Rep. Kabir Karriem, D-Columbus, talks with Mississippi Today’s Bobby Harrison and Geoff Pender about the positive impact on the Golden Triangle and the state of the new Steel Dynamics aluminum mill coming to Lowndes County after a special session where legislators approved $246 million in incentives for the project. But Karriem added the Legislature needs to address other issues now, such as fixing Jackson water woes, improving health care in the state and restoring voting rights to people convicted of felonies.
In this episode of Mississippi Stories, Mississippi Editor-At-Large Marshall Ramsey sits down with Austin Golding, President & CEO of Golding Barge Line which is based in Vicksburg. Golding Barge Line specializes in movement of refined petroleum products, petrochemical-chemicals, and chemical products throughout the entries US inland waterway systems.
As Mississippi River levels drop to record low levels, Austin talks about the challenges faced by river barges and their crews and how that effects the US Economy. He also shares the history of his company and what life is like on the currently not-so Mighty Mississippi.
Gov. Tate Reeves stood proudly at a podium in the ornate Mississippi Capitol on Wednesday and boasted “it is a great day to be a Mississippian” after lawmakers approved his proposal to provide $246 million in incentives to lure a $2.5 billion aluminum mill creating 1,000 jobs to Lowndes County.
It was also a great day to be Tate Reeves.
It is reasonable to assume that Reeves’ 2023 reelection campaign will cut political ads referencing his first major economic development project and even video of that Capitol news conference.
Reeves will be a favorite to win in 2023 and the aluminum mill built by Fortune 500 company Steel Dynamics will be a feather in his political cap. But history tells us that the enticement of a major economic development project does not always help a candidate win.
In the summer of 2003, a proud Gov. Ronnie Musgrove was on hand as Nissan opened the state’s first and still largest auto manufacturing plant near Canton. Of course, Republican Gov. Haley Barbour defeated Musgrove a few months later in November 2003.
Musgrove had headwinds, such as a growing Republican voting trend in the state and other issues, that Reeves will not face. But the 2003 story is an illustration that economic development does not always equate to electoral victories.
“We did not set the timetable for when the plant would open,” said Musgrove, now an Oxford resident, when asked if he believed at the time the plant would be a boost for his campaign.
Musgrove demurred on responding to questions about whether he should have gotten more credit for the plant.
But he was more than willing to talk about the circumstances that led to the state landing its first automotive manufacturing plant — viewed as a watershed event that arguably has withstood the scrutiny of time.
In 2000, his first year in office, Musgrove was heavily criticized for calling an August special session to revamp the state jobs incentives laws and to create the Mississippi Development Authority.
“We did not have the incentives to attract a major auto manufacturing plant. Despite some work by past governors and legislators, our incentives were designed for 1950s-era manufacturing,” he said.
But within a month of that new incentive package being approved by the Legislature, the state received a phone call from Nissan. The state was asked to put together a proposal.
Musgrove asked if he could hand deliver the proposal to then Nissan Chief Executive Officer Carlos Ghosn.
“They asked why I would want to go to that trouble. I told them I wanted to convey how serious the state of Mississippi was,” Musgrove recalled. He was willing to fly to Japan to deliver the proposal.
But the flight to Japan was not necessary. Ghosn was going to be at the company’s North American headquarters in Los Angeles and had 30 minutes free to meet with Musgrove.
The governor then called a political rival in terms of party politics — Trent Lott, the Mississippi Republican who was the majority leader of the U.S. Senate. He asked Lott if he wanted to be a part of the meeting.
As the meeting was breaking up, Musgrove pulled a small Japanese cell phone from his coat pocket, handed it to Ghosn and told him when he called to tell him Mississippi’s proposal had been accepted, he could press one on the cell phone and reach him at the Governor’s Mansion.
Ghosn was impressed.
“He looked at the phone and said, ‘That is pretty good, governor,’” Musgrove recalled.
Sure enough, a few weeks later Musgrove received the phone call from Ghosn informing him Nissan was accepting Mississippi’s bid.
Ghosn then called Lott.
When he and Lott talked later, “The first thing Trent said was, ‘Did he call you on that phone?’” Musgrove said. “I told him I didn’t know.”
