The superintendent of the Cleveland School District has stepped down, according to a press release issued Friday by the district.
Superintendent Otha Belcher Credit: Cleveland School District
Superintendent Otha Belcher stepped down on Sept. 30 and “will assume another role within the District,” according to the statement.
“While the District appreciates Dr. Belcher’s service, all parties agree that a change in leadership will be the most effective method of continuing to move the district in a positive direction for the future.”
Belcher started in Cleveland in June 2019, leading the district for three years during the pandemic before stepping down on Friday. Prior to this position, he was an assistant superintendent in the Jackson Public School District and worked in the Vicksburg-Warren and Hinds County school districts.
“I don’t know of anyone that’s found it to be a negative,” said Jason Shaw, a local parent, in reference to Belcher’s reassignment “I think everyone agreed that it was time for him to go. Not that he was a bad person, I don’t know of anybody that said anything bad about him as an individual, he just wasn’t doing the job.”
Lisa Bramuchi, a former assistant superintendent of the district, has been named interim superintendent and Reggie Barnes, a former superintendent, has been brought on as a consultant to help with the superintendent search.
Shaw emphasized that new leadership will need strong communication to establish trust with the community, as well as focusing on making repairs and improvements to the school buildings.
Belcher could not be reached for comment, nor could board members Paulette Howze and Debbie Fioranelli.
Los bebés de Mississippi tienen más probabilidades de morir antes de su primer cumpleaños que los bebés de cualquier otro lugar del país, según datos publicados el jueves por los Centros para el Control y la Prevención de Enfermedades.
El estado tenía una promedio de mortalidad infantil de 8.12 por cada 1,000 nacidos vivos, muy por encima del promedio nacional de 5.42 en 2020, el año más reciente para datos nacionales disponibles. Luisiana, el segundo desde abajo, registró 7.59 muertes por cada 1,000 nacidos vivos.
Mississippi ha tenido la promedio de mortalidad infantil más alta del país durante años. En 2019, el estado encabezó la lista con una promedio de 8.71.
Los bebés Negros tienen el doble de probabilidades de morir que sus contrapartes blancas en Mississippi. En 2020, la promedio de mortalidad infantil entre los bebés blancos fue de 5.7, en comparación con 11.8 entre los bebés Negros, según datos del departamento de salud. En 2019, 322 bebés murieron antes de cumplir un año en el estado. Casi el 60%, o 185, eran Negros, aunque los bebés Negros representaron solo el 43% de los nacimientos.
A nivel nacional, la principal causa de mortalidad infantil son los defectos de nacimiento. Pero en Mississippi, las causas principales son el nacimiento prematuro y el embarazo o las complicaciones del parto, así como el síndrome de muerte súbita del lactante (SIDS, por sus siglas en inglés). Mississippi tiene la tasa más alta de nacimientos prematuros del país, lo que está relacionado con condiciones crónicas como tensión arterial alta y diabetes entre las madres.
La tasa de mortalidad infantil es uno de los muchos indicadores de salud en los que Mississippi "no solo ocupa una posición 50" pero "el 50 por milla", como lo expresó el Dr. Daniel Edney, oficial de salud estatal, durante la primera audiencia organizada por el Grupo de Estudio del Senado sobre la Mujer, Niños y Familias el martes.
El grupo, que fue creado por el vicegobernador Delbert Hosemann después de que la Corte Suprema revocara Roe v. Wade, escuchó a un orador tras otro indicar que el estado no está preparado para los embarazos de alto riesgo adicionales ahora que Mississippi ha prohibido los abortos.
El departamento de salud estima que el estado verá 5,000 nacimientos mas cada año.
La audiencia de la comisión del Senado, presidida por la senadora Nicole Boyd, republicana de Oxford, dejó que extender la cobertura de Medicaid de 60 días a 12 meses será una prioridad para el Senado en la próxima sesión. Pero la legislación probablemente enfrenta una batalla cuesta arriba en la Cámara, donde el presidente Philip Gunn, republicano por Clinton, eliminó la medida el año pasado, alegando que va a expandir Medicaid, aunque no haría que más personas fueran elegibles para el programa.
Y aunque los expertos dicen que extender la cobertura de Medicaid después del nacimiento ayudaría a reducir la mortalidad materna y también mejoraría la salud infantil, no ayudaría a garantizar que las mujeres estén saludables cuando queden embarazadas. La comisión del Senado escuchó datos que indican que una de cada seis mujeres en edad fértil no tiene seguro, lo que les dificulta obtener atención para controlar condiciones como la hipertensión que aumentan el riesgo de malos resultados en el parto.
Andrés Fuentes
Andrés Fuentes es periodista de FOX8-TV en Nueva Orleans y traductor de Mississippi Today. Antes de que el nativo de Nueva Orleans regresara, era periodista para WLOX-TV en Biloxi, Mississippi.
Editor’s note: This story was reported and published in a collaboration between Mississippi Today and the Sun Herald. Isabelle Taft reported for Mississippi Today and Gautama Mehta reported for the Sun Herald.
