OurTupelo

Clarke County Sheriff Anthony Chancelor reinstated two of his deputies days after he said they were part of “an attempted internal coup” when they joined others in leaving the force and expressing concerns with how the department is run and the sheriff’s priorities. 

The two full-time deputies who are now back in service are Sgt. Kenneth Holifield and Deputy Peyton Kennedy, Chancelor said Wednesday evening in a statement shared with local media. 

On Monday, the sheriff said Holifield, Kennedy, Sgt. Andy Lafferty, Sgt. Steve Whitaker, Deputy Ellis Ray Dogget and Don Moore had resigned. 

Those who have not been reinstated held full- and part-time positions.  

Five of the six deputies who initially left signed an open letter saying they would resign from the sheriff’s office due to pressing issues, which they did not elaborate. 

“We are concerned about issues that we don’t have any control over,” they wrote. “We all share the concern of where our priorities of the administration lies. The integrity of us five deputies are being questioned by our community that we are sworn to uphold and protect.”

Whitaker’s resignation letter made allegations of on- and off-duty misconduct by the sheriff and raised issues with how administrative staff work. 

During a Monday Clarke County Board of Supervisors meeting, Chancelor was answering questions from the board when Whitaker interrupted to say he was resigning.  

“Everybody knows why,” Whitaker said before he eventually left the room. 

Chancelor could not be reached for further comment, and efforts to reach the deputies involved were not successful.

Almost half of Mississippi’s 138 school districts have not submitted at least one year of financial audits, leaving their finances murky. 

As of Tuesday, 61 districts have not submitted the audits for fiscal year 2025, which ended June 30, according to records requested by Mississippi Today from the Mississippi Department of Education. Additionally, 29 of those districts are also missing financial audits for fiscal 2024, and 13 are also missing them for fiscal 2023 — risking an immediate accreditation downgrade. 

Districts on probation must  develop plans to come into compliance. Eventually, districts may have their accreditation withdrawn, which comes with sanctions, including limiting extracurricular activities. 

Okolona Municipal Separate School District  hasn’t turned in audits for the past four years. 

Okolona school leaders reached out to the state education agency last year because they could not make the following month’s payroll. The state Board of Education voted to take over the district in November.

The interim superintendent, Chad Spence, would not comment on how Okolona is working to get up to date on audits, but agency spokesperson Jean Cook said the Education Department is working with Okolona to secure a contract with an external auditing firm to complete the outstanding audits. 

Following the Okolona takeover, state leaders have ramped up accountability for delinquent districts. In January, the board changed a rule that would put school districts with two or more outstanding audits on probation or downgrade their accreditation. Before the rule change, districts could have missed filing four consecutive annual audits before potentially losing accreditation.  

Schools have been turning in their audits since the agency tightened its rules and upped the consequences — districts missing audits for fiscal years 2024 and 2023 have fallen from 47 in December to 32 in March and to 29 in May, according to state officials.

Even so, Paula Vanderford, the agency’s chief accountability officer, said the issue of missing financial audits remains a top concern for the state Education Department. 

“I would consider this very serious,” she said. “We have to be concerned about whether we can be faced with another Okolona and be caught by surprise.”

State leaders dip into a specially allocated emergency fund when they take over a district, but that pot of money is limited. State Superintendent Lance Evans has said the agency already spent $1.5 million since taking over Okolona, meaning $4.8 million remains for future district takeovers. 

If that money runs out, the agency would need to “have a conversation with the Legislature,” Vanderford said.

“That doesn’t give us the ability to walk away from a district in need,” she said. 

READ MORE: ‘We don’t want any more Okolonas.’ State officials say their crackdown on schools with missing audits is working

Federal law requires public school districts to submit annual audits. Missing audits can mask urgent financial problems at school districts, which leaders have warned could lead to more emergencies and sudden takeovers. 

District leaders must submit audits to the Office of the State Auditor for review before they can be submitted to the Federal Audit Clearinghouse. The education agency monitors district compliance with the audit deadline. 

Because of the audit backlog, the Office of the State Auditor is prioritizing the review of fiscal 2025 audits, Cook said.

Still, although a number of districts submitted their fiscal 2025 audits to the state auditor’s office in March, the office didn’t clear those audits for release before the March 31 federal deadline. 

That’s because a four-person team reviews school district audits and is managing over 40 school, county and community college audits, said Jacob Walters, spokesperson for the Office of the State Auditor. 

The team had warned schools’ audit firms to submit the reports by Dec. 31 to get approved by March 31. Many districts submitted audits within the last few days of March, making it impossible for the team to review them in time, Walters said.  

Another reason for the delay was that the federal Office of Management and Budget issued compliance requirements for those audits in November. Audit firms held the reports until then to ensure compliance with the standards, Walters said. 

