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In Mississippi legislative parlance, there are rare issues that can “take your picture off the wall” at the Capitol.

This refers to issues about which voters care so deeply that if a lawmaker doesn’t do right by them, they will oust him or her in the next election. Their photo will no longer be in the framed array of the current Legislature.

Monkeying with state retirees’ benefits, massive tax increases — there are only a few singular issues considered to have such statewide, grassroots gravitas. And in general lawmakers either treat them like a third rail on a subway, or else snap-to when it comes to a vote.

Is restoring voters’ rights to ballot initiative — sidestepping the Legislature and putting an issue directly to a statewide vote — one of those take-your-picture-down issues?

Some elected leaders and candidates believe so. And some recent public polling and social media outcry would appear to back them up. Some citizens groups have tried to organize members to call and write lawmakers about it. Should the Legislature fail again to restore this right, it will likely be a campaign issue in many statewide and legislative races this year.

READ MORE: Restoring Mississippi ballot initiative process survives legislative deadline

A recent poll by Tulchin Research for the Southern Poverty Law Center Action Fund reported 65% of Mississippi voters surveyed support restoring ballot initiative rights, and only 14% opposed. Support crossed party, age, race and other demographic lines.

There’s no doubt many Mississippians across the spectrum were hopping mad when the state Supreme Court stripped voters of this right in 2021. This was with a ruling on medical marijuana, an instance where voters had taken matters in hand after lawmakers dallied for years on an issue. Legislative leaders were quick back then with vows they would restore this right to voters, fix the legal glitches that prompted the high court to rule it invalid.

But given the way they’ve fiddle-faddled on restoring the right for going on two years now, it would appear some legislative leaders don’t see it as top-of-mind for voters, or don’t believe voters are paying a lot of attention to particulars.

READ MORE: Mississippi Supreme Court strikes down ballot initiative process

Lt. Gov. Delbert Hosemann and his Senate Accountability Chairman, John Polk, R-Hattiesburg, in particular, haven’t exactly tripped over themselves in effort to restore voter’s right to a ballot initiative.

Polk’s initial draft of a measure this session essentially would have given voters ballot initiative rights in name only. It would have given the Legislature power to veto or amend citizens’ initiatives before they go before voters, sort of missing the whole point of a ballot initiative. It also would have required, on top of forcing initiative sponsors to collect more than double the signatures previously required to get something on the ballot, that sponsors get at least 10 signatures each from the state’s more than 300 municipalities. This would be a near impossible task.

Even after making some concessions, Senate Bill 2638 would still require about 240,000 voter signatures to put something on the ballot compared to about 107,000 under the state’s previous initiative process. The Senate’s demands for requiring a large number of signatures killed reinstatement last year when the House wouldn’t go along.

Polk told his colleagues if he had his way, he’d require even more signatures for voters to bypass the Legislature, and he voted against the measure even though he was the one presenting it for a Senate vote.

Many political observers viewed Hosemann routing the measure to Polk’s committee again this year — instead of the Constitution or Elections committees — as a sign he’s not all that into restoring ballot initiative rights.

Sen. David Blount, D-Jackson, before last week’s Senate vote, appeared to warn his colleagues about only paying lip service to restoring the initiative.

“We’re about to find out soon where people really are, when we see if we get a legitimate, workable ballot initiative process,” Blount said. “… We need to be straight with people that we mean it.”

There are reasonable arguments for and against voter ballot initiative.

Voter initiative, a creation of the early 20th Century progressive movement, gave citizens the ability to overcome the influence of big money interests on legislatures, and can still serve as a valuable backstop. There are 25 states with some form of voter initiative or referendum (the power of voters to kill a law).

But Mississippi’s form of government, just like the nation’s, is a representative democratic republic, not a direct democracy where major policy or spending is decided by a majority vote of the masses. Our founding fathers were just as afraid of the “excesses of democracy” as they were of despotic kings, and they believed democracy should be tempered through legislative representation, protective of minority rights, and checked by the judicial and executive branches.

Polk warned last week that out-of-state interests can spend large amounts of money and harness social media campaigns to co-opt the ballot initiative process and force policy that is not truly grassroots.

The issue, as it did last year, will likely come down to House-Senate negotiations on a final version of restoration late in the legislative session.