JACKSON COUNTY – Unlike other Mississippi hospitals, Singing River Health System is not facing an immediate financial crisis – and that’s exactly why its leaders say they need to find a buyer.
The roughly 700-bed system, based in Jackson County on the Coast, came through the COVID-19 pandemic in decent shape, with revenue up in 2021. But the long-term forces buffeting Singing River and small hospitals around the country mean the future is still dark.
Costs are rising, especially for nursing staff. The hospital system needs to make improvements to facilities and equipment after years of underspending. Singing River has almost no leverage to increase payments from the state’s dominant commercial insurer, Blue Cross and Blue Shield of Mississippi. And in part because Mississippi has refused to expand Medicaid, a significant number of the system’s patients have no insurance, meaning Singing River doesn’t get paid for their care.
Hospital leaders say they need a bigger chain to take over so they can benefit from economies of scale and greater negotiating power with suppliers and insurers. If they wait until a crisis point, they’ll have less leverage and possibly fewer interested buyers.
“We’re coming at it now at a place of strength,” CEO Tiffany Murdock told a community group in the town of Hurley in August. “And in five years, I can’t promise you the same thing.”
It’s the latest demonstration of a trend with potentially troubling consequences for patients: In the world of American hospitals, only the huge survive.
From 2005 to 2017, the share of hospitals around the country that are part of a larger system rose from 53% to 66%.
In Mississippi, a 2017 merger made Baptist Memorial Health Care the largest hospital system in the state. The University of Mississippi Medical Center has expanded its footprint to Grenada, Holmes County, and the Gulf Coast and is bidding to lease hospitals in the Mississippi Delta. Rush Health Systems, which owns seven hospitals in east Mississippi and west Alabama, this year merged with Ochsner, the Louisiana-based system Singing River leaders see as their likely buyer. In 2019, Franciscan Missionaries of Our Lady, also based in Louisiana, acquired St. Dominic Memorial Hospital in Jackson.
State and locally owned hospitals like Singing River are a fading model. The American Hospital Association reports that, of the country’s 6,100 hospitals, about 950 are owned by local governments, down from 1,130 in 2008.
The potential downside of spending years trying to fight massive economic forces – and ending up in a much weaker negotiating position with a potential buyer – is clear enough in Mississippi. Hospitals like Greenwood Leflore are struggling to stay afloat long enough to find a savior or be forced to close their doors.
A growing body of research shows hospital consolidation usually increases costs for consumersby reducing competition. And despite hospital leaders’ claims about the resource benefits of joining a larger chain, research also suggests it doesn’t improve outcomes for patients.
“We know that consolidation is going to increase prices and potentially decrease access to care,” said Christopher Whaley, a health economist at RAND Corporation. “But if the alternative is that the hospital or physician group goes out of business and exits the market entirely, then maybe that’s a tradeoff we have to make.”
Tiffany Murdock, CEO of Singing River Health System, speaks during a public hearing over the potential sale of Singing River Health System during a Jackson County Board of Supervisors meeting in Pascagoula on Wednesday, Aug. 17, 2022. Credit: Hannah Ruhoff / Biloxi Sun Herald
While small hospitals like Singing River look for buyers, bigger players like Ochsner – one of the biggest hospital systems in the Gulf South – have been looking for new acquisitions.
In 2020, Ochsner and Singing River announced a strategic partnership, and Singing River acquired Garden Park Medical Center in Harrison County, rebranding it as Singing River Gulfport. During Hurricane Ida, the partnership allowed Ochsner patients in hard-hit southeast Louisiana to move to the Gulfport hospital.
Corwin Harper, Ochsner CEO for Northshore and the Mississippi Gulf Coast, said expanding into Mississippi makes sense in part because so many Mississippians already use Louisiana health care facilities, and the states face similar issues with workforce recruitment.
“With Ochsner being the largest health system in Louisiana, it’s almost a natural migration for people to access the resources that Ochsner has,” he said.
Murdock, a registered nurse whose career in hospital administration has included stops in California and Oregon, was named the administrator of Singing River Gulfport. When former CEO Lee Bond stepped down earlier this year, Murdock was named interim CEO of the health system and then CEO. She is the first woman to hold the position.
In June, the hospital trustees voted to pursue a sale to a “like-minded hospital organization,” though Ochsner is generally the only name that comes up in Jackson County.
A report by the firm Raymond James found that while the hospital’s revenue had rebounded in 2021, rising expenses had cut margins. The hospital sees a high rate of uninsured patients, and federal payments to care for them are dropping. And as a small system, it has little opportunity to access loans or to increase cash flow by negotiating with insurers, since most of its patients are on Medicaid or Medicare and the commercial market is dominated by Blue Cross.
“It’s a nationwide issue,” Ryan Kelly, executive director of the Mississippi Rural Health Association, said of hospitals’ financial struggles. “But it is especially important here because we are a more poor state. Our hospitals are in the red, like on the verge of closure in a critical state, and it’s not because our hospitals are doing anything wrong or there’s anything wrong with Mississippi. It’s just because we’re a poor state and we have less money to go around.”
The pandemic also highlighted the benefits of scale.
