Mississippi Today’s political team shares their biggest surprises of the 2023 legislative session, breaking down major issues that lawmakers are debating (or not debating) in the final days of the session.
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Legislative leaders, negotiating a state budget during the final days of the 2023 session, said they intend to provide funds to help with recovery efforts from Friday’s tornadoes that tore a path of death and destruction through the Delta and north Mississippi.
The storm has thus far resulted in 25 deaths in Mississippi and destroyed buildings stretching from the south Delta to the Amory area in northeast Mississippi.
House Speaker Philip Gunn, R-Clinton, was among the legislative leaders who visited Rolling Fork that suffered massive destruction. On Sunday he said legislators “stand ready to provide whatever monetary resources we can to help them.”
He said Sunday he was first told by Mississippi Emergency Management Agency officials $5 million might be needed to provide the state’s share to match the federal funds that will be available as a result of President Joe Biden issuing an emergency declaration. Later in the day, as more research was conducted, Gunn said $8 million might be needed. But he said as the recovery effort continues that number is fluid.
Gunn said the funds could be incorporated in the budget bill for MEMA. Unless a rules suspension is passed, legislators face a Monday night deadline to pass the appropriations bills to fund state government.
“I don’t think money will be the issue,” Gunn said. “I think the issue is how we help them get their lives back … I saw devastation like I have never seen before.”
Another area where the state might provide help, Senate Education Chair Dennis DeBar, R-Leakesville, said, is to the local schools. He said he has been talking with Lt. Gov. Delbert Hosemann and House leaders about the state paying the insurance deductibles for schools that were damaged by the storm both in the south Delta and in north Mississippi.
DeBar said there also could be a state fund created to provide immediate help for the schools until they receive the federal money they are in line to get because of the president’s emergency declaration.
Hosemann’s office said work is being done to help local school districts have locations as soon as possible where the displaced students can return to school.
While the storm has diverted some of the attention away from legislative leaders’ efforts to reach a budget deal, that work is continuing.
DeBar said he was “very disappointed” to read a Mississippi Today story on Saturday that quoted Gunn and other House leaders saying they will not agree to place additional money in the Mississippi Adequate Education Program that provides the state’s share of the needs for local school districts.
DeBar said if lawmakers put more money into education, it should be placed in the MAEP formula since it provides funds for basic needs, such as teacher salaries, custodians and lunchroom workers.
He said more money is needed in the formula because inflation has skyrocketed in recent years, yet the formula has been essentially level funded.
DeBar said Senate leaders will continue to push for additional MAEP funding this year, and he said he would resume that fight in the 2024 session if an agreement cannot be reached this year.
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Mississippi Today Editor-at-Large Marshall Ramsey and FWD.us State Director Alesha Judkins talk about Mississippi’s ongoing incarceration crisis for this episode of Mississippi Stories. FWD.us is a nonprofit advocacy group founded by technology and business executives that work to support immigration and criminal justice reform. Currently, Mississippi has the highest imprisonment rate in the nation and fives time the national average for the length of stay in jail. Judkins discusses what contributes to these statistics and what can be done to reform or alleviate the issues in our state’s prison system.
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President Franklin D. Roosevelt appointed William H. Hastie as the first Black federal magistrate.
Hastie served as a judge in the Virgin Islands before becoming dean of the Howard Law School in 1939. Two years after being appointed to aid Secretary of War Henry L. Stinson in reforming the military’s segregationist policies, Hastie resigned from the position to protest the “reactionary policies and discriminatory practices.”
In 1949, President Harry Truman appointed him judge of the Third United States Circuit Court of Appeals, making him the first Black American to be appointed as a federal appeals court judge. After leaving the bench, he aided Thurgood Marshall in the NAACP’s groundbreaking litigation.
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House and Senate conferees met for days including through the Easter weekend in 1997 to hammer out an agreement on the landmark Mississippi Adequate Education Program legislation that was ultimately approved by both chambers.
All of those often intense and combustible meetings were open to the members of the media, who were on hand to see Senate negotiator Hob Bryan, D-Amory, storm out of the meeting in response to House proposals he found objectionable. Reporters also were on hand when the conferees, with the exception of then-Senate Appropriations Chair Dick Hall, R-Jackson, signed the compromise on the school funding formula, sending it on to the two chambers that approved it overwhelmingly.
