A sign perched on a shelf at Valour Cobbins’ Bread and Butter Shoppe reads, “If you cook, they will come.”
How else to explain a booming business in the center of downtown Greenwood, a business that was supposed to be the resurrection of a winery that had closed?
“God had other plans … a different route for me,” said Cobbins, as she prepared a chicken salad sandwich for a customer. “This used to be The Winery at Williams Landing. I saw this wonderful space and that a kitchen had been added. However, seeing as how the whole wine making process takes quite a bit of time, I thought, you know I really love cooking. Why not make good, nutritional food and make money too while I get this winery going?”
Plot twist.
Her love for cooking – gourmet cooking at that – and unexpected financial support started Cobbins on a path that would spotlight her culinary talents.
“If you cook, they will come.”
And come they do.
On a whim, Cobbins says she applied for a grant she spotted while surfing Facebook.
“I thought, why not? The process was simple enough.”
Her whim turned into reality when Cobbins learned she had been chosen to receive a $5,000 Coalition to Back Black Businesses (CBBB) grant, along with a business coach. Optimum, along with parent company Altice USA, broadband communications and video services providers, in partnership with CBBB, also awarded Cobbins a $25,000 enhancement grant that “provides the Black business community with resources, funds, and mentorship opportunities.”
“I’m telling you; it was a blessing. The grants were amazing, something we desperately needed. The pandemic almost put us under.”
“I officially opened in April of 2021. By September, the business was so busy, the winery was put on the back burner. It’s still on the back burner, but not out of the picture,” she said, heading outside to the rear of her shop with a few customers in tow to show off her garden.
“I love gardening too. And a lot of what I cook with, I grow right here in my little garden,” she says, while tending to her tomato plants.
Located at intersection of Howard Street and Wright Place, the Bread and Butter Shoppe offers a variety of gourmet sandwiches, salads, wraps, specialty teas and smoothies, and fresh juices.
“I’m doing this. Me. And I love it … this … cooking for people,” Cobbins said, adding, “I call myself a ‘solopreneur.’”
Owner/operator Valour Cobbins, at her Bread and Butter Shoppe, located in downtown Greenwood, Tuesday, July 11, 2023. Credit: Vickie D. King/Mississippi Today
Valour Cobbins, owner/operator of the Bread and Butter Shoppe, chats with customers, Tuesday, July 11, 2023, in downtown Greenwood. Credit: Vickie D. King/Mississippi Today
“I love tomatoes,” said Bread and Butter Shoppe owner/operator Valour Cobbins, while tending to a variety of tomatoes, vegetables and herbs in the garden behind her business, Tuesday, July 11, 2023. Credit: Vickie D. King/Mississippi Today
Humorous sign at the Bread and Butter Shopped in Greenwood, Tuesday, July 11, 2023. Credit: Vickie D. King/Mississippi Today
Valour Cobbins, owner/operator of the Bread and Butter Shoppe in downtown Greenwood, checks on the kombucha tea fermenting at her business, Tuesday, July 11, 2023. Kombucha is a black tea, sweetened and fermented. It is a probiotic touted for its health benefits. Credit: Vickie D. King/Mississippi Today
Chicken salad sandwich preparedfor a customer at the Bread and Butter Shoppe, located in downtown Greenwood, Tuesday, July 11, 2023. Credit: Vickie D. King/Mississippi Today
Bread and Butter Shoppe owner/operator Valour Cobbins (left), chats with customers, Tuesday, July 11, 2023 in Greenwood. Credit: Vickie D. King/Mississippi Today
Valour Cobbins, owner/operator of the Bread and Butter Shoppe in downtown Greenwood, prepares a chicken salad sandwich for a customer, Tuesday, July 11, 2023. Credit: Vickie D. King/Mississippi Today
GREENWOOD — Brandon Presley, the Democratic nominee for governor, recently challenged incumbent Republican Gov. Tate Reeves to a debate ahead of the November general election, possibly at the Republican official’s deer hunting camp.
“He said he wanted to debate the governor of California at his deer camp,” Presley said of Reeves. “If he’ll give me his deer camp address, we’ll debate him there. We’ll debate him anywhere, any place, anytime.”
Presley’s comments about the hunting camp are a reference to a Twitter exchange between Reeves and Democratic California Gov. Gavin Newsom about firearm rights and the 2nd Amendment.