“We were spending, you know, a nickel on a surgical mask five years ago when during the height of COVID, we’re spending $5 a mask and buying thousands of masks,” Murdock said at the community meeting in Hurley.
Ochsner, by contrast, built its own plant to make personal protective equipment in Lafayette.
But scale can come with a loss of local autonomy.
Ochsner also has a lease agreement with Hancock Medical Center on the Coast. In May, Ochsner closed the labor and delivery unit at the hospital, citing the low number of deliveries that made it hard to operate the unit safely. That left the county without a single labor and delivery unit and frustrated some Hancock County residents and leaders.
Over the summer, a Singing River retiree named Irby Tillman appeared poised to derail hospital executives’ plans.
Under Mississippi law, anyone can force a referendum on a public hospital sale by obtaining a petition with at least 1,500 signatures. Tillman, who worked as a carpenter at the hospital, was at one of the board of supervisors meetings where the sale was discussed. He heard an attorney say that the supervisors would make the decision – unless someone forced a referendum.
“I happened to be standing there and I said, ‘Well, I’ll take that challenge,’” he said. “I don’t think five men should have that big decision.”
But even if Tillman had never launched his petition drive, pursuing the sale would have required Singing River executives to embark on a kind of political campaign to persuade not only supervisors but also their constituents to support the sale.
The hospital is the second-largest employer in Jackson County with more than 3,500 employees. People all over the county remember births and deaths, emergencies and routine check-ups, first jobs and decades-long careers at Singing River.
Many of them also remember a profound betrayal: For years, the hospital secretly stopped paying into retirees’ pension fund before it collapsed in 2014. A settlement in a federal class-action lawsuit resulted in lower payments than retirees had been promised.
Murdock embarked on a county-wide speaking tour late this summer. She spoke at school district convocations and rotary club meetings, the chamber of commerce and churches, trying to convince people to support the sale.
Meanwhile, Tillman traveled the county, too. In late August, he and his cousin Paul Wise, also 73 and a Singing River retiree, spent several hours outside Ixtapa, a Mexican restaurant in Vancleave. They both grew up in Pascagoula, two of their grandmother’s 75 grandchildren. Wise was leaning toward supporting the sale, while Tillman was leaning against it.
Paul Wise and Irby Tillman, Singing River retirees, collect signatures in support of a referendum on selling the hospital outside a restaurant in Vancleave, Mississippi. Credit: Gautama Mehta / Biloxi Sun Herald
Tillman prided himself on never saying a word about how he thought anyone should vote, only emphasizing the importance of having a say in the process. The men carried a handmade poster that said “Let your voice be heard” and was decorated with small American flags. Everyone they talked to wanted to see a referendum.
All five supervisors and even Murdock signed the petition.
“If I didn’t sign, I didn’t want (that) to get in the way of the goal, which is to move this forward,” she said. “And so I didn’t want that to be the headline. I wanted the headline to be like, ‘This is the right thing to do, whether there’s a petition or not.’”
But she was wary of what a referendum could mean.
Mississippi Today could locate only one such referendum in state history. Oktibbeha County voters roundly rejected a proposal to sell OCH Regional Medical Center in 2017. If that happened in Jackson County, Singing River leaders said the county would have to raise taxes and still be unable to cover rising costs.
In the end, Tillman did not gather enough signatures to require a referendum. It rained heavily in the weeks before the deadline to turn in the petition, and Tillman relied on old fashioned methods to obtain signatures.
“Water and ink don’t go together too good,” he said.
And after months of discussion, showing up to board of supervisors meetings and public hearings, he was leaning toward supporting the sale anyway, he said.
Irby Tillman addresses Randy Bosarge during a Board of Supervisors meeting on the possible sale of the Singing River Health System in Pascagoula on Wednesday, Aug. 17, 2022. Tillman started a petition to bring the sale to a public vote. Credit: Hannah Ruhoff / Biloxi Sun Herald
The Jackson County Board of Supervisors doesn’t yet have a specific timeline for when the request for proposals will be finalized and buyers can begin submitting bids.
The potential buyer frequently mentioned by name in Jackson County is Ochsner. But other hospital chains could make a move, too.
The Franciscan Missionaries of Our Lady Health System (FMOLHS), which operates St. Dominic Memorial Hospital in Jackson and hospitals in Louisiana, said in a statement that it is “aware” that an RFP has been issued.
“FMOLHS regularly evaluates opportunities to expand access to care by partnering with quality health systems to bring together outstanding clinicians, the most advanced technology and leading research to ensure that our patients receive the highest quality and safest care possible,” said Kevin Cook, chief operating officer.
The sale will leave Mississippi with one less locally owned hospital, and it may be an indication of the future facing every small hospital in the state.
Richard Roberson, general counsel and vice president of policy at the Mississippi Hospital Association, said Singing River’s situation highlights the structural forces working against Mississippi hospitals.
“I think that is what’s scary about it – you do see a hospital that is a strong hospital, a strong health system, and as good as they do things, they’re still struggling,” Roberson said.
HATTIESBURG – The auditorium grew quiet as members of the Institutions of Higher Learning Board of Trustees waited for people in the audience to take the mic at the University of Southern Mississippi.
