Natchez Alderwoman Joyce Arceneaux-Mathis said this week she wants to understand what is keeping plans for a city-county recreation improvements on hold.

We suggest she looks for the answer in two places — the City Council Chambers and across the street at the Adams County Board of Supervisors’ office.

We’re not picking on Mathis, mind you; she’s one of 11 elected city and county leaders who could move recreation forward quickly.

Instead, for nearly five years, the community’s leadership team has simply stewed over the matter, all the while five more seasons of T-ball, soccer and other recreational sports have operated with old, rundown facilities.

The half of a decade we’re counting is only the time that’s passed since the idea of a city-county recreation project was put on a countywide ballot. County voters resoundingly supported the idea. It was a clear mandate from the voters that something needed to be done.

Yet here were are years later and aldermen now want to see a financial plan and to understand how much money the county will put up toward the effort. The county seeks to hire a recreation director first and let that person build out the plan then figure out the financing later.

Honestly, either option would work. But the problem, it seems, is none of the elected officials seem capable of working out a solution to move the effort forward.

Instead, aldermen have called another meeting to talk with the recreation commission. Can the city — please — also invite county supervisors to the same meeting so, perhaps, the group can make a decision and begin moving toward a solution?