The office staff are prioritizing the audits, he said. State Auditor Shad White has approved hiring an additional employee to address the school audit backlog.

State education leaders have said the factors driving missing audits include school administrative turnover, too few district business managers, auditor staffing shortages and the burdensome federal funding portion of the audits. 

Some districts are having problems finding accounting firms that have the capacity or ability to complete these audits. 

The education agency is struggling to keep up, too. Because of limited capacity, the department can’t sanction every district, Vanderford said. Districts found out of compliance must have due process and show-cause hearings, depending on whether they risk being put on probation or having their accreditation withdrawn.

“We’re going to have to triage these districts,” Vanderford said. “While they’re all at risk, we don’t have the capacity to inform a dozen districts at one time they have to have a hearing.”

The Family Dollar store at the busy intersection of Cooper and Terry roads will be closing its doors by the end of May, further limiting options for people to buy groceries, school supplies and cleaning items in south and west Jackson. 

The store’s closure was announced internally to employees toward the end of March. Signs went up shortly after, informing people of the store’s closing sale. Items have been discounted up to 70% this month to eliminate remaining inventory. 

Bobby “Bulldog” Rhymes lives a few blocks from Family Dollar and shops at the store several times a month. He said he wasn’t aware of the closure until he approached the store and saw the going-out-of-business signs that cluttered the windows.

Rhymes said he often has to go to the Cash Saver in west Jackson to get groceries because of the lack of stores in his neighborhood. 

“They’re leaving us without local service. Without being able to go get what you want,” Rhymes said. “Instead of 15 minutes, you’re talking 40 or an hour.”

Mississippi Today reached out to Family Dollar Corporate along with the district manager of the Terry Road location for comment about the closure. Neither responded before publication. The chain will have 10 stores remaining in south Jackson after the closure.

Acire McDonald serves as the assistant store manager. A transfer from another Family Dollar store in Brandon, McDonald has been working overtime at the Terry Road location. A manager asked her to help fill in as the store’s employees quit or were fired. 

“No context, not telling us if the old employees are going to be able to go to another store or anything like that,” McDonald said. “So we just filling in from other stores.” 

Mississippi Today spoke with two other employees, who both went through similar experiences.

When asked about the recent closures, Jackson Ward 6 City Council Member Lashia Brown-Thomas said a Roses discount store will soon be opening near the Family Dollar that is closing. She urged residents to remain patient while the council works to “bring south Jackson back together.”

Ward 7 Council Member Kevin Parkinson said he and Thomas had met with several groups who were planning projects in the area but could not provide information about them.

The closure of the nearly decade-old store is just one of many across Jackson in recent years. The continuous closures have primarily affected south Jackson. The most recent closure in the area was the Food Depot at the intersection of West McDowell and Terry Road. The grocery store closed in December, creating an even bigger problem for food access in south Jackson. 

A resident of Willowood for 28 years, Lula Green is one of the many residents affected by the scarcity of stores.

“Its very difficult, because we don’t have anything around in this area,” Green said. “Now everything is moving out of the area, and we have to go way out in order to get something.”

Green told Mississippi Today that when she can’t get groceries at the local Cash Saver, she has to travel nearly 7 miles to the Kroger on I-55 in northeast Jackson to get what she needs. She goes to Walgreens in Clinton to buy her medication. Green says it is more convenient than the local Walmart, despite the nearly 6-mile difference.

Mississippi is one of the top states in the nation for food insecurity. Nearly 1 in 5 people faced food insecurity in 2023 in Hinds County, where Jackson is located.  

The area has limited grocery options aside from a traditional store. Residents Dewaskii Davis, Jina Daniels and Matt Casteel have a network of gardens across the Jackson area. Additionally, other options – such as the Mississippi Farmers Market in Jackson – are helping residents find food for lower prices.

Astel Ellis has worked at the farmers’ market for 11 years. 

“The vendors we are getting our food from, they’re consolidating in a way that makes running a small grocery store unsustainable each year,” Ellis said. “Local communities that can come together and make food will be a more and more important resource in the future.”

Scott Crawford, a disability rights activist who lives in the Fondren area of north Jackson, said while he has the privilege of living near a grocery store, he’s concerned for people who don’t.

“It’s absolutely vital that they have a grocery store much closer to them, because they don’t have a car and can’t just load groceries into a trunk,” Crawford said. “It is way more difficult than most people understand.”

The Mississippi Department of Human Services on Wednesday set aside $5 million to pay for a childcare program in crisis for over a year. 

That funding would cover vouchers, or coupons that make childcare more affordable for low-income families, and the money would be enough to provide for about 800 children. Over 6,000 families remain on a waitlist for these vouchers, according to the department.