Tom Duff – a USM alumnus, one of the wealthiest Mississippians and this year’s president of the IHL board – broke the silence.
“This is kind of like church,” he quipped from the stage of the Joe Paul Theater.
Tom Duff, the president of the Institutions of Higher Learning Board of Trustees, leads a listening session for the presidential search at University of Southern Mississippi on Oct. 3, 2022. Credit: Sean Smith/SM2
The comment illustrated the fervent tenor of Wednesday’s two listening sessions, the first step in the process IHL will use to appoint a successor to Rodney Bennett, USM’s tenth president who stepped down earlier this year.
Out of about 400 attendees, nearly 55 students, faculty, staff and alumni addressed the trustees, using words like “advocate,” “passionate” and “grit” to describe the qualities they’d like to see in the next top administrator at USM.
As far as many speakers were concerned, IHL doesn’t need to go far to find its next president. Several told trustees they wanted Joe Paul, the interim president, to lead the university permanently. He was repeatedly likened to Aubrey Lucas, who many consider one of USM’s most beloved presidents.
“We need someone who has Southern Miss in their soul,” said Toby Barker, the mayor of Hattiesburg. “We’ve had that in the last three months with Dr. Paul. You only need to look at the positive effect that Dr. Paul has had since arriving on campus.”
Several speakers used metaphors to convey their aspirations for the university and its next president.
The president of the student government association told trustees she’d like a president who knows that “Southern Miss is a destination … not a layover.” Awell-known supporter of the baseball team remarked that USM has “a good story to tell, but what we need is a storyteller for our president.”
“I believe Southern Miss is at a crossroads,”said state Rep. Missy McGee, R-Hattiesburg.
In his nine years as president, Bennett had a historic tenure at USM. The first Black president of the predominantly white university, he grew freshmen enrollment and improved retention among the 14,000 student population, helped attain top-tier research status, and twice raised wages for the lowest-paid workers on campus.
While no one blamed Bennett by name, nearly every speaker suggested that USM had not seen its best days under the former president – a perception not always born out by data.
Multiple speakers said they felt that enrollment had declined at the university since the start of the pandemic, but IHL’s numbers show the total student population has actually held steady from fall 2019 to fall 2021.
Nonetheless, some speakers told trustees they’d like the next president to prioritize recruitment, specifically at schools like Jackson Academy and in the Clinton and Madison districts.
USM could increase recruitment by improving support for sororities and fraternities, many speakers suggested. At USM, significantly less students – about an estimated 1,600 – are members of sororities and fraternities compared to Mississippi State University and the University of Mississippi, where Greek-affiliated students number more than 5,000.
“The future president may not be Greek, and that’s totally understandable, but I would definitely encourage you all to seek the importance of our Greek community,” said Betsy Mercier, a recent graduate and the advisor for USM’s Delta Delta Delta chapter.
As the smallest of Mississippi’s three top-tier research universities,multiple speakers said they felt USM has long received the short end of the stick compared to its peers – University of Mississippi and Mississippi State University – in terms of funding and prestige.
“I knew that throughout my professional career, that I was – especially being in Mississippi, that because I did not have an Ole Miss birthright or a Mississippi State birthright, I was going to have to work longer and harder than everyone else,” Dave Estorge, a member of the alumni board, said. “I got a chip on my shoulder, always have.”
Billy Hewes, the mayor of Gulfport, told trustees he believes IHL has an “institutional bias” against USM. He said he thought the board had chances in the past to give USM a leader like Mark Keenum or Robert Khayat, but that trustees chose not to.
“Ten years ago we had that opportunity,” Hewes said. “You had some good candidates, including our interim president, who is showing an enthusiasm we haven’t seen in a decade. And so, it is incumbent on this board to find somebody who has those attributes, who can do for Southern Miss what we’ve seen done at other schools, and get us back to where we desire to be.”
Many students, faculty and staff emphasized the importance of increasing diversity at USM. About 61% of students at USM are white and 27% are Black – that has barely changed since 2013, Bennett’s first year in office.
Fred Varnado, the former director of continuing education, said he wanted the next president to “ensure there is diversity in the cabinet.”
Tegi Jenkins-Rimmer, an alumnus and the assistant director of programming, put it this way: “What matters to me in a president now is the same thing that mattered to me when I came to Southern Miss years ago – a president who cares about faculty, staff and students who look like me.”
“We need a president who is willing to give us a voice and a seat at the table,” she added.
Heidi Moore, a first-generation student pursuing a masters in higher education administration, said she wanted to speak to trustees from “a different perspective, a poor perspective.”
“There have been moments when Southern Miss has taught me I belong in one area and I don’t get to go anywhere else,” she said. “USM has also taught me liberation, critical thinking skills. I want someone who is so vulnerable, transparent, brave, courageous – someone who sees everyone.”
USM’s next president will need to boost morale among faculty and staff, several speakers said.
Maurine Pace, a staff member in the Office of Research Administration, said that nearly a dozen of her coworkers have left in recent years for remote, better-paying jobs with other university systems.
“The crisis is here today, it’s not two years down the road – it’s here,” a faculty member said.