Newsom wrote on X, the company formerly known as Twitter, that he wants to add a 28th Amendment to the U.S. Constitution that raises the minimum gun purchasing age to 21, establishes background checks and bans the purchase of assault weapons.
Reeves responded to Newsom’s post by challenging the California governor to a debate over firearm policy.
“I know you would prefer the French Laundry….but let’s do the debate at my deer camp instead!” Reeves wrote.
Reeves’ campaign didn’t respond to a request for comment about Presley’s debate challenge or if he’s willing to participate in a debate at all this year.
The Republican nominee, in 2019, participated in two debates with Attorney General Jim Hood, the Democratic nominee for governor, twice that year — one in Hattiesburg and one in Columbus.
It’s unclear if any media outlet or organization has formally offered a forum for the two candidates for governor to debate before the November 7 general election.
The Mississippi Supreme Court has denied former NFL quarterback Brett Favre’s attempts to escape a civil lawsuit over the Mississippi welfare scandal.
Favre first filed a motion to dismiss charges against him in the lawsuit, which has been ongoing for more than a year, in February. The judge in the case, Hinds County Circuit Court Judge Faye Peterson, denied the motion in April. It was her first major ruling in the case, a sprawling lawsuit with 47 defendants and pending motions that have been stale for months. Favre appealed the decision to the Mississippi Supreme Court in May.
Mississippi Department of Human Services is bringing the case in an attempt to recoup $77 million in misspent funds from the federal Temporary Assistance for Needy Families program, or TANF. This includes more than $7 million that went to Favre’s projects, a pharmaceutical startup company and a volleyball stadium at his alma mater University of Southern Mississippi.
As part of its complaint, the welfare agency alleges Favre benefitted from these fraudulent transfers, in part because Favre had agreed to fund the volleyball stadium construction himself. Favre’s attorneys argue that not only is MDHS wrong about that, but the agency’s whole theory about who should be liable in this case is faulty.
“MDHS’s theory would effectively place no limits on UFTA (Uniform Voidable Transactions Act) liability—anyone could be sued who could in any way be deemed to have reaped some undefined benefit from a transfer,” Favre’s original motion reads. “That of course is not the law in Mississippi or anywhere else.”
This was much of the basis for Favre’s appeal to the Mississippi Supreme Court. His attorneys argued that interlocutory review “would materially advance this case’s termination and enable the parties and the circuit court to avoid the exceptional expense of litigating meritless claims; avoid further unwarranted damage to Favre’s reputation; and facilitate the administration of justice in Mississippi.”
The justices declined to intervene, denying Favre’s appeal Wednesday.
“This will now allow the civil litigation to move forward, and MDHS is encourage by that prospect and by the Supreme Court’s ruling,” Mississippi Department of Human Services Director Bob Anderson said in a statement after the order came down.
MDHS had argued plainly in its answer to Favre’s appeal that the major orchestrators of the illegal welfare fraud scheme had already pleaded guilty to criminal charges and that the purpose of its civil lawsuit was to “recover the misspent TANF funds from those who aided these fraudsters and benefitted from their frauds.”
“Brett Favre is one of those people,” the attorney for MDHS wrote. “Favre took $1.1 million in TANF funds from Nancy New for speeches he never made. Favre repaid that, but he has neither repaid the $1.7 million he arranged for his drug company, Prevacus, to receive in exchange for giving Nancy New stock, nor the $5 million he orchestrated the USM Athletic Department to receive for a volleyball facility.”
Texts made public last year revealed that New, a nonprofit operator tasked with managing tens of millions of federal anti-poverty funds, had paid Favre $1.1 million under a promotional gig, but only so he could pass the funds to USM so the university could get started on constructing the athletic facility. The only evidence of work Favre conducted under this contract is one radio ad he cut for the anti-poverty program. Favre’s attorneys said he never did use the money he received on the volleyball project.
Favre is not facing criminal charges in the U.S. Attorneys Office’s parallel criminal case, which has produced no major public developments since the office indicted former WWE wrestler Teddy DiBiase Jr. in April.
Mississippians selected their picks for legislative races on Tuesday in what became a history-making primary election.
Several races had not been called as of Wednesday afternoon as some votes were still being counted. For full live election results, click on the link below.
State Rep. Jason White overcame a key hurdle Tuesday in his quest to become the state’s next speaker of the House by comfortably winning his primary.
White, a West native, defeated GOP challenger Cliff Hayes on Tuesday with 80% of the votes in his central Mississippi House district. He is unopposed in the November general election.