“Childcare is not a luxury – it is the infrastructure that makes work possible for Mississippi families,” said Bob Anderson, executive director of the department, in a press release. 

Anderson called the investment “targeted,” “responsible” and said it reflects the department’s “commitment to deploying public resources where they make a real difference.”

This move comes a month after lawmakers failed to appropriate any money toward childcare, despite pleas from early childhood educators who are going without salaries and providing free care for thousands of families that have been on the voucher waitlist over the last year. For years, the childcare voucher program relied upon pandemic-era federal funds that dried up in early 2025. 

The additional $5 million comes from a pool of unspent money from the Temporary Assistance for Needy Families program – a spending solution advocates proposed a year ago. 

In 2025, MDHS officials said it was not possible to use more federal TANF money than the state already devoted to childcare. Currently, Mississippi transfers the maximum 30% of TANF funds to the state-run voucher program. 

However, advocates pointed to other states that have legitimately and successfully steered additional TANF funds to child care vouchers without interfering with the 30% limit. In January, state officials changed course and said they were exploring the model’s viability. 

One of the most vocal advocates who has been calling for this funding is Carol Burnett, executive director of the Mississippi Low-Income Child Care Initiative. Burnett described this development as a “fabulous move in the right direction” and said while the amount of money is low compared to how much is needed, it establishes a precedent. 

“It’s a development to celebrate because it sets something in motion that we can build on as we move forward,” Burnett told Mississippi Today Wednesday. “There was no way we could build on it until DHS agreed they could do it. And now that happened.”

The agency is taking a “fiscally conservative stance” on this initial investment, Mark Jones, director of communications at the state Department of Human Services, told Mississippi Today.

“In October, MDHS will make consideration of a future increase,” Jones said.

Blocks away from where state lawmakers will consider redrawing Mississippi’s political maps to reduce Black representation in government, thousands of people gathered Wednesday in Jackson to protest those efforts and mobilize people to vote in November.  

The energy from the crowd was so palpable and raucous at times that some of the event’s speakers had to pause their remarks to let the attendees participate in rounds of chants, shouting, “No justice, no peace.”

FAQ: Mississippi redistricting. Why does it matter? What’s being considered?

Wednesday’s rally was a rebuke of the U.S. Supreme Court’s recent ruling weakening the federal Voting Rights Act and efforts by Republicans across the South to redraw electoral districts to weaken Black voting strength. The participants protested those efforts by sporting shirts that called for fair political districts and waving signs that said, “No Jim Crow maps.” 

The target for some of the redistricting efforts in Mississippi is U.S. Rep. Bennie Thompson, the state’s lone Democrat and Black member in Congress, who frequently draws the anger of Mississippi Republicans and President Donald Trump. 

“I’m mad as hell about them calling Congressman Thompson a terror,” said U.S. Rep. Jonathan Jackson, a Democrat from Illinois who attended the rally. 

Jackson, son of the late Rev. Jesse Jackson, was referring to a comment Mississippi Gov. Tate Reeves made on a radio show earlier this month, where he said that Thompson’s “reign of terror” in the state’s 2nd Congressional District would soon end. 

Thompson told the crowd on Wednesday that GOP leaders will soon have a “fight on their hands” if they want to redraw the state’s congressional districts by slicing up the majority-Black Delta and Jackson metro area and putting those regions into majority-white districts. 

“We can’t let short-minded people turn us back,” Thompson said. “Now, we don’t have to act like the crazy folks did on January 6, but you’re going to know we’re upset.”   

READ MORE: ‘We’re going backwards.’ Mississippians share experiences of voter suppression, dread of redistricting battle

Some Republicans in the state and the Trump White House have pushed for Mississippi lawmakers to redraw the state’s four congressional districts to make it difficult for Thompson to win reelection. 

But several politicians at the rally, such as Scott Colom, the Democratic nominee for the U.S. Senate this year, criticized Reeves’ comments, noting Thompson has a history of sending federal dollars to Mississippi, one of the poorest states in the nation. 

“The issue with that is I don’t remember Gov. Reeves sending back the money that Congressman Thompson voted to give for infrastructure,” Colom said. 

For now, Reeves has cancelled a special legislative session for lawmakers to redraw the state’s Supreme Court voting map. The session was supposed to have begun Wednesday. But Reeves said in an interview earlier this month that he expects the Legislature to redraw Mississippi’s congressional, state legislative and judicial districts before the 2027 state election cycle. 

House Speaker Jason White on Wednesday said he expects the governor to call lawmakers into a special session soon to redraw state legislative districts. 