And given its treatment thus far on High Street, reinstatement of voters’ right to take matters into their own hands is far from certain.

But any lawmakers involved in killing or watering down such rights are taking a risk. And voters could take their pictures off the Capitol walls.

READ MORE: 5 reasons lawmakers might not want to restore the ballot initiative

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It’s an election year — political love is in the air.

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Mississippi is leading the country in syphilis cases, resulting in a tragic uptick of newborns risking death from the disease across the state. 

Mississippi has had a more than 900% increase in babies born with syphilis – a sexually transmitted disease that is also passed to an infant during pregnancy – in six years ending in 2021. Syphilis can cause miscarriages and death. Surviving children born with the disease can have major malformations and life-long complications.

The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention reported preliminary data that 2,677 babies nationwide born with congenital syphilis in 2021. It was the highest number reported in one year since 1994. Case counts have been rising steadily since 2013. 

“It’s absolutely alarming and shocking,” said former State Health Officer Dr. Thomas Dobbs, “and it’s totally preventable.”

Dobbs now leads the University of Mississippi Medical Center’s School of Population Health. He and other leading health care officials in the state are trying to warn parents and colleagues about the growing problem.

“Years past, it was a rare and uncommon event (at Forrest General Hospital), where we had a couple babies per year with congenital syphilis,” said Dr. Anita Henderson, a pediatrician at The Pediatric Clinic in Hattiesburg. “Now, we are seeing babies on a monthly, sometimes weekly basis, who test positive from mothers who received partial treatment, or no treatment.”

Syphilis is treated effectively with penicillin. Despite a simple cure, Mississippians are continuing to contract and pass along the illness with dire consequences.

In 2016, eight babies in Mississippi were born and hospitalized with syphilis. In 2021, that number hit 106, according to data Dobbs shared based on health department and hospital discharge numbers. While syphilis cases in infants have gone up nationwide, Mississippi’s rate of increase is nearly five times the national average. 

“The numbers are bad,” said Dr. Charlotte Hobbs, a professor of pediatric infectious disease and microbiology at UMMC, “and they’re just going to get worse.” 

Mississippi is tied with Nevada for the leading rate of overall cases of syphilis per population of 100,000.

Most states require syphilis screenings in pregnancy by law, but Mississippi is one of six that doesn’t. Without mandatory screenings, some mothers are shocked to learn they even have the disease. They may not have symptoms, and by the time they do find out, it’s sometimes too late. 

State Epidemiologist Dr. Paul Byers said in a statement the health department is exploring the possibility of a regulation requiring syphilis testing during pregnancy.

“The messaging isn’t always clear,” Hobbs said, “but syphilis can kill your baby and it can kill you.”

Henderson said it largely comes down to a lack of sexually transmitted disease education. Sometimes those who have syphilis don’t realize a single dose of treatment isn’t enough to eradicate the infection and they need multiple doses. Maybe they were treated, but their partner never was, and they got reinfected. 

“I do think they are surprised to learn syphilis can cause problems with the baby,” Henderson said. “Syphilis is easily treated … so it is not something people think about a cause of death in children in 2023. But we have had several babies die and many other suffering long term issues.” 

Dobbs said poorer women – usually women of color – especially struggle to access prenatal health care. Nearly 71% of the babies born and hospitalized with syphilis in Mississippi in 2021 were Black, according to data provided by Dobbs. It’s another example of the state’s alarming health care disparities in treatment of the Black population in Mississippi. 

Transportation is a major barrier. OB-GYN offices can be a long haul from rural portions of the state, and county health clinics are dealing with major nursing and staff shortages. County health clinics may offer free syphilis screenings, but nine locations have closed in recent years, and more have reduced their hours.

“We don’t have a comprehensive support network where women are accessing prenatal care,” Dobbs said.

He sees that as the largest barrier. Another comes with how difficult it is for expecting mothers and parents to access health care in general, especially under Medicaid. That’s why doctors across Mississippi are pushing for the state’s Medicaid coverage to include presumption of eligibility during pregnancies. A bill in the House that would have sped up access to care for mothers at lower income thresholds during pregnancy already died this session. 

