One of Natchez’s most public eyesores is finally getting a much-needed makeover.

City and county crews have begun the time-consuming work of breaking up the concrete foundation left at the former Natchez Pecan Shelling Company facility on Broadway Street.

Once the concrete is removed, the plan is to level the area and replant it with grass.

Mayor Butch Brown and the city’s administration deserve credit for seeing the huge problem and working quickly to resolve it.

The pecan factory site sat undeveloped and barren for years after former Natchez Mayor Phillip West took a brief dip in hot water after demolishing the building without approval of the Mississippi Department of Archives and History.

Soon after the building was razed, would-be condo developers ran into trouble and the site remained idle for years, tied up in a legal squabble between developers and the city.

The city repurchased the site from the developers as part of a settlement agreement.

Acquiring the land was necessary in that it allowed the city to get clear of the legal matter, but it also put an important piece of the bluff back in public control.

For years now, the pecan factory’s state of blight has been a tangible example of what can happen when government doesn’t follow its own rules and things go badly.

We’re glad this political saga will soon be in the history books and buried beneath a few inches of dirt and, hopefully, a nice thick layer of green grass.