Historians, state lawmakers, national advocates, members of Congress and civil rights attorneys spoke at Wednesday’s rally, called Day of Action, aimed at bring generations of voters together to rebel against the redistricting efforts and mobilize them to vote during the upcoming midterm election.

“We will not be erased,” said state Rep. Kabir Karriem of Columbus, chairman of the Mississippi Legislative Black Caucus. “We’re not going anywhere. And if you think you’re going to get rid of us, you’ve got another thing coming.” 

Southern states, led by white Republicans, have raced to redraw their congressional districts and erode majority-Black districts after the recent high court ruling. 

“In the 250th year of the country, the nation has decided to double down on the idea that it is a white republic,” said Eddie Glaude, a nationally recognized academic and political pundit who grew up in Moss Point. 

The Rev. Jerry Jefferson, president of the Okitibbeha County Branch of the NAACP, drove over two hours from Starkville to attend the rally. Jefferson, donning a “I FIGHT FOR VOTING RIGHTS” shirt, said the memory of prior civil rights struggles still looms large for him and many other attendees at the Jackson Convention Center on Wednesday.

“Once again, every time we try to go up the social ladder, political ladder or whatever it is, there’s always somebody who’s going to come try to cut our feet from under us and put us down to where we were before. But we refuse to go back,” Jefferson said.

The rush of some Southern states to redraw districts ahead of midterm elections caused several speakers to compare the erasure of majority-Black districts to fights during the Civil Rights Movement to gain voting rights for Black people and to the end of Reconstruction in the Deep South, when the federal government returned control to state leaders and they began enacting discriminatory laws and trying to intimidate Black voters. 

Rep. Bryant Clark, a Democrat from Holmes County whose father Robert Clark in 1967 became the first Black person elected to the Mississippi Legislature in the modern era, said today’s efforts to reduce Black officials mirror the decision of white lawmakers in the 19th century to disenfranchise Black voters by enacting Jim Crow laws. 

“It’s the same fight, same song, second verse,” Clark said. 

The national NAACP has responded to this by calling on Black athletes and fans to boycott the athletic programs of public universities in states that are taking steps to reduce Black representation in politics, including in Mississippi.

If Black athletes participate in the boycott, it could drain rosters for powerhouse football programs and deplete revenues.

Derrick Johnson, the national NAACP president, on Wednesday at the rally compared predominantly white universities using many Black student athletes as a revenue source while not standing up for Black voices to a type of “sharecropping.”

“We don’t believe in sharecropping,” said Johnson, who lives in Mississippi. “We should not perform on the football fields or basketball courts where they cannot generate a profit.”

The rally ended with Tennessee state Rep. Justin Jones urging the participants to channel their anger against efforts to reduce Black voting strength into voting in the federal midterm election on Nov. 3. 

“If you can get 5,000 people together on a Wednesday in the rain, then I believe you can get so many more on a Tuesday in November,” Jones said.

Mississippi Today reporter Michael Goldberg contributed to this report.

Eddie Glaude is a member of the board of directors for Deep South Today, parent company of Mississippi Today.

About 99 students in Canton could lose their school by August if the Mississippi Charter School Authorizer Board agrees to revoke its charter. 

At a May 14 hearing, an attorney for the board argued that SR1 College Preparatory and STEM Academy should lose its charter because leadership mismanaged the school, particularly its finances, violating state law and its contract.

Tamu Green, the school’s founder and chief executive officer, contended that mistakes were made because his staff lacked promised training and technical support from the charter board. He said he didn’t know all the relevant federal and state requirements.

“It’s a guessing game a little bit,” Green said of finalizing the school’s financial paperwork by the close of the fiscal year. 

“I mean, my unwritten rule was we just spent,” he said. And he didn’t know that financial paperwork had to “look really good” by the end of the fiscal year.

Hearing officer Kim Turner, who regularly serves as the State Agencies director at the attorney general’s office, will recommend whether SR1 CPSA should keep its charter. If Turner recommends revoking the charter — and if the authorizer board accepts her recommendation — SR1 CPSA would become the first charter school the state forces to close.

The board’s main concerns about SR1 CPSA involve school spending, accounting and money management. The school has received over $2 million in local and state tax dollars since it opened to students in August 2023.

How did school leaders spend taxpayers’ dollars?

The board voted in December to start the process of shutting down the school in part because it had one day’s cash on hand — $24,000. The board requires charter schools to have enough money available to cover 30 to 60 days of operations. 

Jamie Travis, an attorney for SR1 CPSA, said school leadership never missed payments.

He also argued that the school now has $600,000 in the bank, which he said was evidence it is financially viable.

But Tolliver McMullen, a certified fraud examiner and public accountant who was an expert witness for the authorizer board, testified that money in the bank doesn’t alleviate all concerns about the school’s finances — how the money is spent and whether school officials can account for their spending are important factors, too. 

