For the first time in years, state leaders have voted to increase the amount of tax credits available to Mississippians who donate to private schools. 

The Children’s Promise Act program currently allows people to claim up to $18 million in tax credits in total. Under a bill headed to the governor, that state would instead allow people to claim up to $24 million in tax credits starting in 2027.

Since 2020, private schools and foster care organizations have been receiving money through the Children’s Promise Act, which gives donors dollar-for-dollar tax credits for up to 50% of the donor’s state tax liability. 

House Ways and Means Chairman Trey Lamar, a Republican from Senatobia, originally touted the program as a way to give money to nonprofit organizations that care for foster children, but a provision to give tax credits to private-school donors was tucked into the bill when it was passed in 2019.

READ MORE: School choice dead in the Legislature, but private school tax credit bills alive

House Bill 1944, which passed the House and Senate this week, would change the buckets of money available to different organizations, giving private-school donors access to more tax credits. 

Under current law, half of the program’s tax credits, up to $9 million, are earmarked for people and organizations that donate to foster care service organizations. The other $9 million in tax credits are available to donors to private or special purpose schools that have any students in the foster care system, students with chronic illnesses or disabilities or students who are eligible for free or reduced-price meals.

But if Gov. Tate Reeves signs HB 1944, one of the $9 million buckets would be entirely available to private-school donors because the legislation separates the schools in the second category and gives special purpose schools access to a new pot of tax credits up to $6 million. 

That means next year, nonprofit foster care organizations would be eligible for $9 million, private schools would be eligible for $9 million and special purpose schools would be eligible for $6 million.

Though Lamar’s attempt to substantially increase the cap on the program failed this year — as it has in previous years — this is the first time money has been added to the program since 2022, in large part to advocates who have rallied against the program. Opponents say the program is an indirect way for the state to funnel tax dollars to private schools.

People who distribute, or intend to distribute, abortion-inducing medication in Mississippi could face a criminal charge and up to 10 years in prison if convicted, under a bill lawmakers are sending to Republican Gov. Tate Reeves. 

Experts say criminalization could lock up desperate Mississippians and scare doctors away from prescribing these medications in clinical settings for non-abortion purposes, such as stopping postpartum hemorrhaging and easing symptoms of miscarriages. 

Lawmakers added restrictions on abortion-inducing drugs to a drug trafficking bill that passed the House 76-38 and the Senate 37-15 on Tuesday. Republicans control both chambers. 

“I think we’re going to end up trapping a lot of people into the criminal justice system simply because they want to have autonomy over their own bodies,” said Rep. Zakiya Summers, a Democrat from Jackson, who voted against the bill. 

Rep. Celeste Hurst, a Republican from Sandhill, said she introduced this amendment to keep abortion medication, such as mifepristone and misoprostol, from entering Mississippi. 

“The intent is to keep doctors from out of state from circumventing our current law,” Hurst told Mississippi Today. 

But there is virtually no way for Mississippi to prosecute providers who send abortion pills across state lines, according to Mary Ziegler, an expert on abortion law and a professor at University of California at Davis School of Law. Shield laws in states where abortion is legal protect abortion providers, patients and helpers from out-of-state investigations, lawsuits and prosecutions, Ziegler told Mississippi Today. 

“I think lawmakers are imagining this will be primarily used against doctors or drug manufacturers in blue states,” Ziegler said. “But it will be much harder for prosecutors to actually get those people into court than it will be for them to get someone whose partner has these drugs.”

What makes the legislation especially harmful, Ziegler said, is its vagueness. The bill says possession would only be criminal if there were an intent to distribute, but Ziegler expects Mississippians using the drugs for their own purposes could be prosecuted. 

Language around clinical settings is also vague. The bill says Mississippi providers would only be prosecuted if they prescribed abortion-inducing medication with the intent to cause an abortion, not in instances where those drugs are prescribed to aid in a miscarriage or stop hemorrhaging. Despite this exemption, the bill is sure to have a chilling effect on health care, Ziegler said. 

In both cases, Ziegler said, “the differentiator is intent, which is really, really hard to prove.”

This kind of legislation primarily comes down to the fact that abortion opponents are disappointed that abortions have increased in recent years, Ziegler said.  

In 2022, the Supreme Court’s Dobbs decision, in a Mississippi case, overturned the constitutional protections around the right to abortion. At the time, it was considered a huge victory for the anti-abortion movement. But abortions have paradoxically increased across the nation in the years since then, largely due to increased access to mail-in abortion medication. 

“That’s kind of a hollow thing for the state if that happens and then the number of abortions doesn’t go down,” Ziegler said. “It’s like, what did you really accomplish?”

Sen. Daniel Sparks, a Republican from Belmont and one of six lawmakers who hashed out the final details of the legislation, told Mississippi Today he supported the amendment as a way to enforce Mississippi’s abortion ban.

“The state of Mississippi has been pretty clear of where they are about their pro-life position,” Sparks said. “If people are circumventing that through the mail or through other mechanisms, then I think we’re trying to be consistent with what the law is.”

