NATCHEZ — In a few weeks, a stroll through Memorial Park may be a little smoother.

Last week, crews with the Urban Youth Corps began prepping the park area to replace aging sidewalks, Natchez Public Works Director Justin Dollar said.

“This is just something that really needed to be done,” he said. “We are trying to enhance the appearance of the park, to make it the best we can for the people, the pedestrians who use the park.”

With the assistance of a couple of public works employees, the Youth Corps workers have dug up the old brick sidewalks and the concrete sidewalks, and will start laying new bricks today.

The work should last a couple of weeks, Dollar said.

“We are trying to salvage what we can of the bricks,” he said. “We will use them for future projects, and if it is the same type of project we will use them again, but many of these bricks are too worn and broken to use again.”

The concrete sidewalks that are being replaced will also be replaced with concrete, Dollar said.

The city was awarded a $25,000 grant through the Mississippi Department of Transportation’s Urban Youth Corps program to hire five young individuals between the ages of 18 and 25 to work summer jobs with Natchez Public Works.

The participants work 40 hours a week and earn $7.75 an hour.

When the grant was awarded, Community Development Director James Johnston said participants would also receive basic skills training from American Medical Response, Alcorn State University, Copiah-Lincoln Community College, Home Bank, Mississippi State University Extension Service and the Carby & Carby law firm.

The grant requires a 20 percent match, and the city is meeting that through the in-kind use of equipment and staff time.