NATCHEZ — The Natchez Bluff has never looked more festive during the holiday season as it has this season after local business owners donated and volunteered to wrap downtown trees and their storefronts with lights.

The initiative started when Fred and Melinda Kent and Regina Charboneau decorated the front of Regina’s Kitchen on Main Street.

Fred Kent said locals responded to the lights so well that it sparked the idea to light two oak trees at the end of Main Street across from the Natchez Grand Hotel.

“It was a team effort,” Kent said. “Bryan Marvel, with Prints and Antiques on Commerce Street managed the project and several others pitched in to help. … Justin Dollar and his team in the Natchez Public Works department did an excellent job of trimming the trees and getting them prepared for us.”

Fred Kent said the spark set off a chain reaction as other downtown merchants started to light up their business fronts as well, including Cotton Alley Café and 100 Main Street Spirits and Eatery.

Natchez Mayor Darryl Grennell boasted about their efforts during Monday’s Economic Development Council meeting, which Melinda Kent attended.

“They called me approximately three weeks ago and asked if they could have lights placed on the live oaks on the bluff for Christmastime,” Grennell said during Monday’s meeting. “That is just a fraction of what they’ve done for this city. They’ve invested here and love Natchez. They know the treasure that is here and are constantly trying to make Natchez grow.”

After the first two trees were lit, Fred Kent said they started soliciting help from others to light up the rest of downtown.

“It kind of caught on,” Melinda Kent said during Monday’s meeting. “Magnolia Bluffs Casino sponsored one of the oaks after they saw the first oak, then Connie and Pat Burns did six of the crepe Myrtles and now Mr. Pat Biglane has promised to do another tree. Anyone who wants to help us finish, we’re almost there.”

Melinda said the oak trees are time-consuming to decorate and can cost anywhere from $1,200 to $1,500 for both lights and labor. The crepe myrtles are less labor-intensive to decorate and cost approximately $700 to cover three or four of them with lights, she said.

Melinda said the lights — which are industrial LEDs — are meant to be a permanent placement that could simply be turned off after the first of the year. However, others have asked if they could remain lit even after the holidays are over.

“It will be up to the city to say when they go dark and when they’re lit,” Melinda said. “I went over there the other night and there were tourists there who were talking about the lights. People notice.”

Melinda said others in Natchez have found even more ways to beautify downtown for the holidays.

Joe Johnson and Leon Hollins of Arts Natchez dedicated their time and skills to repaint the old snowmen decorations on the bluff so that they’d look good as new, Melinda Kent said.

After Monday’s meeting, Fred Kent said he hoped the lights would provide a permanent accent to the Natchez Bluff.

“We’d love to leave the lights on and never take them down,” Fred Kent said. “… When you look at those limbs stretched out 60 to 75-feet, it’s truly something you wouldn’t see anywhere else in the country.”