Sen. Bradford Blackmon, a Democrat from Canton who voted against the bill, said it’s “outrageous,” “ridiculous” and “unnecessary” to lump abortion medication in with scheduled drugs and allow the state to enforce imprisonment of one to 10 years for the offense. In the end, Blackmon said, it’s just going to hurt poor women. 

“The wealthy Mississippians are still going to be able to go where they want to get abortions,” Blackmon said.

Retired Circuit Judge Bob Helfrich died Tuesday. He was 72.

Helfrich was known best for his role prosecuting Sam Bowers, the imperial wizard for the White Knights of the Ku Klux Klan, in the 1966 killing of NAACP leader Vernon Dahmer Sr. in Hattiesburg.

The White Knights was the most violent white supremacist organization in the 1960s.

Before Bowers went to trial in 1998, Helfrich told reporters, ‘‘Justice was never served the first time. It’s time justice was done.’’

The first trial had led to a few convictions, but the klansmen didn’t stay behind bars long because governors pardoned them, commuted their sentences or released them early. Most of the killers walked free, including Bowers.

Thirty-two years after the fact, Bowers went on trial for ordering the killing of Dahmer, who died after defending his family from klansmen who fired into the family home and set it on fire.

READ ALSO: Son like father: Vernon Dahmer Jr. was a patriot

Dennis Dahmer was 12 years old when the attack took place on Jan. 10, 1966. That same year, Helfrich watched his dad die from lung cancer. He, too, was 12.

“That’s why I feel close to the Dahmer family,” Helfrich said then. “I was there when my dad died, there till his last breath.”

Days before the August 1998 trial began, his voice broke with emotion as he spoke about the family. “I cannot imagine the thoughts that go through their minds,” he said.

Dennis Dahmer described his relationship with Helfrich as a close one. “We both talked about our shared experience of losing our fathers during adolescence,” he said.

In his closing statement, defense lawyer Travis Buckley claimed that Bowers was being persecuted, comparing it to Adolf Hitler’s propaganda campaign against Jews.

Helfrich told jurors that Bowers ordered klansmen to kill Dahmer, just like Hitler ordered his henchmen to kill millions of Jews. “Did Hitler do it? No. Was Hitler responsible? Yes. And what do we have here?” Helfrich said as he pointed at Bowers. “Let’s talk about Hitler. Let’s talk about an evil genius sitting right there.”

A jury convicted Bowers, and the judge sentenced him to life in prison, where he died in 2006.

“The Dahmer family will always be grateful for the decision made by District Attorney Lindsay Carter and then-prosecutor Bob Helfrich to reopen the civil rights murder case of Vernon F. Dahmer Sr.,” Dennis Dahmer said.

Yes, he said, it was “a risky political decision to make, but it was the right thing to do. Justice delayed is better than justice denied!”

Five years after that conviction, Helfrich was sworn in as a circuit judge. Dahmer’s daughter, Bettie, declared, “It’s a new day for justice in Forrest and Perry County.”

Helfrich became one of the first group of judges to utilize drug courts in Mississippi. Those courts make it possible for those battling drug problems to reverse convictions after completing a recovery program.

In 2006, he threw out the burglary conviction of Black Korean War veteran Clyde Kennard, who was railroaded in 1960 after he tried to enroll at the then-all-white college now known as the University of Southern Mississippi.

Kennard was sentenced to seven years in prison and was released in 1963 after officials at Parchman prison discovered he was dying of cancer. The lone witness recanted his testimony, saying Kennard had done nothing wrong.

“Because this matter did begin here, it should end here,” Helfrich said. “This is not a black and white issue; it’s a right and wrong issue. To correct that wrong, I am compelled to do the right thing.”

in a statement Wednesday, Mississippi Supreme Court Chief Justice Mike Randolph said Helfrich “developed a deep commitment to drug courts, and the former participants held him in the highest regard. … He went on to lead one of the most respected drug courts in the state. Judge Helfrich was appointed multiple times by the Chief Justice of the Supreme Court of Mississippi to serve on the State Intervention Court Advisory Council, and he assisted and counseled all of the state’s trial judges.”

Helfrich retired last year, and Gov. Tate Reeves appointed Hattiesburg attorney Thomas “Michael” Reed to take Helfrich’s place until the term expires in 2028.

Devery Anderson, author of the book “A Slow, Calculated Lynching: The Story of Clyde Kennard,” said the passion and resolve that Helfrich “mustered in prosecuting the mastermind behind the 1966 murder of Vernon Dahmer tells you everything you need to know about him.”

His exoneration of Kennard demonstrates that Helfrich “was always willing to do the right thing — let the consequence follow,” Anderson said. “He will long be revered in Mississippi law for these and a host of other reasons.”

Update 4/1/26: This story has been updated to include a statement from Mississippi chief justice, Mike Randolph.

So much to talk about: Mo Williams to Kentucky, Mississippi State’s baseball excellence, Tiger Woods’ errant drives, Warner Alford, the Final Fours, some Saints news, and Rick’s gumbo.

Stream all episodes here.

Opioid Settlement Fund Advisory council member Greg Spore was hopeful when reviewing applications last fall from organizations looking to prevent and address addiction in Mississippi.

