Aldermen’s failure to solicit proposals for health insurance, review questionable management of public facilities and third party services, puts needed checks and balances at risk. Successful communities use requests for proposals (RFP) — thoughtful solicitation of work with some semblance of a level playing field. Only with RFPs can Natchez hope to avoid slippery appearance of impropriety or steering of contracts to preferred vendors. Why is this lost on our Board of Aldermen? The goal is simple — restore public confidence in our elected leaders. Aldermen must decide whether to perpetuate Natchez’s rigged systems or seek investment by firms unwilling to compromise business ethics. Aldermen must decide whether they clean up our collective public act and develop a reputation for community integrity and transparency, or continue the corruption-riddled practices of the past.

Three current issues beg for clean-up. First in line is the depot. Credible people assert that there is evidence of disregarded procedure, falsified public records, manipulated bid processes, and slick use of short objection deadlines. Perfectly acceptable private business behavior in the open market often violates public law. The depot is public property. Thus, there are restraints due to involvement of taxpayer money. Aldermen-trustees should proceed with slow, steady, thoughtful analysis, not sign off on rapid, reckless action.

The depot is tied to the needed forensic audit of the books of the City’s Office of Tourism Management (OTM), In turn, this implicates contracts among OTM, Reuther’s Grand Hotel and Reuther’s management of the Natchez Convention Center (NCC), Natchez Community Center, Natchez City Auditorium, and Visitor Reception Center. The forensic audit needs to explore possible steering or tying arrangements among these entities that could be unlawful. This is of paramount interest to taxpayers and owners, investors and operators of local lodging/food businesses and their employees. The aldermen clearly do not have a handle on these relationships or money flows and require outside help. Whether OTM unlawfully spent public money or Reuther managers ever filed contractually required reports for the public facilities they manage for the city, agent for the Natchez Convention Promotion Commission (NCPC) is important. If not, contracts have been breached by Reuther management, and aldermen need to know about it to determine if interests for any future project is possible, including the depot. Simply put, the aldermen should wait for a completed forensic audit to move on the depot.

Meanwhile, Reuther interests are purchasing the Regions Bank building for conversion to a hotel. I join others in thanking Reuther for investing in Natchez. We need new investment downtown. The announcement suggests that occupancy at the Grand is encouraging expansion. It also suggests that to the extent Reuther interests may have been subsidized by the city for years with management agreements, there may be no need for future subsidies. Aldermen must review annual reports and financials of NCC and the other public facilities. The Grand must be audited on any public portion of its arrangements with Reuther management.

Secondly, NCPC is charged with tourism leadership. The facilities and personnel identified herein should be placed under the NCPC umbrella, with NCPC employing professional managers and City OTM staff, rather than the dysfunctional arrangement currently in place. NCPC, not OTM, should direct all marketing, with Mississippi tourism support, rather than sending limited, valuable tourism tax monies out-of-state. NCPC should use excess public tourism tax funds to improve the Community Center and City Auditorium, both neglected for at least the past sixteen years.

Third, the City employee health insurance vendor hastily selected without review suggests that the Aldermen have not paid attention to public demands. I question whether the driver for that contract is fees and commissions for the provider, not the health of public workers.  Rushed public business rarely passes the smell test, and stinks here.

Walt Kelly’s pun in his popular Pogo comic strip, “Yep, Son, we have met the enemy and he is us”, is said to derive from early 1800s battlefield banter. The reality is that our population has decreased from almost 24,000 to about half of that since 1970. It is time to demand that our public officials, the aldermen, earn their pay and do their job with integrity. Is not this the  takeaway from our most recent municipal election?
Paul H. Benoist is a Natchez resident.