White, the current House pro-tem and three-term legislator, is viewed as the likely successor to Speaker Philip Gunn, R-Clinton, who is not seeking reelection. No other candidate has emerged as a likely competitor to White for the post of speaker.
First Black Republican since 1800s elected
In an historic election, Rodney Hall of DeSoto County will become the first Black Republican member of the Mississippi Legislature since the 1800s. He won in the newly created House District 20 with 55% of the vote against Charlie Hoots.
Hall, a military veteran, previously served on the staff of U.S. Rep. Trent Kelly of Tupelo.
A second Black Republican candidate, Biloxi City Councilman Felix Gines, garnered enough support in Tuesday’s primary to force a runoff in the House District 115 race. Gines and Zachary Grady will square off on Aug. 29 for the seat currently held by retiring Rep. Randall Patterson.
Late in 2022, the Mississippi Republican Party announced an effort to boost its Black slate of candidates and membership.
Few House or Senate incumbents lost primaries
State Sen. Philip Moran, R-Kiln, was the only Senate incumbent to lose Tuesday. Philmon Ladner garnered 6,501 votes, or 54%, to defeat the three-term incumbent Moran in the Republican primary. Ladner is unopposed in the November general election.
Four years ago, the 2019 Republican primary included several shocking outcomes. Notably, two key members of the House leadership, Ways and Means Chair Jeff Smith of Columbus and Pro-Tem Greg Snowden of Meridian, were defeated in 2019.
There were no such surprises this year, as no key member of the House or Senate leadership was defeated Tuesday.
Four House incumbents, however, did lose their primaries.
Rep. Brady Williamson of Oxford lost his District 10 Republican primary to Josh Hawkins.
Rep. Perry Van Bailey of Calhoun County was defeated in the District 23 Republican Primary by Andrew Stepp.
Legislative veteran Rep. Rufus Straughter of Belzoni was upended in the District 51 Democratic primary by Timaka James-Jones. Straughter is completing his seventh House term.
Rep. Doug McLeod of Lucedale who was toppled in the District 107 Republican primary by Ronald Lott by eight points. McLeod, who was unopposed in 2019, was arrested that year on charges related to spousal abuse after the deadline for candidates to qualify to run for the post. McLeod later was found not guilty when his wife testified on his behalf.
At least two incumbents will likely advance to the Aug. 29 runoff after no candidates in their elections garnered a majority of the vote.
In one probable runoff, Rep. Nick Bain of Corinth earned just 48.1% of the vote in Tuesday’s primary and will face Brad Mattox, who captured 35.1%. A small number of votes still needed to be counted by Wednesday afternoon.
In the other runoff, incumbent Rep. Dale Goodin of Richton placed second in Tuesday’s District 105 Republican primary with 29.8% of the vote. He will face Elliott Burch, who earned 46.2% of the vote.
Incumbent Tracy Rosebud of Tutwiler appears to have avoided a runoff in the District 30 Democratic primary. With a small number of votes remaining to be counted, Rosebud had 50.8% as of Wednesday afternoon.
Through a partnership between the state Health Department and the state Division of Medicaid, Healthy Moms, Healthy Babies program places registered nurse case managers in the homes of pregnant mothers undergoing high-risk pregnancies.
Since launching, it has expanded to 23 full-time nurses and 17 part-time nurses providing services to about 640 patients around the state.
“With limited resources for mothers and babies, a lot of our efforts are going to be directed to our highest impacted areas to help the folks in the most desperate need the fastest,” Edney said.
The way resources are distributed across the state – sparsely in rural and remote areas but plentiful in certain others – means the program must take a targeted approach.
“We can not look at Mississippi as one organism. We are really six different regions when it comes to public health in terms of populations, demographics, resources available and challenges,” Edney explained. “I have to have different strategies for different areas. The one-size fits all strategy won’t work.”
Dr. Justin Turner, chief medical officer at the state Health Department, witnessed personally how important access to quality health care for mothers is.
Turner’s wife made 30 total visits to five different hospitals or emergency rooms during her last two pregnancies.
Seven of those visits came during her pregnancy five years ago, and the remainder of the visits came during their second pregnancy in August 2022. During her last pregnancy, she experienced “uncharacteristic pain” around month five, requiring her to be supervised by her family 24 hours a day until she gave birth.
