NATCHEZ — The first burst of economic stimulus money is making its way to Natchez in the form of approximately $662,000 for infrastructure.

The Mississippi Department of Transportation received $24 million through the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act, which is part of the stimulus package.

MDOT will distribute the money to cities in Mississippi based on population for infrastructure projects.

Each city has six months to find a project, go through all normal approval processes and begin to advertise for bids.

Mayor Jake Middleton and City Engineer David Gardner said they plan on using the $662,000 to do maintenance overlays of central business district streets.

The MDOT money will pay for 100 percent of the project and does not require a match.

MDOT received the stimulus money Feb. 20, and the city was notified of it late last week.

“That’s very fast,” Gardner said of the stimulus money trickle-down.

Since Commerce, State, Franklin, Rankin, Washington and Pearl streets and sections of Canal Street have already been identified for improvements, Gardner and Middleton said they can begin moving quickly on getting the necessary approvals.

“We’re going to concentrate on areas that haven’t seen any treatment in a quarter of a century,” Gardner said.

Both Middleton and Gardner plan to meet with the board of aldermen to discuss the streets and get the board’s input, although a formal motion is not required.

Gardner said he is hopeful Natchez will get more money than what has already been allotted.

If the six-month timeline runs out and cities have not submitted plans for approval to MDOT, the money will be redistributed to other cities.

“We’re not saying we are, but we might,” Middleton said of receiving any extra money.

The money the city is to receive cannot be transferred to pay for the road overlay of Franklin, Martin Luther King Jr., St. Catherine and Homochitto streets.

“That’s the first question I asked, but we can’t,” Middleton said.

The city still needs $650,000 to pay for the $1.3 million overlay project.

Middleton and Gardner said the city has not seen this much roadwork in years.

Gardner said the money Natchez will receive is different from any other money the city has ever gotten in that there’s no match and MDOT will handle the contracting once bids are received.

“In our 16 years, I’ve never seen anything come to Natchez like this,” he said. “It’s a very unique set of money.”

With the $1.3 million done on the four major arteries, and if this $662,000 comes to fruition, Middleton said having nearly $2 million worth of road work done in a year is pretty good.