It’s not uncommon for an expecting mother to wait more than a month before their public health insurance is approved after they become aware of their pregnancy. That public health insurance covers about 65% of the state’s pregnancies. 

Doctors offices often won’t see pregnant patients until they have their coverage card in hand – which could mean missing out on penicillin treatments in the first trimester, when outcomes would be the most favorable.

Penicillin treatments, though relatively simple, are pricey. Doctors’ offices often don’t want to take on that expense without the assurance they will be paid back.

“Women of a reproductive age need to have regular health care to have proper family resources,” Dobb said. “Women should be empowered to time births consistent with their desires, with the counseling of physicians.” 

But in Mississippi that access often isn’t easy to come by. Dobbs said the syphilis outbreak is a reflection on the depletion of Department of Health resources.

“If your health department doesn’t have anybody in them, you can’t get tested or treated,” Dobbs said. “Those are the bread-and-butter pieces of syphilis control. Over the past two decades, public health has deteriorated remarkably.”

Now, an increasing number of children in Mississippi are living with the consequences. 

The post Mississippi battles 900% increase in babies born with syphilis appeared first on Mississippi Today.

House leaders quietly let die a bill that would have stripped some of the authority of the board that oversees the Mississippi Public Employees Retirement System.

The bill died Feb. 9, a deadline day, when House Appropriations Chair John Read, R-Gautier, did not call it up for consideration.

The action, or lack of action, came one day after House Speaker Philip Gunn received a letter from PERS Executive Director Ray Higgins saying the retirement system board would likely vote in an upcoming meeting to delay increasing the employer contribution rate.

The board had voted by a 7-3 margin in December 2022 to increase the rate paid by state agencies, school districts and local governments from 17.4% of an employees paycheck to 22.4%.

The board’s December decision had caused consternation with legislators and local governmental entities because of the additional cost of the rate increase.

READ MORE: Lawmakers ponder stripping state retirement system authority after board votes to raise rates

Higgins wrote to Gunn he believed the board in an upcoming meeting would ratify his suggestion to postpone the rate increase from October 2023 to July 2024.

“This change will provide more time for planning while remaining consistent with actuarial recommendations and acting in the best interest of the membership to ensure the plan is properly funded long term,” Higgins wrote to Gunn. “We will also discuss the potential and cost of phasing in the rate increase.”

Higgins recently told members of the Senate Finance Committee the rate increase was needed to ensure the long-term viability of the system. The Public Employees Retirement System currently has more than 300,000 members either working currently or in the past in state or local governments .

Under state law, increasing the rate state and local governments pay into the system is “the only lever” the PERS Board has to address funding shortfalls. The House bill would have given the Legislature the final say on rate increases.

The action of the board to increase the rate by 5% to 22.04% would have cost state and local governmental entities, including school districts and higher education entities, $345 million annually, including $265 million for state agencies and education entities.

In the letter, Higgins said the board also would provide recommendations to the Legislature on how to deal with some of the funding issues, such as changing the benefits for new employees. Higgins had told a Senate committee recently changing the benefits for new employees would help long-term, but would not provide any immediate relief.

The system’s current full-funding ratio is about 61%, meaning it has the assets to pay the benefits of 61% of all the people in the system, ranging from the newest hires to those already retired. Theoretically, it is recommended that retirement systems have a funding ratio of about 80%.

Higgins said the system is stressed by the fact that additional benefits were added for employers in the late 1990s and early 2000s without a method to pay for those benefits.

In addition, the current governmental workforce is shrinking while the number of retirees in the system is growing. Higgins said during the past 10 years the governmental workforce is down by about 10%, while the number of retirees has increased by more than 25%.

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FEBRUARY 14, 1879

Blanche Kelso Bruce became the first Black American to preside over the U.S. Senate. He was also the first Black American to serve a full term in the Senate and later the first Black American to win any votes at a major party’s nominating convention. 

After escaping from slavery during the Civil War, he attempted to enlist in the Union Army. When he was turned down, he began teaching, eventually organizing Missouri’s first school for Black children in Hannibal. After making his way down the Mississippi River, he decided to enter politics, rising through the ranks of Republican leaders, elected sheriff of Bolivar County, then the county superintendent of education. He turned the Bolivar County school system into one of the best in the state, becoming a well-known figure across the state. 