The pain would spiral out of control resulting in psychogenic nonepileptic seizures (PNES), previously known as pseudoseizures – emotional and stress-related episodes similar to epileptic seizures but not of neurological origin.
As the number of trips increased, Turner said he had a tough time reassuring his family and himself.
“I was thinking, 'how do I continue to do what I’m supposed to do as the chief medical officer and help assist the state as a whole, when I can’t even help my wife at home?'” Turner told Mississippi Today.
For Black women in Mississippi, the pregnancy-related mortality rate increased from 51.9 to 65.1 deaths per 100,000 live births, quadruple the rate of white women (16.2). With this data in mind, fears of the worst outcome flooded both Turner and his wife’s minds.
“It was natural for me to think that my wife was going to be another statistic,” Turner explained. “She would ask me things like, ‘Baby, am I going to die?’”
The pregnancy remained a challenge until the day that she delivered their child by cesarean section. Every day prior to her being pregnant was “a day of misery,” Turner said. After delivery, his wife never experienced another pseudoseizure episode.
Turner said fortunately for his wife, she had a husband who is a doctor, an OB-GYN, support from family and friends, and a great health care team.
However, he couldn't help but think of how many mothers in Mississippi lack support. Turner said the Healthy Moms, Healthy Babies program aims to add emotional support for mothers who may be in need of it.
“For a lot of women, they benefit from the nurturing and feeling like someone is listening,” Turner continued. “The more people that’s on their team, the better it helps them to endure the process of pregnancy itself.”
As services are being provided to participants, Turner said the health department, stakeholders, policy makers and community members must collaborate to improve outcomes for mothers and their babies.
“We need to find common ground in the areas that we can improve and make sure that we are providing our moms and babies a decent chance at having a healthy pregnancy and coming into this world,” Turner said.
As a Medicaid-reimbursed program, Healthy Moms, Healthy Babies allows mothers to receive monthly targeted case management, health education, and assessments by nurses, social workers and nutritionists at no direct cost to them.
For moms with Medicaid, the services are reimbursed. Edney said the program works with uninsured moms to help them enroll in Medicaid or, if they are not eligible, will provide the services for free.
The Mississippi State Health Department declined Mississippi Today's request to interview a mother who has participated in the program.
After making contact with a mom in need, the nurse consults with the mother’s doctor, who shares why she may be considered high-risk. Common high-risk conditions include preterm labor, diabetes, multiple pregnancy losses and starting prenatal care late.
The nurse then works to mitigate her symptoms by going to the mother's home and pairing her with a multidisciplinary team of resources, such as social workers and nutritionists.
The team of health care workers educate her on the importance of prenatal care, diet plans and how to limit her chances of becoming high-risk in the future. Edney said the program is “working aggressively” to support affected Medicaid moms.
“In our last reporting from the maternal mortality review committee, 87% of deaths were Medicaid moms, and out of all of our maternal deaths, 80% were preventable,” Edney told Mississippi Today. “That is unacceptable.”
Currently, 86% of the participating mothers are Medicaid beneficiaries.
Healthy Moms, Healthy Babies monitors not only high-risk mothers but also high-risk babies up to one year of age.
Daniel Edney, M.D., is the State Health Officer. Credit: Vickie D. King/Mississippi Today
A baby is considered high risk if they are born prior to 37 weeks of gestation, weigh less than 5 pounds 8 ounces at birth, have genetic disorders, experience nutritional deficiencies, infections, or live in unsafe conditions among other factors as well.
The average age of infants enrolled in the program is less than one month old.
The goal of the program is to increase the infant's chances of survival, Edney said. Mississippi leads the nation in its rate of infant mortality.
“I know that if we continue doing what we are doing, nothing is going to change. So, if we all agree we have a problem, which I think everybody does, then this has got to change,” Edney stated. “I don’t have to convince anybody that being 50th in the nation for dead babies is a good thing, because it isn’t.”
The Health Department plans to expand the program so that more women and babies in rural communities have access to necessary care.
Jillian Harper-Peavy, the state program director for Healthy Moms, Healthy Babies, said partnerships with different individuals and organizations are critical for the program to expand.
Jillian Harper-Peavy, program director for Healthy Moms/Healthy Babies, at the 2023 Black Maternal Health Conference. Credit: Courtesy of MSDH
Those organizations include community health centers; hospitals; OB-GYN offices; pediatricians; managed care organizations; and other maternal and child health programs.