Joint rule 23A of the Mississippi House and Senate stipulates that “all official meetings of any conference committee on a bill or on a resolution proposing a constitutional amendment shall be open to the public at all times, unless declared an executive session in accordance with the provisions of Section 25-41-7, Mississippi Code of 1972.”
That is the rule now, approved overwhelmingly by members of the House and Senate in 2020. It was not the rule in 1997 when House and Senate negotiators held open conference committee meetings on the MAEP. The House and Senate negotiators just thought it was the right thing to do.
As the 2023 session quickly approaches its scheduled conclusion, there are about 250 bills in conference, meaning on each bill three senators and three House members appointed by the two presiding officers are meeting to work out the differences in the House and Senate versions of the legislation.
Despite the joint rules approved by the House and Senate saying conference committees “shall be open,” many House and Senate members would have a bonafide conniption if a group of reporters or the general public tried to walk in on their conference meeting. Some conference committee meetings might be open on occasion, but not often and not like it used to be.
There was a time in the Legislature when reporters sat in the office of then-Lt. Gov. Phil Bryant as House and Senate negotiators tried to solve a budget deadlock. Reporters crowded into the office of then-Senate Appropriations Chair Jack Gordon and watched conferees talk about cars and food because they had nothing else to say about the then-ongoing budget impasse.
At one point, Republicans, including now-Speaker Philip Gunn, but at the time the minority leader, complained that the Democratic leadership of Speaker Billy McCoy was not negotiating on the budget in good faith with the Republican leadership of the Senate. McCoy and his budget leaders welcomed members of the House Republican minority to come to the open conference committees, where they could watch the budget negotiations in person.
In fairness to the current leadership, conference committees have never been completely open. The nature of the process makes that virtually impossible. At the end of the session, when conferencing kicks into high gear, a lot is going on and legislative leaders are not necessarily thinking about the importance of transparency, but simply trying to meet constitutionally imposed deadlines.
And often agreements are reached on bills with no formal conference meeting. The two primary conferees — one from the House and one from the Senate — might meet in passing in the halls of the Capitol and hammer out an agreement and ask the other conferees to sign off on the agreement at their convenience.
And truth be known, members of the media and the general public would not be interested in many of those bills.
But there are major pieces of legislation where there would be intense interest.
In the early 1990s, then House Education Chair McCoy and Senate Education Chair Ronnie Musgrove began holding their conference meetings in the open. There was no rule requiring them to do so. They just looked at it as an effort at transparency and perhaps good government.
The idea of the open conference committees grew, to a large extent, out of their actions. In theory, legislators still embrace the idea of open conference committee meetings in their joint rules, but in reality not so much — at least not so much thus far.
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Tornadoes ripped through Mississippi on Friday night, leaving at least 25 dead, dozens injured and a trail of destruction throughout the Delta and into the east central regions.
READ MORE: At least 25 killed in Delta tornadoes
Officials at the Mississippi Emergency Management Agency confirmed the casualty count from Sharkey, Humphreys, Carroll and Monroe counties, adding, “Unfortunately, these numbers are expected to change.” Search and rescue teams were still working into the day on Saturday.
Below are photos from several of the communities affected by the storms.
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Lawmakers on Saturday continued to haggle particulars of a roughly $7 billion state budget, and reported some progress.
But they remained at loggerheads on some big ticket items, particularly the more than $2.6 billion K-12 education budget. House Speaker Philip Gunn and his top budget lieutenants said they are firm on refusing to fully fund the Mississippi Adequate Education Program formula or add any more money to it as Senate leaders have proposed.
Instead they want lawmakers to earmark directly to programs, such as one that has benefitted Speaker Gunn’s former chief of staff. Gunn said he supports funding a revolving loan program for schools lawmakers funded last year, for which his former chief of staff Nathan Wells and a former chair of the state school board benefitted.
“Our position has been clear for quite some time,” Gunn said. “… The formula doesn’t work. It’s broken. It doesnt work. We are putting more money into education, we believe in that, but we are not going to do it with the formula.”
Lawmakers facing a Saturday night deadline were filing numerous budget “dummy bills,” with blanks for numbers to keep them alive and continue negotiations. Lawmakers will return to the Capitol on Sunday for more budget work, and are expected to end their 2023 session sometime next week.
READ MORE: Superintendents to Legislature: Please fully fund our schools
House Education Chairman Richard Bennett on Saturday also said emphatically that House negotiators would not agree to the Senate’s proposal to fully fund the Mississippi Adequate Education Program formula, at a cost of about $181 million more a year.