SR1 CPSA leaders spent around $800,000 in a year when the school had about 15 students, he said. That breaks down to roughly $53,000 spent per student in its first year, or roughly five times the amount that Canton Public School District spent per student in 2023-24.

The state also raised questions about how the school’s leaders documented their spending, such as $55,080 in Amazon purchases charged to two credit cards. School officials had not disclosed the credit cards to the state as required. 

“The issue is that SR1 lacked clean, complete, readily verifiable documentation with the oversight required,” said Dillon Pitts, the attorney representing the state charter authorizer board.

READ MORE: Financial shortfall may cost Canton school its charter

The charter authorizer board also noted concerns that SR1 CPSA has experienced significant turnover in its business office since it opened in 2023. The school has a different business manager since the charter board started investigating in earnest in December.

Green and his team did not provide all documentation on the contractors from whom they buy cafeteria food, lease student transportation and acquire equipment at the school, according to Pitts.

Green told the charter authorizer board that the documents belong to SR1 (Scientific Research), a nonprofit organization Green owns, which has a separate governing board and is not under the board’s purview, according to Pitts. But Pitts argued that SR1 signed a contract with the charter authorizer board and is also subject to board monitoring. Several school leaders failed to provide the board with statements of economic interest, which disclose whether school contract money goes to companies they have a financial interest in.

Green said his impact should not just be measured by numbers.

“Unfortunately, I look at people as people. I don’t look at this monetary value,” Green said of his school’s past budgeting.

State questions school officials’ compliance with federal laws related to students with disability and food service

Pitts said the board also has evidence that SR1 CPSA leaders also violated federal guidelines that ensure safe food for students and classroom accommodations for students with disabilities. Pitts submitted the documentation to the hearing officer for review.

A food services provider inspected the cafeteria and found portion sizes, food temperature and nutritional values were out of compliance with federal standards, Pitts said. Food safety reports were missing, too. Staff members were eating meals intended for students without paying.

SR1 CPSA is one of two charter schools that operate their own cafeterias. Most charter schools partner with a local school district or the Mississippi Department of Education.

Another inspection of records revealed that seven out of 11 Individualized Education Plans, or IEPs, were missing parent or guardian signatures, according to Pitts. These plans outline how school officials are accommodating a student’s disability.

Dorlisa Hutton, chief operating officer at SR1 and vice president of SR1 CPSA, said the state education department didn’t find any instances of noncompliance in the school’s special education department. That’s because the agency has not monitored those records yet, said Jean Cook, an Education Department spokesperson.

The struggle to enroll students in an underserved community

Student enrollment also ties into some of the financial troubles of SR1 CPSA. The school has fallen short of its enrollment goals for three consecutive years. Green delayed opening the school twice because he couldn’t enroll enough students. 

Despite that recent history, Green said he anticipates a significant enrollment jump: from around 99 students to 300 by July.

“We want this thing to grow,” Green said of his future plans for his school. “I really am blessed that families still trust in us to say, ‘Hey, like the old spiritual: we’re going to be all right.’”

Public schools receive funding from the state Education Department based on how many students school leadership intends to enroll for the upcoming year. The department recoups the money for the students not enrolled the following year, which hurt SR1 CPSA financially.

By overprojecting enrollment in previous years, SR1 CPSA received much more state funding than it would otherwise. But the Education Department requires charter schools to repay money they received for overprojected enrollment. SR1 CPSA had overspent its revenue for both years of operation, which caused the school to enter its second year with a negative cash flow. 

It’s difficult to open a school in an underserved community like Canton because building trust with locals takes time, Green said during the hearing. “Generational trauma” also makes recruiting students difficult, he said.

Green said his school should get another opportunity to improve its financial reporting and management because the board didn’t offer technical support in preparing financial paperwork and other services. Pitts, the attorney for the authorizer board, argued that the school had been offered assistance and already been given another chance.

Pitts told the hearing officer that the authorizer board moved to shutter SR1 CPSA in its first semester in 2023 after it enrolled roughly 15 students but requested money to serve 150. The authorizer board didn’t proceed with closing the school in part because SR1 CPSA leaders pledged to improve management.

Turner will next review the hearing transcript in addition to hundreds of documents, which the state charter board argues will prove fiscal mismanagement in violation of state law. 

Turner will then issue a recommendation on whether to revoke the school’s charter. Charter board members have the final vote on whether to accept the recommendation and effectively shutter the school.

Travis indicated plans to appeal the case to the Hinds County Chancery Court, which could keep the school’s final fate uncertain for longer.

The public can now get a glimpse of 1960s Ku Klux Klan materials, including charters and lists of dues-paying Mississippi Klansmen, through collections housed at the Mississippi Department of Archives and History.