“We are prioritizing outreach and engagement of patients continually, as we do want to see the program serve more pregnant women and infants,” Harper-Peavy continued. “As additional patients are enrolled, we will continue to assess our staffing capacity and plan accordingly.”
However, financial constraints have hindered its expansion.
Earlier this year, Edney asked lawmakers to fund $9 million to hire nurses needed to fully staff county health departments and Healthy Moms, Healthy Babies. The request was denied.
Now, Edney said he is seeking to redirect the funding he has and cut back in every department possible to hire the 100 or so nurses he’s identified as potential job candidates.
“I’m trying to provide core public health services around this state with a battered workforce,” Edney explained. “I try to get people to understand that while everybody else may be over COVID-19, the health department is not. We were beaten to pieces, and we’re working hard to rebuild our workforce with the resources that we have.”
Susan Bates, nurse team lead in the northeastern region of the state, manages a team of nurses who serve patients in 11 counties, seven of which are maternal health deserts: Marshall, Benton, Tippah, Pontotoc, Prentiss, Tishomingo and Itawamba.
These counties have no hospitals or birthing centers that provide obstetric care, and no practicing OB-GYNs or certified nurse midwives.
Bates, who cares for an average of six to 10 mothers and babies each day, has encountered women experiencing preterm labor, preterm delivery, preeclampsia, anxiety and depression. She’s also cared for premature and low-birthweight babies.
With more than 26 years of nursing experience, Bates said she aims to make every patient feel respected, valued and heard. Her approach is to listen, understand and “not just focus on checking a box.”
“I feel that it is important to establish a relationship of trust between the mother and her doctors that way we can promote and foster communication. This allows us to provide a more comprehensive care and therefore improve our patients’ outcomes,” Bates continued. “So, when we meet our patients' needs, consistently and correctly, they develop trust in us as their caregiver.”
The Corinth native previously worked for the Mississippi State Health Department for 11 years as a public health nurse, promoting and protecting the health of populations using knowledge from nursing, social and public health science.
Bates, who is certified in pediatric advanced life support and neonatal advanced life support, said caring for high-risk mothers and babies requires a calm demeanor to help the family through what can be a scary time.
“If you look at the big picture, then it may seem overwhelming, but we can’t be stopped by that. We have to know that what we are doing makes a difference to each patient,” Bates explained. “One life at a time, we’re making a difference.”
Edney said that scoring poorly in maternal and infant mortality is a “heavy burden” that requires a “heavy lift” to flip the negative trend to a positive one.
“It’ll take years, but with the work that we’re going to do with the agency, I’m convinced that we will not only get off the bottom with infant mortality,” Edney stated, “we will get off the radar.”
Correction 8/9/2023: This story has been updated to reflect the correct number of hospital visits Turner's wife incurred over the span of two pregnancies.
Dr. Justin Turner, chief medical officer of the Mississippi State Department of Health, talks about his wife’s pregnancy issues and how other Mississippians have similar experiences.
Mississippi health news you can’t get anywhere else.
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A sure sign that the college football season is upon us: The USA Today Coaches Poll is out. The question for today: How accurate will it be? Well, last year it wasn’t accurate at all. Seventeen teams that were in the 2022 preseason poll were not in the post-season poll. Many of the preseason picks went on to have losing seasons.
Jesse Owens won his fourth gold medal as a member of the 4×100-meter relay team that set a world record of 39.8 seconds. The success of Owens and other Black athletes defeated Nazi leader Adolf Hitler’s plans to showcase “Aryan superiority.”
The son of Alabama sharecroppers, he and his family moved to Ohio as part of the Great Migration. In 1935, he burst onto the track scene when he broke world records for the 220-yard dash, the 220-yard hurdles and running broad jump.
Despite criticism from the Nazis, Owens became the star of the Berlin Olympics by breaking world records in the broad jump and the 200-meter race as well as tying the record in the 100-meter race. After winning the gold medal in the broad jump, German athlete Luz Long was the first to congratulate Owens.
“It took a lot of courage for him to befriend me in front of Hitler,” Owens recalled. “You can melt down all the medals and cups I have and they wouldn’t be a plating on the 24-karat friendship I felt for Luz Long at that moment. Hitler must have gone crazy watching us embrace. The sad part of the story is I never saw Long again. He was killed in World War II.”
Although credited with “single-handedly crushing Hitler’s myth of Aryan supremacy,” Owens returned to the U.S. to find it no different than when he left.
