The past week brought to light some chinks in the armor of some of our local public institutions.

First up, we learned of a lag in our combined emergency 911-dispatching center.

Seems that all of our law enforcement and emergency responders were working on the Mississippi Wireless Information, or MSWIN, communication system but the Adams County Sheriff’s Office was behind on getting on the system.

Because of the sheriff’s office not being on the system, the combined dispatch system was complicated in that the three dispatchers on duty at any given time could only dispatch for one agency at their respective computer terminals.

For instance, if a call came in for the Natchez Police Department and the dispatcher assigned to the city was on another call, then a dispatcher for another agency could answer that call but could not do anything with it until the city dispatcher had cleared the city dispatch computer terminal.

Needless to say, some calls were delayed in being dispatched to officers.

Fortunately, the Adams County Sheriff’s Office is in the process of going to the new radio system up and running so the dispatch delays should soon be a thing of the past.

Another problem came to light last week when the Natchez Adams County Recreation Commission tried to move forward on a plan to update area ball fields and ballparks.

Turns out a lack of communications exist between the commission and its funding organizations — the Natchez Mayor and Board of Aldermen, the Adams County Board of Supervisors and the Natchez Adams County School.

Apparently, no one is sure if any of the organizations have been paying their allotted share of funding to the recreation commission and the commission’s bills have not been paid for months.

Hopefully, the entities will start communicating and get to the bottom of the financial questions.

Finally, any Mississippians who were paying attention to Saturday’s Louisiana primary elections had to notice how much smoother the voting seemed to go across the river than elections go in Mississippi.

Polls closed at 8 p.m. Saturday and within two hours, 100% of the precincts had been counted — statewide. And, the results were updated live throughout the process on the Louisiana Secretary of State’s website for the world to see.

By contrast, in Mississippi’s Aug. 6 primary, the polls closed at 7 p.m., and it was nearly midnight before 100% of Adams County’s precincts had been counted.

Mississippi could learn a few lessons from Louisiana where the voting and vote count seem to go a lot smoother and quicker.

As the old saying goes, the first step to solving a problem is acknowledging the problem.

Now that we are aware of these problems, we can only hope the powers that be will work together to resolve the problems and improve the services rendered by those organizations.

Scott Hawkins is the editor of The Natchez Democrat. Reach him at 601-445-3540 or scott.hawkins@natchezdemocrat.com.