Vicksburg Auditorium officially changes hands Tuesday — back to the city — in a short ceremony in the circuit clerk’s office.
Mayor George Flaggs Jr. confirmed the auditorium transfer on Friday. Secretary of State Delbert Hosemann will perform the transfer after employees of his office will train the interim circuit clerk, according to an email from Hosemann’s office earlier in the day.
The Warren County Board of Supervisors appointed Greg Peltz, a retired retail manager, to the position Monday hours after declaring the office vacant.
The facility on Monroe Street was built in 1956 and was deeded to the state in 1985 through an interlocal agreement with the Mississippi Commission on Natural Resources to take advantage of $1.15 million in state bond money to upgrade the facility.
The money was earmarked 13 years earlier for the steamboat Sprague.
An agreement expired in 2010, but the deed remained in the state’s hands until an act of the Legislature this past March to transfer it.
Until 2013, the building was managed by Ames, Iowa-based VenuWorks, which has the contract to operate the Vicksburg Convention Center.
The city resumed management of the auditorium in October under a new contract with VenuWorks.
Transferring the structure back to the city is a key step in refurbishing the venue’s wheelchair accessibility, as well as other renovations, city officials have said.