“When I came back to my native country, after all the stories about Hitler, I couldn’t ride in the front of the bus,” Owens said. “I had to go to the back door. I couldn’t live where I wanted. I wasn’t invited to shake hands with Hitler, but I wasn’t invited to the White House to shake hands with the President, either.”
He did receive a ticker-tape parade in New York City, but when he went to attend a reception in his honor at the Waldorf-Astoria, he had to ride a freight elevator.
In 1950, he was voted the greatest track and field star of the first half of the century, and in 1976, President Ford gave him the Medal of Freedom. Four years later, he died, and not long after, the city of Berlin named a street in his honor. He posthumously received the Congressional Medal of Honor.
“Perhaps no athlete,” President Jimmy Carter declared, “better symbolized the human struggle against tyranny, poverty and racial bigotry.”
CORINTH – Crystal and Tim Dotson were spooked after watching “The Devil We Know,” a documentary about how the scarily named “forever chemicals” contaminated public soils and streams for decades.
Curious to know if the chemicals, also called PFAS, were affecting them, the Dotson decided to have their water tested. As they discovered, their water contained PFAs at levels much higher than what public health experts consider safe.
“It was staggering,” Crystal Dotson told Mississippi Today.
The revelation came from a study of Mississippi’s tap water — conducted by Consumer Reports in partnership with Mississippi Spotlight, a collaboration between Mississippi Today and other news partners — that tested samples from 149 connections around the state, including all 82 counties.
For years, PFAS were a staple of manufacturing consumer products because of their resilience to natural factors. In some cases, the chemicals are thought to never break down in the environment. Because of PFAS’ fortitude and widespread use, government studies have estimated that nearly every American has at least some trace of the chemicals in their bloodstream.
The Consumer Reports study echoed that concern: almost all of the samples tested – 98% – revealed some level of PFAS from the volunteers’ tap water. But, much like with other contaminants, there are varying opinions on what amount of PFAS people should be allowed to consume.
The Consumer Reports study also tested for heavy metals, including arsenic, cadmium, mercury and lead. Those results were mostly in line with standards set by the Environmental Protection Agency, which determines the legal level of contaminants allowed in public drinking water. The one exception was a sample in Carroll County, which exceeded the EPA’s action level for lead by 22 percent.
While the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention says more research is needed to know what amount of PFAS is dangerous for humans to consume, studies show high concentrations can lead to reproductive issues, developmental effects, different types of cancer, and a weakened immune system.
The EPA has yet to regulate PFAS’ presence in drinking water, which means there’s no legal limit that local governments have to adhere to. In recent years the agency has put out a wide-range of recommended levels for PFAS consumption. Finally, earlier this year, the EPA began its process of creating a legal standard for the chemicals, proposing a limit of 4 ppt, or parts per trillion, for PFOS and PFOA, two of the more common types of PFAS.
Advocacy groups like the Environmental Working Group are far more wary, arguing that any amount of PFAS can be harmful for people to consume, as the chemicals can accumulate in a person’s body over time.
“We have hundreds and hundreds and hundreds of studies that show the linked health effects, and we know that no level of PFAS in your drinking water (is safe) because it affects the human body at such low levels,” said Tasha Stoiber, a senior scientist at EWG.
Regardless of the standards, most would agree the level of PFAS in the Dotsons’ tap water in Corinth is unsafe. Their sample returned a “total PFAS” level – the sum of over 40 different types of the chemical – of 92 ppt. For reference, the International Bottled Water Association uses a limit of 10 ppt. Their levels for PFOS and PFOA were 11 ppt and 8 ppt, respectively, which are both at least twice the level of what the EPA is looking to enforce.
Tim and Crystal Dotson have a moment in their kitchen in Corinth, Miss., Friday, July 21, 2023. After tests were conducted on several homes in the town, the Dotson’s home proved to have the most evidence of Per- and polyfluoroalkyl substances, PFAS. Credit: Eric Shelton/Mississippi Today
While it’s nearly impossible to trace specific health symptoms to water contamination, the Dotsons say they’ve encountered a myriad of concerns since moving to their Corinth home five years ago. Tim has suffered recent bouts with kidney disease, cancer, and high blood pressure, the latter two of which have been linked to PFAS.
The Dotsons and their four kids, who have lived in Corinth for 10 years, drink the tap water through a Brita filter, but standard filters like those can’t fully eliminate PFAS. Crystal and Tim, who both live off government disability payments, said they can’t afford more advanced filtration systems (For reference, both EWG and Consumer Reports have compiled lists of filters aimed at PFAS.).