But days later, the Legislature passed a $295 million package to lure Nissan to build a $1.2-billion plant employing 4,000 people.
The Steel Dynamics project is supposed to employ 1,000 with a capital investment of $2.5 billion. Reeves calls the project the largest single capital investment in state history.
No doubt, the investment is significant. But it stands to reason that the cost to build plants and to equip plants would increase over time due to inflation.
According to the Nissan web page, Nissan has now invested $4 billion in the state and employs 5,000 with an additional 25,000 spinoff jobs from suppliers and other companies impacted by the massive plant.
Reeves has said he believes over time Steel Dynamics will have a similar impact.
He hopes, unlike Ronnie Musgrove, he can see the impact of the plant during his second term as governor.
Who hasn’t been in the kitchen, sitting at the counter perched on a stool, watching as grandma got busy?
You don’t say much, if anything at all. You simply watch as your grandmother creates magic. Perhaps she hums a little tune, flashes you an occasional smile, and hands you a big spoon or mixer beater dripping with goodness to sample. It’s your reward for being patient, and for not being underfoot.
All the while you’re a sponge, soaking up the pinches here and dashes there. Maybe there’s a recipe to follow, but more than likely, there isn’t one. Because grandma cooks from memory. Her knowledge has been handed down to her from her mother, her mother’s mother, and so on down the line.
And so, it was for De’Jonae “Dee” Curtis. The now 12-year-old was inspired by her grandmother, and filled with a dream. She first began her cooking business at home at the age of 8, then expanded to the mall before opening, Dee’s Babycakes, LLC on the main drag in the heart of Vicksburg.
“My parents surprised me on my 10th birthday with my first store in the Vicksburg Mall,” said Curtis, her eyes shining with the memory. “That was back in June of 2021. Now I’m here in this location and it’s been really good,” she said of her bakery located at 2600 Clay Street.
“I’m homeschooled, and I not only watched and learned while my grandma cooked, we also watched a lot of cooking shows together,” said Curtis. “It inspired me, and motivated me because I knew, I could do that too. It was a really good way for me to learn math too, you know, a half a cup of this or a fourth of a teaspoon of that. I realized I really liked doing it, the cooking, of course, but it made math fun.”
“I’ve interviewed with several baking shows and I’m just waiting for word if I made it or not. It’s very exciting,” added Curtis.
Curtis also shared that her business is dedicated for her aunt, nicknamed “Babycakes,” who the family lost to breast cancer. It’s the reason, she said, the name of her business will never change. Her aunt’s image also graces the bakery’s advertisements.
A portion of Dee’s Babycakes proceeds are donated to various cancer charities, the Humane Society, and animal shelters. Her long-term goal is to one day help other kids open their own businesses through a non-profit she’s started. She also dreams of national expansion as a brand.
Dee’s Babycakes offers a variety of delectable delights, and all the goodies are solely Dee’s recipes — from the cupcakes and cookies, cakes and chocolate covered grapes to breakfast and lunch specials. There are free samples too, a little taste of the flavors she started out with — strawberry shortcake, lemon and vanilla, and buttercream.
“My ‘OG’ flavors,” Dee says, a giggle escaping her as she dashes off to the kitchen in a flour covered apron.
Credit: Vickie D. King/Mississippi Today
Credit: Vickie D. King/Mississippi Today
Credit: Vickie D. King/Mississippi Today
Credit: Vickie D. King/Mississippi Today
Credit: Vickie D. King/Mississippi Today
Credit: Vickie D. King/Mississippi Today
Credit: Vickie D. King/Mississippi Today
Credit: Vickie D. King/Mississippi Today
Credit: Vickie D. King/Mississippi Today
Credit: Vickie D. King/Mississippi Today
Credit: Vickie D. King/Mississippi Today
Help us feature businesses in Mississippi owned by people of color:
Help us feature women-owned businesses in Mississippi:
The University of Southern Mississippi broke its silence on its role in the unfolding welfare scandal on Thursday after members of the faculty senate executive committee presented a draft of a blistering letter last week to the new president, Joe Paul, and the interim provost.
At a meeting Friday, when the senate had been planning to adopt the draft letter, many faculty grumbled about the university’s preemptive statement, calling it a confusing attempt to shift blame in the welfare scandal. Some faculty said they were just as bewildered by the reply from the Mississippi Department of Human Services to that statement.