Denis Wiesenburg, the president of the faculty senate, likened the relationship he’d like to see between faculty and the president to “a dance … with the administration being the prom committee.”
Other repeated themes in speakers’ comments included donor relations, fundraising and economic development. One teaching professor said she’d like a president who would champion a technological innovation comparable to the development of Gatorade at the University of Florida.
Mac Alford, a professor of biological sciences, said he had a different take on the importance of fundraising. The former faculty senate president said he wanted a president who would fight for more public funding, not for private dollars. To make his point to the trustees, he recalled a cabinet meeting when Bennett announced USM had been approved to increase tuition.
“I realize that’s important in terms of the budget, but we are a public institution,” he said. “If we have public goals in this state, we need people in Jackson, and we need you people at the Legislature, arguing … the importance of this institution as a public institution. Because if we’re going to get 10% of our money from the state of Mississippi, we don’t need you guys. We need our own board.”
According to IHL data, USM has increased annual tuition by more than $1,000 since fiscal year 2018, from $8,108 to $9,203 – nearly one-fifth the median household income in Mississippi. This trend is not unique to USM as each of the state’s eight public universities have had to raise tuition rates as legislative funding has not recovered since the Great Recession.
Chuck Scianna, a USM alumnus and founder of an oil drilling equipment company, addresses the Institutions of Higher Learning Board of Trustees on Oct. 3, 2022. Credit: Sean Smith/SM2
Chuck Scianna, a 1975 alumnus and founder of an oil drilling equipment company, said he viewed higher education as an “investment” and wanted a president with a similar corporate mindset.
“That’s the way I look at it – as a business, not an institution,” Scianna said. “You’re a board of shareholders. Even though we are a public institution, public funds don’t make up 100% of our budget – not here, not anywhere.”
Scianna joked that since Paul became interim president, “I can’t get his hand out of my back pocket.”
In remarks at both sessions, Duff, the IHL board member, said he wanted the community to know the board is committed to a “transparent” search process. He added the trustees will use the comments from the listening session to create a “draft profile” of the community’s ideal candidate – proof the trustees’ would take speakers seriously.
“Oftentimes, IHL is painted by the media and the people as perhaps not caring,” Duff said.
As he spoke, IHL sent out a press release announcing the names of 15 students, professors and alumni who will advise the trustees during the search, including Hewes, Scianna and the SGA president.
IHL has also hired Academic Search, a national firm that is familiar with USM, to assist with the process.
“The enthusiasm and level of desire is evidence to each of us,” Duff said. “This is a very solemn and, candidly, a sacred responsibility on our part.”
The trustees will hold another listening session Tuesday at USM’s branch campus in Long Beach. Members of the public are invited to submit comments for the next nine days at IHL’s website.
Correction 10/4/2022: This story has been updated to reflect that freshman enrollment and student retention, not the overall student population, increased during Bennett’s tenure.
The U.S. Army Corps of Engineers announced Monday it plans to spend $221 million on a flood control project known as One Lake, which would widen the Pearl River along Jackson, as long it meets environmental and other criteria.
Attorney Keith Turner said the Rankin Hinds Flood & Drainage Control District — the project’s local sponsor — submitted a revised proposal in July to the Assistant Secretary of the Army, which will review the new document before sending it back out for a final public comment period.
Turner said the new version of the plan, which isn’t yet publicly available, is largely the same as the drafted proposal. He said the new document proposes a slightly smaller footprint in dredging the Pearl River, which in turn would mean less impacts on wetlands and cheaper construction costs.
In total, the project is estimated to cost $340 million, Turner said.
The $221 million, or 65% of the project’s costs, comes from the Infrastructure Investment and Jobs Act, and is part of $800 million going to the Corps. Sen. Roger Wicker, who has backed the project for years, said that money also includes $700,000 to finalize a pending study on One Lake.
Turner said he has no timeline on when the Corps will finish reviewing the updated proposal, but said “beginning of 2023 is when we hope to see it out for public comment.”
Support for the long-discussed project gained traction in 2020, after a Pearl River flood damaged over 400 homes. The levee board, the project’s sponsor, said that One Lake would have prevented damage in 92 percent of the 222 homes that were impacted in Northeast Jackson, Downtown Jackson and Flowood.
But advocates and some officials downstream of Jackson question the downstream impacts that damming the river could have, and point to alternative flood control measures such as voluntary buyouts and raising levees.
NFL legend Brett Favre, who has become a central figure in ongoing coverage of the Mississippi welfare scandal, has hired former Trump White House attorney Eric Herschmann as his lead counsel, Axios first reported on Monday.
Favre has been a subject of Mississippi Today and national reporting this year for being the inspiration behind at least $8 million in welfare misspending. In recent weeks, several sponsors have reportedly distanced themselves from the the Hall of Fame quarterback and native Mississippian.
Text messages first reported by Mississippi Today this year show Favre communicated regularly and directly with welfare officials about using federal grant money to construct a volleyball stadium at the University of Southern Mississippi, his alma mater and where his daughter played volleyball.
