I would like to applaud our mayor and the majority of aldermen for having the wisdom and guts to finally approve the Roth Hill casino.

For Natchez, a city which cannot pave its streets, cannot pay its police competitive salaries, borrows every year to cover operating expenses and has lost almost 10,000 people in 30 years, to reject the potential revenue from this project would have been foolish in the extreme.

Contrary to The Natchez Democrat, I think the mayor and aldermen bent over backwards to give a vocal minority every opportunity to express its doubts and displeasure over not only the developer’s third amendment, but what was not the subject of the discussion: whether or not the casino should be built at all.

Frankly, the views of the Isle of Capri on the Roth Hill project are about as relevant as the views of one long established restaurant would be on whether a new restaurant should open. But, the mayor and aldermen showed the patience of Job and heard them out.

The much maligned closed door sessions were a necessity, not to keep the public out, but to ensure that the Roth Hill developers would not be privy to critical legal advice the aldermen were receiving from their own attorney.

Who in their right mind would speak to their attorney in the presence of the opposing party and their counsel?

The only reason the staff of The Democrat is in a snit about it is that you, who have been hostile to the casino from the beginning, were kept out of it.

If The Natchez Democrat would show the same zeal it showed on this issue on a host of other issues affecting this town which require good investigative reporting we would all be a lot better off for it.

 

Gary O’Neal

Natchez resident