The Selma City Council approved a contract Tuesday that will allow an engineering firm to study the bank of the Alabama River and find out what is causing it to erode.

The contract was signed with Volkert Inc. and will cost the city a pretty penny in the form of $78,000. With Selma’s aging infrastructure and the numerous buildings that line the banks of the river, it’s important for the city to do its due diligence.

Erosion isn’t a process that happens in the blink of an eye. Rather, it’s the breaking down of the soil over years and years, but it is slowly turning into a big problem.

The city deserves credit for getting the jump on this issue while it still can. Nobody wants to see a building drop off into the river and right now there’s probably still time to ensure that doesn’t happen.

Selma has invested heavily into its riverfront, especially when it comes to the new amphitheater, where construction should be completed in the coming weeks. The hope was that work on the riverfront would increase tourism and give Selma a unique spot to hold special events.

It makes a lot of sense. Most cities aren’t lucky enough to have a river running through them. Along with the Edmund Pettus Bridge, the Alabama River is one of Selma’s most valuable tourism resources, so the city does need to take advantage of it.

But that’s also why it makes sense to find out what is causing the erosion problem.

The erosion may not seem like a big concern today compared with other more prominent issues, like finding a garbage management company by January or the future of the St. James Hotel, but it’s important to deal with it now. If we don’t, it could be a gigantic issue in the future.

As the old adage goes, it’s better to be safe than sorry.