A Mississippi Today investigation earlier this year also chronicled how Favre and his business partner in a pharmaceutical startup company offered stock to former Gov. Phil Bryant in exchange for the governor’s help advancing the company. That venture also received more than $2 million in welfare funds.
While he has not been charged with a crime, Favre is facing civil charges in an ongoing lawsuit the state is bringing against several people and companies that received welfare funds. He repaid the state $1.1 million that he personally received from a welfare-funded nonprofit under an advertising agreement, which allegedly included speaking engagements he never attended.
Mississippi Today first reported last month that Favre and the nonprofit appear to have entered the advertising arrangement as a way to channel more funds to the USM volleyball project.
“I only agreed to represent Brett Favre after I did my independent due diligence and was convinced that he did nothing wrong,” Herschmann told Axios. “Brett enthusiastically tried to help his alma mater, a public university, that needed and wanted his help.”
Herschmann continued: “To be clear, Brett had no idea that welfare funds were being used or that others were involved in illegal conduct.”
Attorney General Lynn Fitch has quietly settled Mississippi’s claims against insurance companies over Katrina damages for pennies on the dollar compared to a similar federal case and those settled by her predecessor.
In 2015, former Attorney General Jim Hood and outside attorneys filed a lawsuit to recoup state funds that were awarded to homeowners when the insurance companies did not meet what Hood argued was their legal obligation. After Hurricane Katrina pummeled the Gulf Coast in 2005, insurance companies refused to pay or paid only limited amounts on many claims of homeowners, saying their damage was caused by water not wind and their policies did not cover flood damage.
The state created the Homeowner Assistance Program to help make those homeowners “whole.” Through that program, the state paid $2.03 billion to homeowners for damages. But, according to the lawsuits, many of those damages should have been covered by insurance companies that denied paying damages or limited payouts, citing water damage when in reality the damage was caused by wind. That could have saved the state tens of millions in public funds to be spent on recovery efforts or elsewhere.
In a similar federal case, where the federal flood insurance program accused State Farm of failing to pay for wind damage and instead foisting it off on the National Flood Insurance Program, State Farm agreed to pay the federal government $100 million. But Fitch settled the state’s wind vs. water case with State Farm — which held the most policies of any insurer on the Coast in Katrina — for $12 million.
Before leaving office as attorney general in 2020, Hood settled three of the lawsuits – against insurers Metropolitan, American Security and Balboa. The three lawsuits, covering 652 policyholders, were settled for a total of $6.78 million, or $10,410 per policyholder. Since then, Fitch has settled five of the lawsuits, including the largest against State Farm and Allstate, for a cumulative $21.9 million, or $1,441 per policyholder.
When asked about the settlement discrepancies, Michelle Williams, Fitch’s chief of staff, said in a statement: “I cannot answer some of your questions because we still have pending litigation and your questions involve litigation strategy. But, I will note that the Federal/NFIP (National Flood Insurance Program) case involves different issues, different facts, and different laws from our state case even though the underlying event of Hurricane Katrina is the same.”
One case, against PRIME Insurance, is still pending finalization.
Mississippi Insurance Commissioner Mike Chaney said he supported the settlement of the lawsuits to bring stability to the insurance market in the state.
“I am glad they got settled,” he said. “I have a stable market unlike what is happening in Florida, Louisiana and Texas” with their insurance markets.
Despite Williams’ and Chaney’s defense, some question whether Fitch should have gotten better settlements for the state.
“Because she is a Republican, Attorney General Fitch is probably cozier with the insurance companies than were her two predecessors,” said David Baria, a Bay St. Louis attorney and former Democratic state lawmaker who last week won $10 million in punitive damages against USAA insurance company in a similar case where the insurance company was accused of using deceptive practices to avoid or delay paying a claim.
While the Jackson County jury awarded the estate of Sylvia Minor $10 million in punitive damages and $1.5 million in compensatory damages, Fitch settled the state case involving hundreds of other homeowners with the same USAA for $1.4 million.
Private attorneys contracted with Hood to assist on the case, who receive a percentage of any settlement but nothing if they do not prevail, declined comment on the settlements.
But Baria, who was not involved in the state cases, said a person could compare what the jury awarded in his case and what was awarded in a similar federal case ($100 million) “and “reach your own conclusion” about whether the Fitch settlements were too low.
Chip Merlin is founder of the Merlin Law Group, one of the largest national firms representing policyholders in disputes with insurance companies. His firm handled hundreds of Katrina policyholder claims, including many in Mississippi, all of which have been resolved. Like many others across the country, Merlin was keeping tabs on pending cases, including the state of Mississippi’s lawsuits over the Homeowner Assistance Program.
Merlin said, “I was as surprised as anybody else,” when he learned from recent news reports that most of the outstanding state litigation had been quietly settled starting more than a year ago, with the Mississippi AG’s office issuing no press statements or releases or posting on its website. Merlin said this shows a great lack of transparency for cases brought on behalf of the public.
“I almost fell out of my chair,” Merlin said. “How come we didn’t know about it? That’s a public lawsuit … That impacts the public treasury and there should be some explanation why elected officials thought this was in the best interest of Mississippi.”
