[03/23/01] The mayor of Greenville, where the Sportsman’s Association of Black Bass Anglers tournament was based for the past two years, praised the organizers, but said $40,000 was too much for the event.

Last May, the City of Greenville allocated $6,000 to sponsor the same contest that Vicksburg officials voted Monday to allocate $40,000 to bring here. Greenville Mayor Paul Artman said the tournament was a substantial impact on the economy, but that the 42,000 taxpayers there would not have spent as much.

“One entity would have had a hard time putting that kind of money into it,” Artman said. “Our budget would not have allowed that.”

According to Census 2000 figures, the population of Vicksburg is 26,407.

The year before, Washington County’s equivalent of the Vicksburg Convention and Visitors Bureau spent more than $16,000 on the fishing event, the largest part for participants’ lodging and food.

Monday’s 2-1 decision by the Vicksburg Mayor and Aldermen to spend more than three times the city’s whole annual advertising budget to bring the tournament here has prompted mixed reaction. Some have said the money will be recouped during the weeklong competition; others have expressed dismay, some of it centering on the fact that the club is for black fishermen.

Organizers for the Decatur, Ga., based group said they expect about 400 participants in the Memorial Day event with an economic impact of about $1.2 million.

Although Artman could not say what financial impact the tourney had in Greenville, he said he was disappointed his city was not asked to sponsor SABBA again this year.

“We would certainly be glad to work with them again, but we just did not get the opportunity,” he said.

Louic Nell, sales director for the Greenville Washington County Visitors Bureau, said checks for a total of $16,814 were written by the bureau to pay SABBA expenses for the 1999 event and his bureau did not fund the event in 2000.

More than $7,000 of the total went to the Greenville Ramada Inn for rooms, and other large checks went to suppliers of fish and bait for a youth event. The rest was spent on food, lie-detector tests for participants and about $900 was spent on advertising.

Vicksburg officials have said that the $40,000 to bring the tournament here will be used for advertising in the organization’s national magazine and on the Internet. The funds are coming from the Vicksburg Convention Center’s budget, although the center will not be available for any SABBA events.

“It drew a lot of kids,” Nell said. “But they want a whole lot of money.”

Al Elmore, director of tourism at the Vicksburg Convention and Visitors Bureau, said his office was asked to help sponsor the SABBA tournament, but did not for financial reasons.

While the organization identifies itself as one for black people, membership is open to whites. But to be eligible to fish in the Mississippi River here as planned and compete for prizes, a person would have had to have been a member for a year and fish in an April 8 qualifying tournament.

Of the four local members of the fishing group, two were donors to 1997 political campaigns of Mayor Robert Walker and North Ward Alderman Gertrude Young who are seeking re-election this year.