(Consumer Reports has identified four water filters, including two pitchers and two under-sink models, that can help consumers filter out forever chemicals. EWG also has compiled a list of filters aimed at PFAS.)
“It’s the only water that we have,” Crystal said. “This is our home.”
John Rhodes, the general manager for Corinth’s water department, said he wasn’t aware of high PFAS levels within the city, largely because Mississippi has no testing requirements.
“Unless it’s something that’s regulated, I’m not going to be totally aware of it,” Rhodes said.
The Mississippi State Health Department, which regulates public water quality at the state level, confirmed that it doesn’t test for PFAS. Liz Sharlot, spokesperson for MSDH, said the state doesn’t test for PFAS “based on past random test results not indicating its presence,” adding that more testing will likely happen in the coming years as federal funding becomes available.
About a decade ago, the EPA tested for PFAS in 80 Mississippi locations. While those results revealed no levels above “minimum reporting requirements,” the minimums were at least five times higher than what the EPA is currently proposing. In other words, those results have no bearing on whether they would’ve met the agency’s new standards.
After scientists invented PFAS in the 1930s, manufacturers realized how valuable an ingredient it could be. The chemicals became widely used in tools like firefighting foam in the military, and in an array of consumer products like furniture stain repellents and non-stick cookware.
But those manufacturers and the Department of Defense eventually learned of the dangers of PFAS to those who go near the chemicals. In 2018, ProPublica reported that both the government and manufacturers were slow to reveal the threat of PFAS to the public.
There’s limited knowledge of how widespread PFAS in Mississippi are. Just about a dozen states, Mississippi not included, are either regulating or proposing limits on PFAS in drinking water.
An EWG map of DOD data shows nine sites in the state where the military used firefighting foam containing PFAS. While the military is phasing out use of PFAS, the data from groundwater samples at those sites shows PFAS levels that, in some cases, were thousands of times higher than the limits the EPA is proposing.
Below are the full results from the Consumer Reports study:
This interactive data visualization was created by Enlighten Designs with support from the Microsoft Journalism Initiative and leveraging Microsoft Power BI and Excel.
As shown above, the samples with the highest levels of PFAS came from Corinth, Vaiden, Hattiesburg, Gulfport, Lexington, and Tchula.
Homeowners with some of the higher levels of PFAS offered a wide range of reactions, from concerned, to confused, to indifferent.
Shawn Harris, a banker in Hattiesburg who also runs the Piney Woods Conservation Group, wrote to the EPA urging it to enforce standards limiting PFAS. But even Harris, whose test results showed a total PFAS level of 9.6 ppt, said it’s puzzling trying to figure out what those numbers mean.
“It’s really hard to follow,” Harris said. “When I first got the results I was like, ‘Oh, dang, I’m good, but not that good.’”
Even though he drinks bottled water, he said he’s looking to get an under-the-sink filter for the tap water he gives his pets.
Other volunteers, though, were less concerned. Alan Wilson sent in a sample from his remote weekend home in Lexington, showing 43.4 ppt of total PFAS, one of the highest results in the study.
“When you think about 43 parts per trillion, that’s not much,” he said, adding that he didn’t know why there would be PFAS contamination given that there aren’t any businesses near the property. “So, no, I guess I don’t get too excited about it. It doesn’t scare me.”
It’s unclear how well or how soon local water utilities will be able to filter out PFAS. Once an EPA rule is finalized, utilities will have three years to come into compliance. Even then, many local systems are worried about the associated costs and having to pass on large rate hikes to customers.
The Dotson family believes that some of their medical conditions are a result of the Per- and polyfluoroalkyl substances, PFAS, drinking water contamination at their home in Corinth, Miss., Friday, July 21, 2023. Credit: Eric Shelton/Mississippi Today
Since learning what was in their tap water, the Dotsons have started drinking from store-bought bottles, costing them about $15 a week. Crystal said they started seeing improvements in Tim’s health within a week of the change. As for what happens next, she said she hopes for more accountability over the release of PFAS into public water sources.
“Somebody should go to jail over it,” Doston said. “They need to dissolve those companies and disperse that money to the people that were hurt.”
This investigation was conducted by Consumer Reports in partnership with Mississippi Spotlight, a collaboration between Mississippi Today, the Clarion Ledger and Mississippi Public Broadcasting.