As someone who struggled with addiction for years, Spore thought the tens of millions of lawsuit dollars the state Legislature tasked the council with overseeing could help make the resources that have helped him maintain long-term recovery. He saw some plans to do that in some of the applications he and others were reviewing. 

“I’m optimistic,” he told Mississippi Today in October. “Because I think I have to be optimistic.”

That optimism mostly faded after last weekend, when he found out the Legislature had drastically altered the advisory council’s recommendations.

“I’m really just dumbfounded,” Spore said Monday. “I’m just sort of stumped.”

It’s not that he thought the advisory council was flawless. Spore saw and spoke up against council problems when they arose — such as the body favoring applications members were associated with and high variance in the scoring of applications between different subcommittee groups. And it’s not that he isn’t happy with some of the Legislature’s proposed funding decisions.

But lawmakers went further in changing spending plans for tens of millions of opioid settlement dollars than some councilmembers like Spore thought they could. These changes included sending money to groups that had never applied through the advisory council’s application process, according to the council’s public documents.

“We were just sort of stripped of any input, any vetting we had done,” he said. 

Spore is among other opioid overdose prevention advocates and people who’ve struggled with addiction across Mississippi and the country who expressed concern over the Legislature’s recent moves. They worry about lawmakers bypassing advisory council recommendations in its first opioid settlement distributions, misspending money instead of addressing addiction.

The plan lawmakers released goes against what the Mississippi state code they created last year instructs them to do — only accept or reject changes. Seven budget bills show the Legislature plans to change the recommended amounts of money each applicant receives and even some money to groups that never applied for funds.

Lawmakers changed the Department of Mental Health’s spending bill Monday to replace the agency with Oceans Healthcare, an organization that did apply for opioid settlement money, as the recipient of a $4 million grant to address maternal substance use disorder. The bill’s new version also sends $1 million to South Central Regional Medical Center in Laurel to fund its application.

But there are still other appropriations using money the council oversees for proposals it never reviewed. Lawmakers plan to send the Department of Employment Security $1 million for a new recovery-to-work program, and $4.5 million to community mental health centers for general care purposes. The $4.5 million appropriation is similar to what the Department of Mental Health requested in January in general funds for the organizations. 

Lawmakers sent a bill to Gov. Tate Reeves Sunday to let the Legislature change funding amounts from the advisory council’s recommendations. But neither the current opioid settlement laws or the proposed changes instruct the Legislature to appropriate funds that must be spent to address addiction without the council’s review. 

Republican Senate Judiciary A Chairman Brice Wiggins, who has been involved in this year’s opioid settlement distribution process, told Mississippi Today on Monday lawmakers had the right to make the appropriations the way it did.

“The Legislature changes laws every year and amends laws every year and does that,” the Pascagoula lawmaker said. “It’s all legal. So whatever Mississippi Today’s interpretation is, I defer to lawyers and constitutional scholars.”

He later posted on his Facebook page thanking the advisory council for its work while saying that “stewarding these funds remains the Legislature’s responsibility.”

After reviewing the 2026 opioid settlement bill, Matt Steffey, a constitutional law professor at Mississippi College, said the new proposed language still reads like the advisory council review process is necessary for spending the national lawsuits required to be used for overdose prevention. 

He said it’s hard to see how bypassing the council would follow the law’s stated goal “to ensure public involvement, accountability and transparency in allocating and accounting for the monies in the fund.”

MaryAsa Lee, spokesperson for Attorney General and Advisory Council Chair Lynn Fitch, did not respond to an emailed question about Fitch’s thoughts on lawmakers going outside the council applications in their abatement funding decisions.

The state’s Supreme Court has ruled that lawmakers control money the state wins in lawsuits, and Steffey said he didn’t know if someone would have legal standing to challenge these appropriations in court. But he said just because the Legislature may be able to do that doesn’t mean they should. 

“It certainly shouldn’t set up a year-long process and then ignore it,” Steffey said. “If the Legislature sets up a process, the citizens should be able to expect the Legislature to then abide it and honor it.” 

The 2026 bill requires the advisory council to contract with a consultant to improve the opioid settlement distribution process, which council member James Moore called for last year. Moore has worked to prevent overdoses throughout Mississippi since his son fatally overdosed 11 years ago. 

Seeing how the Legislature considered the council’s work, Moore worries whether a consulting group’s work would be treated similarly.

“Would those same legislators have any motivation to accept the recommendations from an out-of-state agency skilled in grant application reviews?” He asked in an email to Mississippi Today.

Tricia Christensen, an independent drug policy consultant in Tennessee, said the Legislature could further shut out Mississippians with the most expertise in how best to prevent more overdoses. Mississippi is one of the few states where there are no opportunities for people without political connections to offer public testimony. 

“If the Legislature holds all the power, there will be even less ability for community members and subject matter experts to apply for or help influence how funds are spent,” Christensen said in a text message to Mississippi Today. 

Lawmakers in other states have also sought to supersede opioid settlement advisory councils. Regina LaBelle, the country’s former top drug policy official and the director of Georgetown Law’s Center on Addiction and Public Policy, said it could be tempting to soon use legislative power to backfill impending Medicaid funding cuts and other federal health addiction grants.