The department announced Wednesday that the materials can be seen in its research library in downtown Jackson. Items are also now available for viewing online.

In March, state Department of Public Safety officials gave Archives and History a cache of KKK materials they stumbled across while cleaning out a closet. The purge was part of a move to the new Public Safety headquarters outside Jackson.

Inside a small blue suitcase, they found a handbook for the White Knights of the Ku Klux Klan, the most violent white supremacist group in the 1960s, which carried out at least 10 killings. Officials also found Klan charters, a Klan robe, KKK recruitment materials, propaganda, meeting notes, ledgers and a list of members who paid — or didn’t pay — their dues.

The blue case, robe and hood are in the care of the Two Mississippi Museums operated by Archives and History.

In the move from Jackson to a new building in Rankin County, the Department of Public Safety also found old Mississippi Highway Patrol folders labeled “Communist Agitators” and “Freedom Riders,” which contain photos and reports on the 1961 riders. Trained in nonviolent techniques in Washington and Nashville, they rode interstate buses into the South to challenge segregation laws.

T.B. Birdsong, then-head of the patrol, falsely claimed Communists were behind these rides and Russians had trained two riders in Cuba.

Many of the riders convicted in Mississippi because of their civil rights activities, including the late Congressman John Lewis and other famous activists, were sent to the Mississippi State Penitentiary at Parchman.

The link to materials about the Freedom Riders are also available online.

The long-hidden Klan material gives a glimpse into the dark past when membership for the White Knights soared in Mississippi in the 1960s, reportedly to nearly 100,000 members, and politicians sought their support.

The highway patrol began to document Klan activities in 1964, after Klansmen kidnapped and killed three civil right workers in Neshoba County.

The handbook obtained by state investigators outlined secret rituals, bylaws and operations of the White Knights. The organization created a Voting Registration Committee to “study and watch the negro voting activity” and an Intelligence Committee to “keep accurate and indexed information on people, places and cars.”

The next president of the Mississippi University for Women should prioritize listening to and understanding students, people within the institution’s community say. 

That’s something Nora Miller, who retires effective June 30, did well, said Zander Hall, the university’s Student Government Association incoming president for the 2026-2027 school year.

Whether at sports games, campus events or in Columbus where the university is based, Miller made an effort to recognize students and remember their names, he said. 

“She was very personable and engaging, and that is someone we need as students, someone who can get to know us and hear us,” said Hall, a senior studying elementary education from Tuscaloosa, Alabama. 

The Mississippi Institutions of Higher Learning’s Board of Trustees has launched a search for Miller’s successor. In April, the trustees named Scott Tollison, provost and executive vice president of academic affairs, as the interim president.

IHL has not yet announced an official process for the national president search for the university. But IHL Board of Trustees held listening sessions in April, a first step in the search process, to get feedback on preferred traits of MUW’s next leader. 

During those sessions, trustees requested that speakers not name a preferred candidate for the top job. But, some speakers named Sally Burchfield Doty, director of Broadband Expansion and Accessibility of Mississippi. Doty is a 1988 MUW alumna and served in the state Senate from 2012 to 2020. 

Doty told The Commercial Dispatch she is interested in the role. 

Faculty, alumni and other MUW stakeholders also said they hope the university’s next leader can convey to state higher education officials and lawmakers the university’s uniqueness among the state’s eight public universities and highlight the success of its academic programs. 

MUW’s college of nursing and health science continues to rank among one of the best schools in the state for future physicians, MUW nursing professor Mary Helen Ruffin said. 

It’s also the second year of the university’s M-CARE apprenticeship program, formerly known as Mississippi Earn, Ruffin said. Through the program, nursing students work with registered nurses at Baptist Memorial Hospital-Golden Triangle in Columbus to train and earn a license to enter the field. Students who complete the program are guaranteed a job at the hospital, Ruffin said. 

“It’s important for the next leader to build upon the university’s enrollment growth and success of the academic programs,” Ruffin said. “I think we just really need someone who can continue to build upon the momentum that we have right now.”  

While the W has a small student population, about 2,370 students, it has a big regional impact in Columbus and on the rest of the state. 

The W “seems to be a gem in Mississippi higher education that is under-recognized and under-celebrated,” said Chuck Yarborough, who is a history teacher at Mississippi School for Mathematics and Science, which is a magnet school for high school students that shares a campus with MUW. Yarborough said he wants the next university leader to also acknowledge the strong, decades-long partnership between MSMS and the university, which continues to develop students to become future leaders in the state. 

Miller’s retirement announcement was a bittersweet surprise for Trip Hairston, who represents District 2 on the Lowndes County Board of Supervisors. The university’s next leader should be assertive, advocate for the W and have great finance management skills, Hairston said.

