by DAVID HAMILTON

NATCHEZ — The City of Natchez voted Tuesday to file a lawsuit against its former tenant, Titan Tire Corporation.

The Natchez Board of Aldermen Tuesday unanimously voted to authorize City Attorney Bob Latham to collaborate with other attorneys and prepare a lawsuit against the corporation.

Latham said the lawsuit regards outstanding rent owed by Titan Tire as well as property that the corporation allegedly removed from the building that the city aims to recover. Latham would not provide specific details regarding dollar amounts.

“There are a number of issues remaining in terms of rent that was owed under the lease,” Latham said.

Calculating the amount, Latham said, would involve rifling through personal property tax documents to decipher exactly what is owed, which he said he has yet to do.

Latham said Titan Tire assumed a lease agreement for the city-owned property from the Condere Corporation years ago.

Condere took over the plant in 1986 after a decades-long tenure by the Armstrong Tire and Rubber Company ended.

Twelve years later, Condere went bankrupt and Titan Tire purchased the factory.

The Titan Tire plant operated in Natchez from 1998 until 2001, when the plant was closed after a labor strike. The building has since remained abandoned, but Titan continued to man a small security detail at the building Latham said the corporation relinquished possession of the building and property to the city July 1.

The process of filing the lawsuit, Latham said, should be relatively expedient.

“By the nature of the amount of paperwork that’s involved with the lawsuit, I’m not quite sure if it can be done in 30 days, but I expect to move forward fairly quickly,” Latham said.

Specific details pertaining to the lawsuit will become available once the lawsuit is filed, Latham said.