But the settlement funds are limited, and hundreds of Mississippians continue to overdose every year.

“It’s not forever,” she said. “And it’s not a ton.” 

Two bills that would have allowed lawmakers to make Mississippi’s state Supreme Court districts fairer for Black voters died with a Monday night deadline, likely guaranteeing a federal judge will redraw the maps. 

While the House and Senate could not reach agreement on redrawing the three court districts, lawmakers on Tuesday debated and passed numerous other bills, hoping to end their 2026 regular session by Thursday. On Monday night, legislators had finished crafting a nearly $7.4-billion state budget for the fiscal year that begins July 1.

READ MORE: Ed spending, special projects, PBMs and PERS: Lawmakers trying to wrap up 2026 session

The legislative wrangling over the state’s high court districts stems from U.S. District Judge Sharion Aycock’s ruling last year that the districts in the northern, central and southern parts of the state violate the federal Voting Rights Act because they do not allow Black voters in one area a fair chance to elect a candidate of their choice. 

Senate Judiciary A Chairman Brice Wiggins, a Republican from Pascagoula, said he believes that pending appeals related to the litigation and other court decisions involving redistricting played a role in the Legislature not redrawing the districts. 

The American Civil Liberties Union, the ACLU of Mississippi, the Southern Poverty Law Center and private law firms on behalf of a group of Black Mississippians filed a lawsuit under the Voting Rights Act against the state over the Supreme Court districts. 

Judge Aycock in Mississippi ruled in favor of the plaintiffs, but the state defendants asked the 5th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals to overturn her decision. The state did not ask Aycock to pause lower-court proceedings while the appeal played out. 

The 5th Circuit, however, did pause its appellate proceedings until the U.S. Supreme Court hands down its decision in a Louisiana case that many expect will gut much of the federal Voting Rights Act, and allow states more free rein in redistricting. 

If Mississippi lawmakers redraw the Mississippi Supreme Court districts, it would be the first time lawmakers have redrawn them since 1987. 

Current state law establishes three distinct Supreme Court districts, commonly referred to as the Northern, Central and Southern districts. Voters elect three judges from each of these districts to make up the nine-member court. 

The main district at issue in the case is the Central District, which comprises many parts of the majority-Black Delta and the majority-Black Jackson Metro area. Currently, two white justices, Kenny Griffis and Jenifer Branning, and one Black justice, Leslie King, represent the district. 

No Black person has ever been elected to the Mississippi Supreme Court, in the state with the highest percentage of Black residents, without first obtaining an interim appointment from the governor, and no Black person from either of the two other districts has ever served on the state’s high court. 

Jarvis Dortch, executive director of the ACLU of Mississippi, told Mississippi Today in a statement that since a federal judge concluded that Supreme Court districts are shaped in a way that prevents Black voters from having a chance to elect a candidate of their choice, he is disappointed lawmakers chose not to remedy the map. 

“The federal court gave the Mississippi Legislature an opportunity to correct those discriminatory districts,” Dortch said. “Lawmakers chose not to. Their inaction is further evidence that this country still needs the protections of the Voting Rights Act.”

Aycock, in a December order, wrote that if the Legislature ends its session without adopting a new map, attorneys are required to provide a formal notice to her within seven days after the end of the session. After receiving notice, she will meet with attorneys to discuss the next steps in the litigation.

The 2026 legislative session, now set to draw to a close, has seen much infighting between Republican House and Senate leaders, and each chamber has killed many of the other’s major proposals. Some highlights from Tuesday’s deliberations:

Bills increasing state role in immigration sent to governor

Both chambers approved the negotiated version of bills on Tuesday that would increase Mississippi’s role in enforcing federal immigration law and force local law enforcement agencies to assist U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement.  

Republican lawmakers voted in near party-line votes to send SB 2114 and HB 538 to Republican Gov. Tate Reeves for his consideration. Republicans said the bills would enhance public safety and hold people accountable for violating immigration laws, while Democrats raised concerns that the federal government is responsible for enforcement and that the proposals would leave counties on the hook for paying to incarcerate undocumented immigrants. 

“We didn’t have enough money for infrastructure, we didn’t have enough money for childcare, but clearly we have enough money to hold people in jail or in prison because we are so concerned about so-called illegal aliens committing crimes in the state of Mississippi,” said Rep. Zakiya Summers, a Democrat from Jackson.

SB 2114 makes it a state misdemeanor to enter Mississippi from another country outside a legal port of entry, creating a minimum penalty of six months in prison. Illegal immigration is already a federal crime, but this measure also would make it a state-level crime in Mississippi. 

Under the measure, if undocumented people are also convicted of other crimes, they would have a minimum of two additional years added to their sentence. Rep. Joey Hood, a Republican from Ackerman, said the provision is necessary to deter undocumented people from committing crimes against Mississippians. 

Other provisions in the legislation include letting the Department of Public Safety collect data on undocumented immigrants living in Mississippi and directing state and local law enforcement agencies to enter into agreements with federal Immigration and Customs Enforcement to carry out immigration raids. The state attorney general’s office could investigate agencies accused of failing to cooperate with federal immigration authorities. 