In 1874, the Mississippi Legislature chose Bruce to fill the governor’s vacant seat in the U.S. Senate. After Mississippi’s violent 1875 election, Bruce championed a bill to investigate the political conditions there. The bill passed the Senate, but the House, controlled by Democrats, did nothing. He pushed for the desegregation of the U.S. Army, citing what had already happened in the U.S. Navy. 

In 1880, he railed against the treatment of Native Americans. “Our Indian policy and administration seem to me to have been inspired and controlled by stern selfishness,” he said. 

He introduced legislation to assist destitute Black farmers in Kansas. Although the bill died in committee, it led to the distribution of duty–free British cotton clothing to impoverished Kansas communities. 

When the Mississippi Legislature, now controlled by Democrats, gathered to select a new senator in January 1880, Bruce didn’t bother. Lawmakers chose one of Mississippi’s “redeemers” of Reconstruction, White Democrat James Z. George, to replace him. 

Bruce went on to serve as register of the U.S. Treasury and died of diabetes complications in 1898. In 2001, the Senate wing of the Capitol unveiled a portrait of Bruce, based on a Matthew Brady photograph. The statue of George, however, continues to represent the state of Mississippi, along with Confederate President Jefferson Davis.

The post On this day in 1879 appeared first on Mississippi Today.

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Almost two-thirds of rural hospitals across Mississippi are losing money taking care of patients. 

Data from the Center for Healthcare Quality and Payment Reform from mid-January shows that 48 of Mississippi’s 74 rural hospitals have a negative patient services margin.

Patient services margins refer to how much money a hospital makes or loses providing services to patients. It does not account for federal grants hospitals may have received during the pandemic. 

In Mississippi, rural hospitals are integral to the survival of communities, economically and physically. When they shutter, it means the loss of job opportunities and health care. 

READ MORE: ‘Slightly more breathing room’: Fewer rural hospitals at risk of closure, but threat still looms

The center uses hospitals’ patient services margin to calculate risk of closure. If the hospital has enough assets to maintain operations while in the negative for several years, it’s at risk of closure, though not immediate. 

“If a hospital is losing money on patient services and they are not getting enough money from other sources to offset those losses, it’s losing money overall,” said Harold Miller, president and CEO of the national policy center. “In other words, they owe more than they have.”

A quarter of Mississippi’s rural hospitals are at risk of closing immediately, or within the next two to three years — the fourth highest percentage in the country. 

Use this map and hover over your area to find out what your hospital’s patient services margin is.

The post MAP: See which rural hospitals in Mississippi are losing money on patient care appeared first on Mississippi Today.

Note: This editorial anchored Mississippi Today’s weekly legislative newsletter. Subscribe to our free newsletter for exclusive access to legislative analysis and up-to-date information about what’s happening under the Capitol dome.

Mississippi Republican legislative leaders don’t have to listen when their Black colleagues tell them that they’re stripping voting power from Black Mississippians.

They don’t have to listen when they’re told that they’re passing a bill that is bound for yet another federal court battle, that they’re stoking racial division across the state, that they’re once again drawing horrible national attention, that they’re dragging Mississippi back in time.

Republicans have carefully created for themselves a legislative body with virtually unlimited and unchecked power. It allows them to completely shut people who don’t look like them or think like them out of the legislative process, and they often use it to pass legislation that stretches the limits of democracy.

This is no accident. Over the past 30 years, as Mississippi’s electorate shifted from the Democratic to Republican Party, Republicans used their newfound power to strategically redraw legislative districts and give themselves supermajority control of both the Senate and House. They can, without any say whatsoever from Democrats, pass any bill they want. Inside the Capitol, a small handful of GOP leaders have drawn up rules that give them all the power, and rank-and-file legislators — including the vast majority of Republican legislators — wield little influence over what passes or fails.

Democrats, meanwhile, the party of the overwhelming majority of Black Mississippians, have no voting power at all inside the Capitol. They can give impassioned speeches at the wells, they can stretch debates to four-plus hours, they can walk off the floor to protest racist bills, they can hold fiery press conferences, but they cannot stop Republicans from passing any single piece of legislation.

There is almost never partisan compromise. There is rarely genuine debate. There is plenty of one-sided control.