“We have no plan of putting more into MAEP,” Bennett said. “If we gave them the $181 million today, I believe it would not have a major impact in the classrooms. The education department would get more money, the home offices would get more money. But if we put it in the black hole they call MAEP, it’s not going to get into the classrooms.”
Bennett said House leaders want to put “a lot more new money” into education this year, but want to direct where it goes, not put it into the formula that is supposed to provide the state’s share of money for the basic needs of districts, such as teacher salaries, utilities, textbooks and transportation.
Bennett said House leaders want to fund a raise for teacher assistants at about $22 million and direct money to numerous other programs that would probably equal an increase close to the Senate’s MAEP plan.
“I would like to … put $44 million into the revolving loan fund for schools that we put $40 million into last year, for capital projects,” Bennett said. He said the zero-interest loan fund regenerates itself, and he would like to see it at around $100 million soon, so that schools could use it to build more pre-K facilities. Gunn also listed the program as an area the House wants to increase K-12 funding.
The PATH Company, founded by Gunn former chief of staff Nathan Wells and former state school board Chairman Jason Dean, received a contract of up to $3.6 million over four years to administer the loan program for schools. The company is responsible for reviewing schools’ construction plans and ensuring they are “critical infrastructure improvements, adhering to building codes and monitoring repayment of the loans.
School leaders and advocates statewide have for years pushed lawmakers to fully fund the MAEP formula they put into law three decades ago, but it hasn’t been fully funded since 2008. The Senate plan this year includes changes to the formula that would reduce the increase needed to fully fund MAEP this year from $261 million to $181 million, but education leaders said they support it because if lawmakers used the formula it would provide predictability for when school districts set their budgets.
Some other major items lawmakers continued to negotiate Saturday include:
Tornado damage: Legislative leaders, including Lt. Gov. Delbert Hosemann, Gunn and Senate Appropriations Chairman Briggs Hopson III, whose district was impacted, on Saturday toured areas of Mississippi devastated by Friday night’s tornadoes. Lawmakers are expected to consider whether some emergency funding will be needed for the areas or the Mississippi Emergency Management Agency before they end the 2023 legislative session in coming days. Gunn on Saturday asked for prayers for families who lost loved ones in the storm, and told House members that MEMA reported it would need at least an additional $5 million to deal with the destruction, and he expects the Legislature to take that up in its final days of session.
Gunn described to House members how devastating the total destruction he saw was, and after adjournment showed cell phone video he shot. “Those are steel I-beams,” he explained of one clip. “Do you know how much force it takes to twist an I-beam like that … I have just never seen anything like this.”
A hospital bailout: Lawmakers are expected to use a mix of federal pandemic relief money and state dollars to provide grants to the state’s struggling hospitals. The Senate passed a measure for $83 million in grants. Hospitals have asked for $250 million. Lawmakers expect to approve more than $83 million, but likely nowhere near the $250 million. The Senate’s plan would route more of the money to rural hospitals — many on the brink of closure — while the House’s proposal would benefit larger ones.
Roads: The Senate passed a measure to provide an extra $620 million to the Mississippi Department of Transportation for work on major “capacity” thoroughfares. The House amended it to spend $800 million. Gov. Tate Reeves recently called for lawmakers to approve $1.3 billion, and let him choose what roads get built or expanded this election year. Legislative leaders on Saturday said they expected House and Senate negotiators to land somewhere between the Senate’s $620 million and the House’s $800 million.
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Tornadoes ripping through Mississippi Friday night left at least 25 dead, dozens injured and a trail of destruction throughout the Delta and into the east central regions.
Four other residents earlier today reported missing have been accounted for, according to a news release from the Mississippi Emergency Management Agency. The fatalities are from Sharkey, Humphreys, Carroll and Monroe counties. Search and rescue teams Are on the ground.
The National Weather Service reported a 70-mph tornado swept through the towns of Rolling Fork and Silver City in Sharkey County before heading on a path to Alabama, hitting the towns of Amory and Winona.
Sharkey Issaquena Community Hospital in Rolling Fork lost power and was transferring its patients, including those in its nursing home, to other hospitals, according to MEMA.
“My city – my city is gone,” Rolling Fork Mayor Eldridge Walker told CNN Saturday morning. “But we are resilient and we are going to come back strong.”