HB 538 would ban “sanctuary” policies across Mississippi by preventing any state entities from adopting policies that limit cooperation with federal immigration authorities. It would also require these entities to share information about individuals’ immigration status and to honor ICE detainer requests. It gives the state attorney general’s office the authority to investigate and sue agencies or officials who don’t comply with the measure. 

Last-minute negotiations on education policies

Though lawmakers appeared to reach an agreement on a teacher pay raise earlier this week, the legislation was sent for further negotiation Tuesday and changed to include a provision similar to the bill’s original language about school counselors. 

Amid the teacher pay raise debate, the original language in SB 2103 was stripped. The bill, authored by Republican Sen. Angela Burks Hill of Picayune, would have removed the requirement that Mississippi school counselors follow the American School Counselor Association’s code of ethics. 

The amendment added Tuesday would allow the Mississippi Department of Education to come up with an ethics policy for Mississippi school counselors to follow, according to Senate Education Chairman Dennis DeBar, a Republican from Leakesville.

“We trust the department to make good, sound judgment when they do so,” he said. 

Hill said there’s “no reason” that the state’s counselors should be required to commit to a national code of ethics from what she described as a “social justice activist organization.” The group represents about 43,000 school counselors, and focuses on providing professional development and supporting counselors, according to the organization’s website. 

Hill said her concerns are rooted in keeping parents in-the-know about their children. 

“Some of the platforms that the ASCA has are basically affirmation of gender confusion and fluidity, and they have a balance between students’ rights and parental rights,” she said. “So that’s a concern because if that’s going on, a parent needs to know it.”

While the latest version of the bill does not appear to require counselors to tell parents about changes with their students, policies in other states that require schools to notify parents if their children change their gender identification or pronouns have come under fire and brought litigation.

Both chambers filed the new version of the bill on Tuesday and a full vote is pending. 

Winter Storm Fern bills passed

The Legislature has passed two bills on to the governor that would help fund recovery from Winter Storm Fern.

Both chambers adopted SB 3104, which would give various agencies over $122 million from the state’s Capital Expense Fund. The largest appropriation provides $20 million for the Mississippi Emergency Management Agency for disaster recovery, including Winter Storm Fern. 

On Sunday, lawmakers passed SB 3229 to allow the state to borrow money to help Entergy defray the cost of repairs to its power system from the storm. The storm is estimated to have caused over $200 million in damages to Mississippi’s largest energy provider. 

Legislators have said that the state is able to borrow money at a lower rate than Entergy would, and that by loaning the money to Entergy they can help prevent large rate hikes for customers to repair damages. The bill is similar to one that was passed for Mississippi Power Company after Hurricane Katrina caused widespread damage to its system in 2005.

More than a dozen school districts have to address problems ranging from poor recordkeeping and significant debt to dysfunctional leadership — issues that might otherwise fly under the radar of local communities until they become too severe to ignore. 

The districts each have a downgraded accreditation status, and they must act on plans to resolve the violations state education officials cited. The state Board of Education approved those corrective action plans earlier this month.

Most of the district’s violations stem from late financial audits, poor recordkeeping and fiscal mismanagement. Some districts, including Hazlehurst, North Bolivar and Jackson Public Schools, have been on probation for nearly a decade for failing to clear accreditation violations.

Two of the districts, North Bolivar and Hazlehurst, face a possible state takeover or an unannounced investigative audit of all district records if they can’t clear accreditation violations by the end of the year. State department officials found that the districts didn’t make meaningful progress toward clearing outstanding violations. 

The Mississippi Department of Education will monitor the other 12 districts on probation for compliance with agency policies as well as state and federal law. 

Education Department officials have been dissatisfied with the districts’ progress toward ensuring student safety, complying with federal civil rights law, complying with graduation requirements outlined in state law and record management, among other findings.

Regulators also took issue with past dysfunctional leadership in Hazlehurst, North Bolivar and Jackson Public Schools. In 2025, the agency took issue with governance violations by Greenwood-Leflore Consolidated School District, where board members hired a superintendent without properly advertising the position. Agency inspectors also noted testing irregularities at Moorhead Central School and A.W. James Elementary, two schools in the Sunflower County Consolidated School District based out of Indianola.

The agency has also received confidential complaints from JPS teachers and administrators accusing school board members of getting involved in the district’s day-to-day operations, including student discipline. An inspection of Hazlehurst’s board found that board policies weren’t regularly reviewed, with inconsistencies in student handbooks regarding promotion and retention of students.

Other findings can sometimes be bellwethers for future state takeovers.

The accreditation status for Okolona Separate School District, which the state took over in November, has been probation for two years over the past decade because of poorly run special education and gifted programs. Officials cited Wilkinson County School District, which the state took over in January, for violations stemming from unlicensed teachers and poor school board governance in six years over the past 10 prior to its 2025 takeover because of students’ persistent low performance on state tests.

North Bolivar alternative school students get shorted on instructional time

Besides citations for poor recordkeeping, not tracking staffs’ work hours and fiscal management, the Education Department also cited North Bolivar schools over the quality of its alternative school. 