“It’s sort of like seeing through the fog, and you can kind of make out some shape but you can’t see all the details,” Max Grivno, a history professor who represents the School of the Humanities on the senate, told Mississippi Today.
As former NFL quarterback Brett Favre and the volleyball stadium continue to make national news, officials at USM have refused requests for comment on the scandal from Mississippi Today and other media outlets like CNN and SM2, the student newspaper.
USM’s statement Thursday said that the university had “engaged in this agreement in good faith, following thorough due diligence by outside legal counsel, and after multiple assurances from officials at the highest levels of MDHS.” The statement did not say if USM intends to repay the welfare funds, but said it is working on a proposal to allow MDHS to use space on campus to provide programming for the underserved community.
MDHS responded it could not enter an agreement with USM to use the property in lieu of repayment of the funds “because we believe it to be a continued violation of the law and the purpose of the TANF program to help lift needy families out of poverty.”
In response, the faculty senate on Friday decided to hold its statement and amend it at a soon, but yet to be scheduled, emergency meeting.
At the same time, IHL Board President and billionaire USM alum Tommy Duff is also speaking up, saying USM should pay the money back and that the deal was “stupid,” even if legal, Mississippi Today reported Thursday.
His comments followed an editorial published last month in SM2 that also called on USM to return the misspent welfare dollars.
“The scandal is killing Favre’s reputation and it’s taking USM down with it,” the editorial states. “It’s hard to understand why Favre completed these actions, however the solution seems simple enough: Someone needs to give back the money.”
In 2017, Favre and USM officials crafted a deal with the Mississippi Department of Human Services and a welfare-funded nonprofit to use $5 million in Temporary Assistance for Needy Families (TANF) funds to build a volleyball facility on campus – a violation of federal law, according to State Auditor Shad White and state prosecutors.
White officially questioned the purchase in May of 2020, and while it has resulted in a criminal fraud charge against one defendant in the welfare scandal, neither the state nor federal government has taken further action to claw back the money or hold others accountable.
Mississippi Community Education Center, a nonprofit founded by Nancy New, a key figure in the welfare scandal, paid the athletic foundation to build the volleyball stadium under the guise that the nonprofit would lease university property to provide anti-poverty programming to the area’s underserved community.
USM told Mississippi Today in February of 2020 that the athletic foundation was looking forward to beginning conversations about how to use university property to serve the needy, but nearly three years later, the university says it is only now working on a proposed partnership with MDHS to fulfill this mission, which now appears unlikely given the welfare agency’s recent statement.
The SM2 editorial questioned if the volleyball project, first uncovered by Mississippi Today in February 2020, is an isolated event.
“What other corruption has been swept under the rug by those who are supposed to have good intentions for the university,” the editorial reads. “What other secrets lie below the surface?”
While the volleyball stadium has dominated headlines, it wasn’t the university’s only project supported by welfare dollars.
By the time USM officials began talking with New about funding the volleyball building in July of 2017, they had already entered a similarly structured lease agreement that funneled $200,000 in federal MDHS grant funds to renovate a space inside the Jim and Thomas Duff Athletic Center called the M-Club Room, an area for student athletes.
In the days after Favre and the welfare officials initially met at USM to discuss funding for the volleyball stadium, USM officials expressed apprehension about taking $4 million in grant funds for the project, according to texts Favre sent Nancy New. But somewhere within the negotiations, texts show, the deal rose to $5 million, including an additional $1 million for improvements to the basketball stadium and facility maintenance costs.
In the aftermath of the scandal, the university has not acknowledged these additional benefits it received from the welfare program or responded to several inquiries about these arrangements.
The forensic audit found that the welfare department also paid USM nearly $840,000 in welfare funds for a “Healthy Choices Program” that violated TANF regulations. Mississippi Today retrieved documents through a public records request that show USM entered TANF grant agreements with both MDHS and Nancy New’s nonprofit from 2016-2019 for this program, called a “Student Development Program.”
The grant specifically targeted student athletes and beyond funding salaries, scholarships and departmental expenses, the university used the money for things like specialty performance drinks, popsockets and massages, according to Mississippi Today’s review of receipts.
