NATCHEZ — The saying, “If you build it, they will come,” was made famous in the movie “Field of Dreams.”

“That is a very false statement,” said David Carter, Adams County supervisor, who used the famous quote in a Thursday meeting with the Natchez Adams County Recreation Commission to discuss progressing with plans to upgrade area baseball fields and parks. “If you don’t manage it and market it, no one is coming.”

Carter’s statement came in the joint meeting with members of the Natchez Mayor and Board of Aldermen, Adams County Board of Supervisors and the Natchez Adams School District, all of which contribute to the recreation commission both monetarily and through appointing three volunteer recreation commission members from each entity.

The recreation commission is charged with managing and overseeing the city’s and the county’s ballparks and the Natchez Community Swimming pool.

For the past several months, recreation commission members have been working on a plan to update area ballparks, but the plans have stalled until the Natchez Adams County Recreation Commission and all the government entities involved can establish a firm structure and financial plan going forward.

Several members of Natchez Mayor and Board of Aldermen and the Adams County Board of Supervisors voiced their uncertainty about funding new projects after hearing the realization that approximately $40,000 is still owed to the Natchez YMCA and is unaccounted for.

The $40,000 is in management fees owed to the Metropolitan YMCAs, which managed the Natchez Community Swimming Pool until the commission failed to renew a contract because the commission struggled to get a quorum from November 2018 until May.

Also, the YMCA had not been paid for services during that period.

While officials are set on rebuilding and overlaying area ballparks at Duncan Park, Liberty Park and the girl’s softball complex near Natchez High School, they also said it’s necessary to take a step back, reevaluate and draw a clear plan of how to pay for and manage recreational facilities before moving forward.

Progress

Recreation commission member John Ward Junkin said the recreation board hired Joseph Furr, a Baton Rouge landscape consultant, for approximately $25,000 in May to develop a list of recommendations with rough price estimates ranging from $1.3 million for “must-do” updates to $3.5 million for “gold standard” improvements to area ballparks.

Some of Furr’s recommendations include building an additional field in Duncan Park for tournaments; turning the softball field into a dual-purpose field suitable for baseball and softball games; updating each of the fields with proper bases, dugouts and backstops; updating bathroom facilities and adding shaded seating for spectators and parking lots, Junkin said.

Junkin said redoing the ballparks was included in a “master plan” that recreation commission drew up years ago. However, plans changed and the project had to be revisited. Locating and researching to find an architect to design new field upgrades was a months-long process that started in January, Junkin said.

Meanwhile, Natchez Community Development Director James Johnston sought funds through the Mississippi Department of Wildlife and Fisheries’ Land and Water Conservation Fund program to heat and cover the community pool near Natchez High School and to install lockers and showers for swim teams.

The total cost of the project is approximately $270,000 and the city and county boards both agreed to split the matching cost of $134,000, Johnston said.

Complications

Recreation commission chairman Jimmy Ware said a funding plan for the ballpark updates does not exist yet, and the recreation board is waiting on direction from elected officials as to which of the projects outlined in the plan needed to be pursued first.

One obstacle that makes them hesitant to fund new projects is an undermanaged budget.

“I know that there’s a new plan that I’m completely in favor of,” Carter said, “but not until we have some kind of structure to manage it long-term. … If we don’t have a management plan, we can build anything we want to build but it’s going to fail.”

An inter-local agreement between the Board of Aldermen and Board of Supervisors said the city would allocate $550,000 each year, and the Board of Supervisors would allocate $334,000 and both boards would each hold an additional $100,000 for capital improvements.

Adams County attorney Scott Slover said both boards hold on to those funds until they are requested by the recreation commission on an as needed basis.

The NARC is supposed to be comprised of nine members who work on a volunteer basis. The Natchez Board of Aldermen, Adams County Board of Supervisors and the Natchez Adams School District each appoint three to the board, however the school district and the city are currently missing members after two appointees recently resigned.

Matilda Stephens resigned as treasurer on the board Tuesday after having served a little more than four months in the position.

Carter said he wasn’t sure whether the existing structure of the recreation commission is working to accomplish the city’s and the county’s goals.

“Some of us still don’t know who is running recreation right now,” Carter said during Thursday’s meeting. “It is concerning when you continue to put someone in a treasury position, and they continue to resign. It does throw up a lot of considerable flags. … I’m not sure what the county’s full obligations are besides financial, and where do we stand as far as three boards working together as one? I’m not seeing it really working.”

Solutions

Officials said a possible solution would be to hire an accountant to manage the financial aspect of the recreation commission.

“When we assign board members to a commission it’s no different than our port commission or our airport commission,” Adams County Administrator Joe Murray said. “I don’t think a board member should be responsible for trying to handle all of the financials of the commission. You need to put that in somebody else’s hands because that is a lot of responsibility.”

Alderwoman Joyce Arceneaux-Mathis said the recreation commission needed to regularly present the boards with a complete budget.

“Every organization that has ever come to us for money has come to us with a budget,” Mathis said. “To my knowledge, no one from the recreation commission has ever come to us with a full budget. … I have not seen a budget presentation from the recreation commission since I’ve been on this board. … If we had a budget, we could do more.”