An inspector from the Education Department noted that a paraprofessional, and not a licensed teacher, was supervising an alternative school class in 2024. The class met in a room of Northside High that includes a kitchen, which district officials implied was not conducive to learning. State department officials found that no instruction had transpired during one visit and during another, students received 10 minutes or less of instruction.

State department inspectors couldn’t find progress reports for some alternative school students. Disciplinary histories and other documents that track student behavior were missing from files, too. Inspectors also could not locate documentation that outlined due process hearings for students.

North Bolivar Consolidated School District enrolls students from Mound Bayou, Shelby, Duncan and surrounding communities. None of those communities have more than 2,000 residents. They all lost at least a tenth of their population in the last decade. It’s hard to recruit enough teachers to fully staff every department, Superintendent Jeremiah Burks said. It’s particularly difficult to recruit teachers for the alternative school, he said.

Burks is pushing for a contract with Grade Results, a company that sells online courses.

Burks said he plans to move the alternative school to a better location in the district, one that complies with agency standards and provides adequate separation from general education students. He said he has assembled record review teams tasked with checking student records for missing reports or other documentation. 

With future inspections, state officials will observe a more organized school district with significant progress made to reform its alternative school, Burks said.

“We took to heart (MDE’s) suggestions, and we have been implementing new plans,” Burks said. “I feel good about where we are with addressing the standards. It’s just a matter of putting everything together and formalizing it, so that we can review where we are.”

Greenville and Natchez-Adams school districts struggle to budget

Education Department regulators found bad budgeting in Greenville and Natchez-Adams school districts Millions of dollars were unaccounted for in district ledgers maintained by the two school districts.

With Greenville, district ledgers left out more obscure funds like the Quality School Construction Bond sinking fund, which is devoted to construction projects and requires regular payments by school districts. 

Greenville owed vendors $79,737 and declared it had $869,692 more in their account than it did. 

The Greenville school board hired Ilean Richards as superintendent in January 2025. Local leaders say they are optimistic about better fiscal management in subsequent years. 

“The district is committed to and currently working to ensure that these deficiencies are corrected from previous years of past administrations,” district spokesperson Everett Chinn said in a statement.

Chinn did not respond to additional questions about what specific steps district leaders have taken to improve accounting practices. He also did not answer whether the district has mandated supplementary or requested technical assistance from the Education Department or another agency.

Natchez-Adams School District’s main operating fund reached an over $1.3 million deficit, according to its fiscal year 2022 audit. State law forbids school district officials from spending more resources than are available. Natchez-Adams also failed to submit its fiscal year 2024 audit within nine months of the end of the fiscal year.

In the Carroll County School District and in Natchez-Adams, a fund that set money aside for special education services had a negative balance. From fiscal year 2018-22, Carroll County struggled to balance its budget, pay down loans and correctly account for each fund’s balance. Its accounting paperwork was also missing the correct amounts for money owed.

Other districts, including North Bolivar, struggled to reconcile spending with purchasing and account for fixed assets like copiers, printers and other on-site technology in reports. Vicksburg-Warren School District, Greenwood-Leflore and East Tallahatchie had balance funds that were improperly stated.

In January, the state Department of Education’s Office of School Financial Services agreed to increase its availability to school districts that need technical assistance.

“There is such a profound lack of skilled persons to do that work,” Kym Wiggins, chief operating officer at the state Department of Education, said at a January state Board of Education meeting. “There’s a tremendous need for capable assistance, and so we’re trying to figure out here in office how we can build the infrastructure here to provide the support at the district level.”

More districts have already reached out for assistance, Wiggins said at the March board meeting.

WASHINGTON — The U.S. Supreme Court on Tuesday seemed likely to rule for a Black death row inmate from Mississippi who claims there was racial bias in the makeup of the jury that convicted him.

The justices took up an appeal from Terry Pitchford in a case with similarities to that of another Black man on Mississippi’s death row, whose conviction the high court overturned seven years ago.

The jury that sentenced Pitchford to death for his role in the killing of a grocery store owner in northern Mississippi had one Black juror. Doug Evans, a now-retired prosecutor with a history of dismissing Black jurors for discriminatory reasons, had excused four other Black people.

The Supreme Court ruled 40 years ago in Batson v. Kentucky that jurors could not be excused from service because of their race and set up a system by which trial judges could evaluate claims of discrimination and the race-neutral explanations by prosecutors.

Pitchford’s case focuses on whether his lawyers did enough to object to Judge Joseph Loper’s rulings and whether the state Supreme Court acted reasonably in ruling they had not.

Justice Brett Kavanaugh said he thought one of Pitchford’s lawyers had spoken up. Reading from the trial transcript, Kavanaugh said, “She’s trying to make the objections right there.”

There was broad agreement that neither the judge nor the lawyers performed especially well when the jury was chosen.

“This is the most timid and reticent defense counsel that I have ever encountered,” Justice Samuel Alito said.

But Alito also faulted Loper, who accepted Evans’ explanations and moved on without analyzing whether race was the reason.

“The judge didn’t handle this the way it should have been handled,” Alito said.