Merlin said he can’t opine whether the $12 million settlement with State Farm and other settlements were fair for taxpayers because “we don’t know enough about it — that’s the problem.”
“It’s just very weird the state would settle a year before and nobody know,” Merlin said. “… It calls for the attorney general to say something. I’ve never heard of a settlement involving a public entity being secret … It’s supposed to be on behalf of everybody for the state. If it wasn’t favorable to the state, then the matter should continue on. If it was favorable, you would think elected officials would explain why.”
In terms of transparency, Merlin said it is also unusual that there is a strict non-disclosure clause in the state settlements since the agreements involved public/state funds. Similar language was not in the contracts negotiated by Hood.
Citing pending litigation, Fitch’s office refused to comment on the need for the non-disclosure clause. The attorney general’s office required Mississippi Today and the Sun Herald, which first reported on the State Farm settlement, to submit public records requests to ascertain the settlement amounts. Normally, the AG’s office sends out news releases when settling or winning lawsuits.
As to some companies who settled before Fitch took over for more money per policy, Merlin said: “If similar conduct was going on, then the issue is why did you get so much more against the other companies and less against State Farm?
“I do have to applaud the former attorney general for bringing the litigation in the first place,” Merlin said. “Many times attorneys general don’t bring these actions. It might be difficult, suing big insurance companies.”
Merlin also commented on Mississippi’s Homeowner Assistance Program, which he said was well run and helped thousands of families.
“Mississippi did a great job of getting the money out and taking care of citizens,” Merlin said, “especially compared to Louisiana … I’ve been around to a lot of storms and a lot of states, and nobody ever says the good things, but Mississippi officials did a fantastic job with that.”
State Farm recently agreed to pay the federal government $100 million to settle long-running litigation in federal court, involving two former employee “whistleblowers.” A jury in the case had found that State Farm defrauded the National Flood Insurance Program by charging it for flood damage to a policyholder’s home when the destruction was caused by wind. State Farm’s policies covered wind damage but not flood, which is covered by NFIP. The whistleblowers claimed the company shifted wind damages it should have covered to the federal flood program.
After Katrina, Mississippi received billions in federal block grant funds for Katrina recovery. The state created the Homeowners Assistance Program to provide homeowners grants for flood damage. Thousands of homeowners, who had long been told they did not need federal flood insurance, saw destruction or major damage to their homes by Katrina’s unprecedented flooding.
Mississippi, with its litigation, claimed insurers let the state Homeowner Assistance Program pay people for wind damages that should have been covered by their private insurance policies. The state was suing for damages and money collected from the litigation would go into state coffers.
Hood claimed insurance companies caused Mississippi to pay millions of dollars the state could have otherwise used for other recovery efforts.
“State Farm took advantage of our program by causing HAP to pay for wind losses that State Farm should have covered under its homeowner policies,” Hood said at the time. “Remarkably, State Farm and other insurers walked away from Hurricane Katrina and experienced record profits in the years following, while Mississippi continues to suffer.”
State Farm spokesman Roszell Gadson had little comment when asked about the company’s $12 million settlement with Mississippi. The company has denied wrongdoing in any of its Katrina litigation.
“While State Farm is pleased to have reached a settlement in this matter, the settlement is not an admission that State Farm did anything wrong,” Gadson said. “That is all we have to share.”
According to the lawsuit originally filed by Hood, the state paid State Farm policyholders through HAP $522.1 million, or on average $76,673 per policyholder. By comparison, State Farm paid $98.7 million or on average $14,494 per policyholder.
The largest case settled by Hood before he left office was with Metropolitan Property. Hood settled that case for $4.75 million. Metropolitan paid 429 customers, on average, $8,796. HAP paid $39.2 million, or on average $90,488. Hood settled American Security for $1.35 million. HAP paid 115 American Security policyholders $71 million or $57,070 per customer. By comparison American Security paid $1.2 million or $5,491 per policyholder.
Chaney said the settlement amounts Hood garnered were higher because at least one of the companies wanted to settle quickly so that the lawsuit would not hinder its efforts to merge with another company.
Chaney said all of the settlements were negotiated by Maison Heidelberg, a Jackson attorney who was one of the attorneys hired by Hood to work on the case. Chaney said the methodology used by Hood in filing the original lawsuits were flawed. He said the lawsuits filed by Hood claimed that the insurance companies were not providing proper payouts for 70% of the claimants when in reality it might have been only 700 or 800.
“Then you had people getting $150,000 grants … (through HAP) and coming back and trying to double dip and get money from the insurance companies,” he said.
Heidelberg, along with other private attorneys involved in the cases, declined comment.
Mackenzie Hughes raises the championship trophy after winning the 2022 Sanderson Farms golf tournament, Sunday, Oct. 2, 2022. Hughes defeated Sepp Straka, winning a two-hole playoff. Credit: Vickie D. King/Mississippi Today
We call Mississippi’s only PGA Tour tournament the Sanderson Farms Championship. This past week, it might as well have been renamed the World Open.
