciate everyone who didn’t prejudge and who listened.”
While the town hall meeting was precipitated by plans for the tire plant’s sale, it brought more light to the difficult dilemma Natchez faces in maintaining or discarding a polluted site the city and most industries don’t want or need.
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