In 2019 in another Misissippi case, the Supreme Court overturned the death sentence and conviction of Curtis Flowers, because of what Kavanaugh described as a “relentless, determined effort to rid the jury of Black individuals.”

Mississippi Solicitor General Scott Stewart sought to distinguish Pitchford’s case from Flowers’.

“In Flowers versus Mississippi, this Court faced an extraordinary case and ruled against the state,” Stewart said. “This case is also extraordinary but in a very different way that requires a very different result.”

The Supreme Court could rule for Pitchford but still leave it to lower courts to sort out whether his conviction should be overturned.

Pitchford, now 40, was 18 when he and a friend decided to rob the Crossroads Grocery, just outside Grenada in northern Mississippi. The friend shot store owner Reuben Britt three times, fatally wounding him, but was ineligible for the death penalty because he was younger than 18. Pitchford was tried for capital murder and sentenced to death.

The case has been making its way through the court system for 20 years. In 2023, U.S District Judge Michael P. Mills overturned Pitchford’s conviction, holding that the trial judge did not give Pitchford’s lawyers enough of a chance to argue that the prosecution was improperly dismissing Black jurors.

Mills wrote that his ruling was partially motivated by Evans’ actions in prior cases. A unanimous panel of the 5th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals reversed the ruling.

Kavanaugh, in an exchange with Stewart, praised Mills’ handling of the case.

“Mills is a very experienced district judge. He had been a former Mississippi Supreme Court justice. He knows what he’s doing,” Kavanaugh said. “He read the record entirely differently than you did.”

J. Janice Coleman is an English professor at Alcorn State University and is known as a seamstress who often incorporates history and colorful designs into her quilts, tote bags and other works.

Her textile art has been featured at multiple locations, including the Mississippi Museum of Art and at the National Folk Life Festival, both in Jackson. She has been honored by the Mississippi Humanities Council and was commissioned to create a work honoring Mississippi Civil Rights icon Fannie Lou Hamer by the Mississippi Arts Commission.

Mississippi Today Ideas thought it was appropriate to highlight Coleman and Hamer during March – Women’s History Month.

Note: This interview has been edited for length and clarity.

Mississippi Today Ideas – I appreciate you being here. Talk about your, I wanna call it art. I think it is art. Give us the background of how all this, your work, came about? How did you learn to quilt? And talk about what you do now.

J. Janice Coleman – OK. I learned to sew when I was very young. Of course, I don’t have an exact day and time, but I can date it from the time that we were in the house that we were living in before we built a new house. So that was about, I guess I might have been 6 or 7 years old then.

MT Ideas – And, where was that?

Coleman – In Mound Bayou. And  I remember sewing then. Now, I wasn’t making quilts, I wasn’t making dresses. As a matter of fact, I was making purses or pocketbooks.

I would take a piece of fabric and fold in half on the wrong side. One of the major rules of quilting is that you keep the right sides together. OK, see, I’m almost through with this thing. This is going to be a pocketbook in a few seconds. 

So as a child, I would  get old sheets or old items, old items of clothing and just cut some pieces, blocks or whatever.

Mt Ideas – And, y’all were a farm family? 

Coleman – We were a farm family, yes. 

MT Ideas – So your mother was the person who taught you?

Coleman – I would say yes. She was a seamstress. 

If you look at the works in my exhibit, you will see I still sew according to the same pattern. The first exhibit I had was entitled “Quilts and Other Quadrilaterals.” Everything here is a quadrilateral, whether it’s a quilt or a cotton sack, or a tote bag or whatever. So I never strayed from my basic pattern, but within this basic pattern I can put triangles, circles, oblongs, whatever, but I stick with the basic pattern, the square or the rectangle. A quadrilateral. That’s my pattern. 

MT Ideas – So many of your projects have a historical perspective. How did you come up with wanting to be historical in your work and your art? 

Coleman – Well, it developed over time, and I think it developed before I even had an awareness of it. Because even the sacks are based on family history. I grew up in a farm family. We lived on the farm.

I’ve picked cotton, chopped cotton, picked cucumbers, purple hull peas. I’ve done all of that stuff. May I show my cotton sack? 

MT Ideas – Yes, ma’am. 

Coleman – On the farm, the cotton sack was the only textile that I could recreate. I could not recreate a tractor. I could not recreate a cucumber basket. I could not recreate a plow or any of those things, but I could recreate this cotton sack because it’s fabric. And so when I was at Mississippi State last year, I took my exhibit titled “The Cotton Sack Reimagined, Repurposed, Revolutionized,” and any cotton sack that’s got quilt panels all over it is revolutionized, is repurposed, is reimagined. I was trying to redo this, you know, this drab cotton sack.

This is a very functional thing, but my cotton sacks are not, well, they might be functional. They might be. We might say they are. They represent decor. They do not go to the cotton fields. They go to conferences. They go to colleges. They go to exhibits. They go to museums. That’s where my cotton sacks go.

MT Ideas – When I was a small boy growing up in rural Jones County, my mother and her sisters would get together on our porch and quilt. But there would be several of them doing it. But you do your sewing by yourself, right?