The next leader should also have a strategic plan for prioritizing the university’s long-term sustainability, he said. 

Hairston and Miller advocated for MSMS to remain on the MUW campus. In 2025, the Mississippi Department of Education recommended MSMS relocate to Mississippi State University’s campus. The Legislature did not act on the recommendation.

“We spent a lot of time together, strategizing on what to do next and who to go see and who to call,” Hairston said. 

“I’m going to miss her openness with me,” he said of Miller. “I believe that whoever the successor is has got some pretty big shoes to fill.”

Today’s column comes to you compliments of a chapter in Dr. Dan Jones’ new memoir “Medical Missionary,” an intriguing read I much enjoyed.

We begin in October 2002. Jones, later the University of Mississippi chancellor, was then the associate vice chancellor for health affairs at University of Mississippi Medical Center. Six doctors from a Pyongyang medical center were winding up a two-month visit to UMMC. Jones decided it would be a good idea to expose the North Koreans to American football.

Some background is necessary here: The six doctors were accompanied by a North Korean government handler, presumably to ensure they did not defect. Jones knew the stern, often scowling handler as “Mr. Jon” from a previous visit to North Korea. Jones’ relationship with Mr. Jon had been tenuous, at best.

“Yankee imperialist bastard,” was how Mr. Jon, a short, stocky man with military bearing, had once referred to Jones.

The North Korean doctors’ visit had been highly productive. Jones, an avid Ole Miss football fan, was eager to show them a good time.

“Football?” Mr. Jon asked before the Oxford visit. “Is that the sport they play with tin cans on their heads?”

On the Friday night before the Saturday game, Jones tried to give the Koreans a rudimentary football lesson – no easy task, Jones discovered. While the six doctors seemed politely interested, Mr. Jon was enthralled. Something about the often brutal sport clearly appealed to him

Mr Jon pointed at the TV tuned to a Friday night game. “Why don’t they tackle down that small man wearing black and white,” Mr. Jon asked.

Long after the doctors had retired to bed to rest for the big day, Mr. Jon continued to pepper Jones with football questions. Clearly, they had made a connection. Finally.

Now then, if you are going to your first football game what better way to start than on a glorious October Saturday afternoon with the sixth-ranked Florida Gators, quarterbacked by Heisman Trophy candidate Rex Grossman, against underdog Ole Miss, quarterbacked by Eli Manning?

The experience began in The Grove, which was as busy as a stepped-on ant bed that day.

As Jones describes in the book: “I always love the moment when folks see the Ole Miss campus, especially The Grove, for the first time. All the senses are pinging: the tall oaks lay down their deep green blankets of shade on the lush grass. Red and blue tents shoulder so close it’s hard to tell where one party ends and another begins. The tang of barbecue and grilled sausages is heady perfume, and the taste is even better than the smell. The happy yells of reuniting friends cut over whatever song some tent is blasting and, occasionally, the school chant of ‘Hotty Toddy’ is raised and answered.”

On the walk from The Grove to the stadium, Mr. Jon continued to ask question after question about football. At one point, he asked: “What does it all mean? The thing they keep saying.”

“Hotty Toddy?” Jones asked. 

Mr. Jon nodded.

“Well, it means sort of … nothing. It’s nonsense.”

“It means nonsense?”

“Nobody knows exactly what it means,” Jones responded. “It’s something we say at our school… Hotty Toddy means we’re excited. We’re rooting for our team, we hope to win. It’s like a bow or a high five between fans. We’re all it it together. Hotty Toddy!”

They continued on to the stadium, past the long row of the portable Hotty Toddy potties. Mr. Jon seemed satisfied with the explanation.

Jones had arranged for the visitors to be in the chancellor’s suite, where they could either sit outside and watch the game or sit inside and enjoy the air conditioning and football fare. They also had access to the suite next to the chancellor’s, where beer and bourbon were available.

By the second quarter, Jones and Mr. Jon were the only two remaining in the outside seating. Mr. Jon was mesmerized by the football. Heavily favored Florida led 14-2 at intermission, but Mr. Jon had become a Rebel fan and he wasn’t giving up. He never left his seat, except to visit the adjacent suite to replenish his bourbon.

Local Ole Miss fans will remember what happened in that second half nearly 24 years ago. The Rebels, sparked by a tenacious defense and Manning’s error-less quarterbacking, fired back.

“Sack him!” Mr. Jon yelled as the Ole Miss defense constantly harassed Grossman. When a nearby fan yelled, “Ref, you need glasses,” Mr. Jon responded, “Yes, sir. He does need glasses!”

