NATCHEZ — If Natchez residents want to take a dip, the closest thing to a public pool they’ll find is an empty concrete box.

While Ferriday officials battle over whether or not that town’s reconstructed pool is safe to use, Natchez is left wondering if it will ever have one at all.

The public pool at Duncan Park, built in the 1940s, was drained for the last time in 2001 after longstanding problems.

The pool “leaked like a sieve,” and there were reoccurring problems with keeping the water clean, Recreation Director Ralph Tedder said.

The pool had been reconstructed in 1980 and repaired at least four times since then.

“It was just a maintenance nightmare,” Recreation Committee Chairman and Alderman Jake Middleton said. “For the very small amount people were using that pool, it was taking a good bit of our budget to keep in operation.”

Roughly five to 10 people would swim on slow days toward the end of the pool’s life, Middleton said.

A new pool should be built to accommodate 150 to 200 people, Tedder said.

After the Duncan Park pool closed, the board of aldermen discussed what kind of pool was needed and where it should be built. The county and city governments, along with the school board, created a committee to look into the situation.

But before the next step could be taken, the International Paper Mill closed.

The issue was to be addressed in a countywide referendum, but it was removed, Alderwoman Joyce Arceneaux-Mathis said.

“People in the community were having a hard time holding onto their homes,” Mathis said. “It didn’t seem the opportune time to put it on a referendum.”

Since then, Mathis said she has pushed for a public pool but said she hasn’t had much support from other board members.

“I bring it up every year,” Mathis said. “Every time we bring this up, we’re getting information in the negative — it costs too much to have a pool or the liability insurance is going to kill the city. It’s aggravating.”

For the past two years, the city has set aside roughly $40,000 a year toward a pool, City Clerk Donnie Holloway said. The same reserve is planned again this year, too. But the current $80,000 is just a drop in the bucket.

A top-notch pool would cost roughly $1 million to build and thousands more a year to run and maintain it, Tedder said. Such a pool would add $50,000 in operating costs yearly to an annual recreation department budget of roughly $1.2 million, he said.

The city can’t afford a new pool right now, Middleton said.

“The ball’s rolling, it’s just that the money’s not there right now,” Middleton said. “It’s all we can do right now to take care of what we have, in terms of running the city, period. We have to repave roads and keep fire and police protection.

“We have so many things we need to do without putting something extra out there to take care of.”

Ideally, the county and city would team up to pay for a pool, the aldermen agreed.

County Supervisors President Darryl Grennell said he personally would be happy to work with the city to acquire a public swimming pool.

“I’m 100 percent in support of that,” Grennell said. “(The city) would need to approach the county board of supervisors to give us cost estimates to see if we would be willing to participate.”

The city should have the responsibility of maintining the pool, since the county doesn’t have a recreation department, Grennell said.

“(The city) would have the manpower to be able to oversee it,” he said.

And with new growth, like the new hotels in town, and Lane Company and Rentech on the horizon, things might change soon, Middleton said.

Still, a new pool can’t come soon enough for Mathis.

“Ferriday is at least trying to provide a swimming facility for their children,” Mathis said. “There ought to be some kind of way we can put in a pool in good working order for children to swim.”