Sharkey Issaquena Community Hospital CEO Jerry Keever was at the nursing home when reached by Mississippi Today. He described it as like “being in the middle of a war zone.”
He confirmed the hospital is closed, and there is a temporary hospital set up at the armory.
Baptist Memorial Hospital in Yazoo City, about 40 miles away from Rolling Fork, received more than 20 patients injured in the tornadoes as of Saturday morning.
“Almost all patients were treated at the hospital. Any that the hospital couldn’t treat were transferred,” said Kim Alexander, a spokesperson for Baptist. ” … Across the board, team members came in to do whatever was needed. There was a great response from ambulance crews as well.”
Tornado expert Walker Ashley described the tornado as a supercell that brews the deadliest tornados and most damaging hail in the U.S., according to The Associated Press. A nighttime one like this one is “the worst kind,” said Ashley, a meteorology professor at the University of Northern Illinois.
“You mix a particularly socioeconomically vulnerable landscape with a fast-moving, long-track nocturnal tornado, and disaster will happen,” Ashley said in an email to the AP.
Cornell Knight told AP that he, his wife and 3-year-old daughter were visiting a relative in Rolling Fork when the tornado struck. They took shelter in the hallway. The tornado struck another relative’s home across a cornfield, trapping several people inside.
People hoping to donate water or other resources can bring them to the Rolling Fork Armory, also called the Rolling Fork Civic Center, MEMA said. The center is located at the following address: 19719 US 61 in Rolling Fork, MS 39159.
In Jackson, people can bring donations to the State Fairgrounds at 1207 Mississippi St. The center there is accepting bottled water, canned goods, and paper products from 1:30 P.M. until 5 P.M. on Saturday.
Volunteer Mississippi is asking private citizens not to self-deploy, MEMA added, but the organization will match interested volunteers with affiliated groups “when the time is right.”
MEMA said around 10 a.m. on Saturday that additional personnel from the Federal Emergency Management Agency was on the way to Mississippi.
Gov. Tate Reeves issued a state of emergency Saturday morning, and will send it to the federal government for “expedited approval,” adding that he was confident of the request being approved. Reeves said the state is requesting relief through FEMA’s Individual Assistance, which sends resources directly to impacted residents, and Public Assistance, which funds rebuilding public buildings and infrastructure, programs.
“It’s heartbreaking,” Reeves said Saturday morning at a press briefing in Rolling Fork. “We’re going to fight like a hell to make sure we get as many resources to this area as possible.”
He said he’s heard from governors in other states, from both political parties, offering their concern and support.
“My prayers are with the people of Mississippi today as so many have lost homes or loved ones from last night’s devastating storms,” said Louisiana Gov. John Bel Gov. Edwards. “Louisiana understands the pain they are going through right now, and if there is anything we can do, we stand ready to help our neighbors.
MEMA Executive Director Stephen McCraney said he first heard from FEMA Friday night, and expects a team from the federal agency to arrive by 1 p.m. Saturday to help assess the damages.
Impacted residents seeking assistance should contact their county emergency management official, a MEMA spokesperson said. Residents can find the phone number for their county EMA at this link. MEMA also shared the following shelter locations:
National Guard Armory
19719 US 61, Rolling Fork, MS, 39159
Humphreys County Multipurpose BLDG
417 Silver City Road, Belzoni, MS, 39038
Old Amory National Guard Building
101 S 9th St., Amory, MS, 38821
MEMA added that the American Red Cross is setting up a shelter at the Greenville Multipurpose Center.
The Mississippi Department of Public Safety is partnering with MEMA and the Mississippi Department of Agriculture to accept donations from 1:30-5 p.m. today at the armory on the state fairgrounds in Jackson of bottled water, canned goods and paper products for those affected by accepting donations.the storms. The site will also be open from 9 a.m. t0 3 p.m. Sunday through Tuesday.
The Rolling Fork National Guard/Civic Center also is open and
Molina mobile clinic will be set up at the Sharkey County Civic Center beginning Sunday, according to the Mississippi Insurance Department.
The Division of Medicaid has enacted a provision allowing fee-for-service beneficiaries affected by the tornadoes to receive early refills and additional prescriptions above the monthly limit.
Geoff Pender with Mississippi Today contributed to this report.
This story will continue to be updated as more information becomes available.
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Today, a scar runs across the state and our hearts. Prayers go out to all who suffered from the monster tornado that cut from Rolling Fork, Silver City, Winona to Amory and beyond.
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