When Ole Miss completed the scintillating 17-14 victory and fans charged the field and tore down the goal posts, Mr. Jon threw back his head and yelled: “Hotty Toddy” and, wrote Jones, “gave sloppy high-fives to every American bastard he could reach.”

An addendum: Mr. Jon’s head clearly ached the next morning when the Koreans returned to Jackson to begin packing for the long trip home. 

Addendum, two: Dan Jones would reunite with Mr. Jon on a subsequent visit to North Korea. To learn about that – and so much more, including Jones’ medical missionary work in South Korea, Russia, Iran and China – get the book. It will not disappoint. 

Dan Jones is signing “Medical Missionary” at 5:30 p.m. Wednesday at Square Books in Oxford, where he is joined for a conversation with poet/author Beth Ann Fennelly. Jones is signing the book Thursday at Lemuria in Jackson, where Rick Cleveland will join him for a conversation. The signing begins at 4:30 p.m. the program at 5:30.

In what Clarke County Sheriff Anthony Chancelor called “an attempted coup,” six of his deputies have left the department after a majority signed a letter voicing concerns about the sheriff’s priorities and how following them has put their integrity into question.  

Sgt. Andy Lafferty, Sgt. Steve Whitaker, Sgt. Kenneth Hollifield, Deputy Peyton Kennedy and Deputy Ellis Ray Dogget said they are willing to lay down their badges because of pressing issues. 

“We didn’t want to have to go this route, but we are not speaking for anyone else other than us five Deputies,” they wrote in an open letter published Sunday on the community page Clarke County Hot Topics. “We are concerned about issues that we don’t have any control over.”

Another deputy who did not sign the letter, Don Moore, is also no longer with the department. 

Before the departures, the sheriff’s office had an estimated 16 officers serving a county of about 15,000 residents in eastern Mississippi. 

“Our focus now is moving forward and continuing to provide the dependable service and protection the people of Clarke County deserve,” Chancelor said in a statement the day after the resignations.

He said the resignations came as a surprise and he found it disappointing that the men aired their grievances on social media rather than coming directly to him. 

The deputies could not immediately be reached, and Chancelor did not respond to a request for further comment. 

After the sheriff released his statement, Whitaker’s resignation letter was shared online by a local media outlet called the Scotty Ray Report, and it provided more details about why Whitaker left. 

In the his letter, Whitaker cites multiple reasons and events that took place during Chancelor’s administration, including how compared to administrative staff, most deputies have had to work overtime and take on second jobs.

He also included more serious allegations, including how administrative staff showed up or answered radio calls while intoxicated and how charges have been dismissed for people brought to the jail without agreement from the arresting officers. 

Whitaker alleged misconduct by the sheriff on and off duty that “(put) his deputies in potential civil and legal situations.” 

Chancelor did not respond to a request for comment about the alleged misconduct in Whitaker’s resignation letter. 

Monday morning, Whitaker tried to speak with the Clarke County Board of Supervisors during its meeting. In video clips, Chancelor is addressing the board when Whitaker cuts in to say he is resigning and “everybody knows why.” 

Whitaker did not elaborate because a supervisor used a gavel at least twice, and Chancelor accused him of interrupting a public meeting. 

Later in the meeting, the board went into executive session to talk about personnel issues, but Chancery Clerk Leanne Volking said it took no action. On Tuesday, she said nothing has been presented to the supervisors relating to resignation or termination of the deputies. 

“That’s on the sheriff’s department to present that to the board at the next meeting,” she said, declining to comment further. The next meeting is scheduled for June 1. 

Whitaker had been with the sheriff’s office just short of five years, according to his Facebook profile. 

“I am honored to have served the citizens of Clarke County but I feel this is necessary to maintain my personal morals, principles, and integrity,” he wrote. “I also hope this will bring public awareness and transparency to the citizens of Clarke County.”

Although Whitaker did not share more about alleged misconduct, community members have mentioned a 2019 case under the previous sheriff. Mississippi Today and The New York Times reported about how Clarke County sheriff’s deputies beat Marquise Tilman – an order given by former sheriff Todd Kemp captured in a recording. 

Chancelor was one of the deputies accused in the beating and one of six named in the lawsuit alongside Kemp. Tilman settled with Clarke County and the deputies for an undisclosed amount in 2022. 

Community members have also pointed to Chancelor’s alleged domestic violence against his wife that the Mississippi Bureau of Investigation began looking into in November 2024. At the time, the sheriff called it a “personal matter between my wife and I” and said he and his chief deputy made the decision to call in MBI. 

Bailey Martin, spokesperson for the Department of Public Safety, said Tuesday that MBI’s investigation into Chancelor had been completed and turned over to the attorney general’s office. 

MaryAsa Lee, the spokesperson for that office, said the investigation is active and further comment will not be provided.