READ MORE: The purposefully broken lawmaking process in Jackson

With this power, Republicans have passed all sorts of legislation the past couple years despite vocal pushback from Black lawmakers: a critical race theory ban, which famously led every Black senator to walk off the floor in protest before the final vote; tighter legislative and congressional redistricting maps that diluted Black voting strength; the nation’s strictest voting laws in a state with a sordid, racist history; massive tax cuts that disproportionately affect poor and Black taxpayers; and anti-LGBTQ legislation that threatens the lives of a vulnerable population.

But perhaps no legislation better showcases the unilateral GOP control under the dome better than House Bill 1020, which passed the House late in the evening of Feb. 7.

Yes, the national headlines you read last week were accurate: A mostly-white House supermajority passed a bill that would create a completely white-appointed judicial district and expand the police force within the whiter areas of Jackson, the Blackest large city in America.

READ MORE: ‘Only in Mississippi’: House votes to create white-appointed court system for Blackest city in America

For more than four hours, Black House members delivered what should be certainly considered some of the most cautionary and impassioned speeches ever made in the Mississippi State Capitol building. Many of their comments echoed ones made by their predecessors in the building and civil rights leaders of 60 years ago.

Rep. Ed Blackmon, D-Canton: “Only in Mississippi would we have a bill like this, with our history, where you say solving the problem is taking the vote away from Black people because we don’t know how to choose our leaders … This is just like the 1890 Constitution all over again. We are doing exactly what they said they were doing back then: ‘Helping those people because they can’t govern themselves.’”

Rep. Solomon Osborne, D-Greenwood: “I don’t even know why I’m down here, frankly, because it’s like being at a Klan rally with people with suits on. That’s the only difference I see between these people here. They wear suits rather than sheets … Every day we get up here and open this body with prayer. I wonder what God are these people praying to?”

Rep. John Hines, D-Greenville: “Again, we end up being the laughingstock of America because of what we do here today.”

While Black House members were doing all they could to plead with the humanity of their GOP colleagues, a large number of Republicans left the House floor altogether for a majority of the debate, reappearing from the back halls of the Capitol to cast a final “yea” vote. House Speaker Philip Gunn sat on the speaker’s dais leaned back in his chair with his legs crossed, talking regularly with various Republicans who came to visit with him. Rep. Trey Lamar, the GOP leader who authored and defended House Bill 1020 on the floor floor, sat behind the well and scrolled his phone.

They didn’t seem to listen to what their Black colleagues were saying. They didn’t have to.

Now the bill moves to the Senate, in recent years the more moderate of the two chambers. But it’s an election year, and Republicans believe nothing seems to motivate Republican voters more than being “tough on crime.” And this is Mississippi, so being tough on crime in the Blackest city in America is probably not the worst thing for Republicans who want to go home and flaunt their GOP bonafides.

Considering legislative Republicans have passed legislation in recent years that they knew would face federal lawsuits to hopefully draw the attention and reforming action of the U.S. Supreme Court — remember Dobbs v. Jackson Women’s Health Organization? — it’s difficult to write off anything that moves through the Mississippi State Capitol.

Meanwhile, the Republican supermajority rolls on for at least six more weeks this session. And if you’re hoping political change is on the horizon, there’s more bad news. According to a recent Mississippi Today analysis of this year’s legislative elections, there’s no possible way the GOP will lose control.

For at least four more years, the current trajectory of policy making in Mississippi could very well continue.

READ MORE: Republicans again a lock to control Legislature after November election

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Mississippi Today is pleased to announce that Devna Bose has joined the community health team at Mississippi Today.

Bose, a native of Philadelphia, will serve as the community health reporter. Her work will cover statewide health issues with a focus on rural health care.

She comes to Mississippi Today from the Post & Courier in Charleston, S.C., where she covered education. Before that she worked at The Charlotte Observer in Charlotte, N.C., and the education nonprofit news organization Chalkbeat in New Jersey.

She graduated from the University of Mississippi with a degree in journalism in 2019.

“Returning home to report in the state I grew up in is a privilege,” Bose said. “I know the health care crisis that Mississippi is facing — my family and friends have lived it. That’s why I’m committed to sharing the stories of the people being impacted by the failures of our state’s most powerful. There’s so much work to do, and I’m grateful to be doing it for Mississippi Today, a newsroom I’ve long admired for its dedication to fearless, enterprising journalism.”