The leaders were from all over the planet. Mackenzie Hughes, a 31-year-old Canadian, won the Sanderson rooster trophy and the $1,422,000 check that came with it. Sepp Straka finished second, losing on the second hole of a sudden-death playoff. Straka, from Vienna, has the distinction of being the first Austrian to first qualify for the PGA Tour and then win on it.
Lefty Garrick Higgo finished third. He’s from South Africa. Dean Burmester, another South African, was fourth all alone. Emiliano Grillo, from Argentina, led a group in a tie for fifth.
Rick Cleveland
The Sanderson Farms Championship was played one week after the Presidents Cup matches, in which a team of Americans won easily over a team of international golfers. It seemed clear Sunday the international team could have used Hughes and a few more of the globetrotters who got a lot richer at Country Club of Jackson.
Hughes, from Hamilton, Ontario, shot rounds of 71, 63, 68 and 69 for a 72-hole total of 17-under par 271. He began Sunday one shot off the lead of American Mark Hubbard, who finished with a 74 and wound up in the fifth place tie.
“I’m over the moon,” Hughes said afterward. “I had some moments today where I was tested and was able to pull through. It’s kind of my M.O. to scramble and save some pars. I had to do that a little bit today on the back nine.”
Actually, he had to do it a lot. Hughes missed the green 24 times in the 72-hole tournament. He scrambled for par successfully on 22 of the 24. None was more important than the all-universe par he made on the 72nd hole of regulation to force the playoff.
The 18th hole at CCJ is a 480-yard par-4 with an uphill shot to the green. Playing in long shadows with the sun setting, beautifully, behind the clubhouse, Hughes pulled his drive left into the rough and then had to hit a low shot, beneath the limbs of a pine tree, into the green. His shot skittered over the green and back to within a couple feet of a luxury suite. He faced a 34-yard shot back to the hole, and chose to putt.
“You don’t practice putts that long,” Hughes would say. “I just told myself I was going to somehow two-putt that hole.”
His approach putt, from over 100 feet away, was perfectly judged distance-wise and left him a two-footer to get into the playoff. He tapped it right into the center of the cup.
Mackenzie Hughes and his caddy shortly before Hughes putts for the championship, Sunday, Oct. 2, 2022. Credit: Vickie D. King/Mississippi Today
The sudden death playoff was pre-arranged to start on No. 18. Both parred the 18th, Hughes again scrambling from a bunker fronting the green. So, they played the 18th again and, for Hughes, the third time in a 45-minute span was a charm. He hit a perfect drive, then a 165-yard approach shot to within eight feet of the cup. After Straka missed his 18-footer for birdie, Hughes poured his into the center of the cup. He was already celebrating as the ball approached the hole.
“I knew when it was a foot away, it was going right in the middle,” Hughes said. “That’s the best feeling in the world.”
That best feeling in the world became even better when his pregnant wife and two young sons headed onto the green to celebrate with him.
“That was the coolest part of the whole deal,” Hughes said. “Words can’t describe how good that feels because I love them so much.”
Mackenzie Hughes and his wife, Jenna Shaw, were newlyweds in October of 2016 when Hughes, a rookie still in his first month on the PGA Tour, won the RSM Classic and the first place prize of early a million bucks. If Hughes thought it would always be that easy, he was badly wrong. He had not won again until Sunday, and there’s a story there.
“My oldest son Kenton (soon to be 5) has seen all my trophies but he had never seen me win one,” Hughes said. “He’s old enough to understand it a little bit now and he’s always asking when I am going to win another trophy and when does he get to have a trophy. So this one might have to stay in his room for a while.”
Mississippi’s PGA Tour tournament, which began in Hattiesburg 54 years ago, has been played in the past during April floods, in brutal July heat and was at least once interrupted by a tornado. This year’s sun-kissed event was played under cloudless skies in immaculate autumn weather on what many golfers said are some of the best putting greens in the world.
Nevertheless, the tournament, which has donated more than $10 million to Children’s of Mississippi Hospital since 2013, has faced an indefinite future because of the recently completed sale of Sanderson Farms. That future looked a little brighter after a statement from J. Clinton (Clint) Rivers, CEO and Chairman of the Board of Wayne-Sanderson Farms, the company’s new name.
“We are a newly formed company – literally as of two months ago – and we have a bright future ahead of us,” Rivers said. “For many of us this is our first experience with this event, and I couldn’t think of a better experience. The children’s hospital is a great charity for us to be involved with, and we are proud to be associated with them. I have been asked several times this week about the future of the championship, and I have only one thing to say. See you next year.”
That will come as welcome news to both the children’s hospital and to Mackenzie Hughes, a Canadian who has learned to adore central Mississippi and the state’s capital city.
“I love this golf course,” Hughes said. “I’ll be back for many, many more years.”
Mississippi Today’s Alex Rozier, Geoff Pender and Bobby Harrison discuss the future of Jackson’s beleaguered water system, will it be fixed and what that fix might look like. It seems the federal government through the Environmental Protection Agency is on board for the long-haul fix. Will the state be?
We got you covered.
We’re keeping you informed with the latest on the Jackson water crisis. You can help sustain this news by donating any amount today to join the Mississippi Today member community.