Coleman –  I do. So you all had the quilting bee. That’s what they were called, the quilting bee. When the women would get together and sew. Right? But  I’ve never sewed with anyone. Not that I would be opposed to it. I just haven’t.

MT Ideas – You kind of combine your English professor background into your work, into your art, which I think is unique and is fascinating. How did that come about? Did you just have an epiphany one day?

Coleman – Well, if you’ve spent as much time sewing as I have, then you may as well share it with the students and it needs to become a part of your academic life. 

MT Ideas – Have any of your students been inspired by your work?

Colman – They have seen the sack here many times. I have required them at times to make poster board quilts, and they can do some artistic things. I asked them to make poster board quilts as a way of learning more about authors, particularly African American authors.

So I would tell them to study 20 Black authors and put those authors on a poster board quilt. Some of them have done some amazing work, and I am just pleased that some of them allow me to keep their work.

MT Ideas – Now one of your pieces, one of your works that is just so incredible is your Fannie Lou Hamer quilt. I thought it’d be appropriate to talk about that during March, which is Women’s History Month.

Coleman – The quilt is 6 feet wide and 8 feet long. 

MT Ideas –  it is very inspiring, and I think she must have inspired you. 

Coleman – Yes, she did. But the quilt, I didn’t intend for it to be that long. I think Fannie Lou Hamer was 5 feet, 4 inches tall. And on the quilt I wanted her to be 5 feet, 4 inches tall. Life size. Right? But the the quilt got longer when I had to put the writing on the quilt, what she’s saying at the top of the quilt.

And then I had to have a border, so it just got longer than I intended for it to be, but Mrs. Hamer just had a way of doing that.

MT Ideas – Now she was a Civil Rights icon and did so much in terms of helping to enfranchise people to vote in Mississippi and throughout the South. Did you depict all that in your quilt?                                                                                                                                                    

Coleman – Yes, I had gotten a grant from the Mississippi Arts Commission to make that quilt. I got the grant in, maybe it was July or August of 2023.

But I already knew that I was going to dress her in red, white and blue, in flag print, because she really was a patriotic American. But she said, you know, you have to make the work. You have to work to make the dream come true.

And she worked. She gave it all that she had and then some, so I knew that I wanted to show her in red, white and blue. And if you get very close to the quilt and you look at the body part anyway, and some other parts of it, you will see in that fabric the words to “America, the Beautiful.”

MT Ideas – What was  the famous quote she had at the 1964 Democratic Convention, the “I’m sick and tired” quote?” 

Coleman – I think she said that before 1964. The one on the quilt is from 1964 where she says, “I question America. Is this America?” And a woman who saw that at the fall Folk Festival in Jackson said, I think we are still questioning America.

MT Ideas — And so what else is on the quilt?

Coleman – She suffered so much physical abuse. So I was thinking, I was wondering if I were going to try to show some of that abuse. Like I had this thought for a moment of showing one leg longer than the other, but then I decided I don’t want her all broken up like this on this quilt. Right? And so if you look over her left eye, you would see just a little red under the lid.

There’s nothing on the other eye, just the left eye. And I just let that stand for all the abuse that her body has suffered.

MT Ideas – Well, it’s breathtaking, and you should be proud of it.

Coleman – But no woman wants to be shown all beaten and battered, though. Right? 

As you engage with the art, the art engages with you. When it’s talking to you, you have to listen or you’ll never be able to finish anything. I’m serious about that.

MT Ideas – So what are you working on now?

Coleman – I’m not sewing now. I’m in the middle of the school year. I don’t sew much during the school year because it’s too distracting. I usually sew when school is out.

I was on the Fannie Lou Hamer project for a year, but it was slow going until school was out. And I got behind on the project because of the Mississippi Arts Commission that wanted it completed about May 15th. So the time that I had to work on the quilt ran along the months of the school year.

So after May 15th or when school was out, I was working on that quilt about, I would say sometimes about 16 hours a day.

MT Ideas – So, do you work in your home? Is there a room, a special room that you work in? 

Coleman – I work at my dining room table. But I think if you were to walk in my house, you would know that a person who sews lives there. 

And you would know that a person who reads a lot of books lives there.

MT Ideas – Well, you say you’re not working on anything right now. Do you have a vision for what you’re going work on next?

Coleman – I really want to put Myrlie Evers on a quilt. And not so much as a Civil Rights worker, but as a singer at Carnegie Hall. I interviewed her a few years ago when she was about to turn 80, you know, she’s 90, 93 now, I believe. And she was talking about how pleased she was that she finally got to sing at Carnegie Hall. 

MT Ideas – Uh, real quick, the Fannie Lou Hamer quilt, has any of her family seen it?

Coleman –  No, and, believe it or not, she hasn’t even been to the Delta. 

MT Ideas – She, the quilt? 

Coleman – Yeah. She hasn’t been to the Delta yet. She needs to get up there. She’s been getting around. But we do need to go to the Delta sometime soon.

MT Ideas – I appreciate your time. I’ve learned a lot more today about sewing. It’s good to know about it, but I never could do it myself. 

Coleman – Have you tried?

MT Ideas – No, ma’am. So some things I just know it’s better not to try. 

Coleman – OK. I know that too.