Community Health Team Editor Kate Royals oversees the health team.

“Devna is an incredibly talented writer and a thorough journalist. Her work on the school system in Newark and its uneven and sometimes nonexistent management of students with asthma led to changes in the district and proposed federal legislation,” said Royals. “We are so excited to have her back in Mississippi.”

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Perhaps the most Mississippi-centric Super Bowl is history, and your Mississippi Today sports columnist has some thoughts on Kansas City’s thrill-packed 38-35 victory.

First and foremost, our Mississippi lads did not let us down. We’ll get to that, but first let’s get to the play everyone wanted to talk about immediately after the game. Yes, I am referring to the holding call against Philadelphia cornerback James Bradbury with just under two minutes to play. 

Patrick Mahomes – the fast-growing legend – threw an incomplete pass intended for Juju Smith-Schuster in the end zone on third down, seemingly setting up a chip-shot field goal that would give Kansas City a 3-point lead but also give the Eagles and their heroic quarterback Jalen Hurts plenty of time to either tie the game or perhaps win it.

But wait! An official flagged Bradbury for holding Smith-Schuster on the play, which he clearly did. Bradbury reached out and grabbed Smith-Schuster’s jersey, delaying him a split second on his route. 

The Chiefs were awarded a first down and then were able to run the clock down, kick the winning field goal with just seconds to play for the victory. It was an anti-climactic finish to what was an otherwise entertaining game.

FOX network commentator Greg Olsen – who was terrific, by the way – immediately questioned whether the officials should make that call in that situation. Seemingly millions of fans did the same on social media. “You can’t make that call in that situation,” seemed to be the consensus opinion.

Here’s the deal: Smith-Schuster was the intended receiver on the play. He faked a pass pattern across the middle, then cut back to the outside. Fooled, Bradbury reached out and grabbed Smith-Schuster’s jersey. It was holding, plain and simple. In my opinion, you have to make that call regardless of how much time is left. I don’t subscribe to the “the officials shouldn’t decide the outcome” opinion. I look at it this way: A clear infraction of the rules should not decide the outcome.

It was the right call. And apparently Bradbury knew it. “It was holding,” he said, afterward. “I tugged the jersey.”

Case closed.

Mississippians – and there were nine on the two rosters – did not disappoint. A.J. Brown, the Eagles’s splendid receiver from Starkville and Ole Miss, caught six passes for 96 yards, including a 45-yard touchdown. Those are winning statistics in a losing effort. Brown clearly has become one of the best receivers in the sport.

For the winning Chiefs, defensive tackle Chris Jones of Houston and Mississippi State, anchored the defensive line, occupying two Eagles blockers for most of the night. Willie Gay, who weighs 240 and runs like a halfback, was in on eight tackles ranging from sideline to sideline from his middle linebacker position. Linebacker Darius Harris of Horn Lake and Middle Tennessee State was in on one tackle.

Eagles running back Kenneth Gainwell from Yazoo County and Memphis, accounted for 52 yards total, running for 21, catching four passes for 20 more and running back a kickoff 11 yards. He scored an apparent touchdown on the first possession of the game only to have it nullified by replay. Eagles and former Southern Miss wide receiver Quez Watkins caught one pass for six yards and narrowly missed a diving try for a much longer pass. It would have been a terrific catch and it’s a play he has made before both for the Golden Eagles and the NFL Eagles.

Also for the Eagles, cornerback Darius Slay, formerly of Mississippi State, made four tackles and big Fletcher Cox of Yazoo and Mississippi State made one tackle. Cox, as Jones, was often double-teamed by Chiefs blockers. Cox and Jones are perfect examples of how misleading the statistics of defensive linemen can be. Their tackle totals were meager, yet they consistently did their jobs, occupying two blockers.

Seemed a shame that one of the quarterbacks, Mahomes or Hurts, had to walk off the field a loser. Both played marvelously. Put it this way: Hurts threw for 304 yards and a touchdown, ran for 70 yards and three touchdowns, did not throw an interception – and lost. What Mahomes did, willing the Chiefs to victory on one good leg, is the stuff legends are made of – and he is one at age 27.

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