The forensic audit also questioned nearly $1.2 million in welfare funds that New’s nonprofit paid the university to fund “externships” for students in the School of Psychology through a program that provided USM student workers to New’s for-profit school.
USM also received $231,986 through Families First for Mississippi – the name of the nonprofit-operated welfare program during the scandal – with the goal of helping fifth-graders develop healthy eating habits. Auditors did not question this program, called the “RISE program” and funded by nonprofit Family Resource Center of North Mississippi.
The nutrition program shared a name with another program funded by the same nonprofit, former WWE wrestler Ted “Teddy” DiBiase’s RISE Program, which led to federal charges against former MDHS Director John Davis.
At last month’s faculty senate meeting, Wiesenburg, the president, suggested they should write a letter to USM’s administration. At most universities, faculty senators are representative bodies made up of faculty elected by each department. The administration is supposed to seek the faculty senate’s feedback on a range of policies that affect the university from teaching and learning to the search for a new president. This is called shared governance.
Wiesenburg’s suggestion prompted an impassioned speech from Grivno who said he thought the statement should point out that the misspending was “a symptom of a deeper rot” – that the athletic foundation and the administration operate with little faculty oversight.
Grivno wouldn’t advocate for USM returning the funds to the state, he said, “because they will just give it to another one of their cronies.”
“We should call attention to the fact that this happened because we had a breakdown of shared governance,” he added.
Grivno also noted the faculty senate’s exclusion from the presidential search process that led to Paul’s appointment. He noted that IHL’s search advisory group, which was stacked with administrators and high-level donors, did not include a single faculty senator.
“People scratch their heads and go, ‘how did this happen?’” Grivno continued. “It’s not an accident, it’s not an oversight. It was intentional. It’s offensive because it was meant to give offense. We can at least squeal like a stuck pig and say, ‘this wasn’t right.”
For nearly three years, university and IHL officials have been virtually mum about the volleyball controversy – a primary reason for the faculty letter. USM has not responded to several emailed requests for an interview or for comment on its welfare-funded projects since Mississippi Today first reported on the project in February of 2020.
The new, state-of-the-art volleyball stadium was the brainchild of Favre, whose daughter played the sport at USM. He began discussing the project with USM officials as early as 2016. During the years Favre was working to get the volleyball facility built, The Athletic reported that the athletic foundation took $130,000 in donations from Favre’s charity, Favre4Hope, which says its mission is to serve needy or disabled children and breast cancer patients.
By mid-2017, Favre was in touch with Gov. Phil Bryant, Bryant’s appointed welfare director John Davis and New, who was given authority to spend millions of federal welfare funds, about funding the volleyball stadium.
USM’s legal counsel and the welfare department decided that despite the federal prohibition on using welfare funds for brick and mortar construction, they could structure the payment as a lease between the athletic foundation and New’s nonprofit Mississippi Community Education Center.
USM, owner of university property, would lease its athletic facilities for a five-year period to the athletic foundation for $1, and the athletic foundation would turn around and lease the property to the nonprofit for $5 million. The leased property included the to-be-built volleyball facility, where the nonprofit said it would staff resource offices.
“It’s very difficult to make that argument in hindsight because the volleyball court had not yet been built,” White said in a September interview with ESPN. “So they were leasing a volleyball court at a very, very high rental rate before the volleyball court was built. That is not a lease. That is building something with welfare money, which you cannot do.”
USM sent the lease between USM and the athletic foundation, with the attached sublease between the athletic foundation and Mississippi Community Education Center, to Mississippi Institutions of Higher Learning, which has the final say over university contracts of $250,000 or more. IHL legal counsel from the Attorney General’s Office and IHL’s Board of Trustees then approved the lease.
In May of 2020, Mississippi Today retrieved meeting minutes showing that the IHL Board of Trustees approved a lease for the purpose of building the volleyball stadium – what officials called a “Wellness Center” – knowing, according to meeting minutes, that “MCEC’s funding for this project is via a Block Grant from the Mississippi Department of Human Services.”
Tom Duff, who sat on IHL’s board and now serves as its president, told Mississippi Today Thursday that he did not know about the volleyball project even though he voted on it, because it had been placed on the consent agenda – a block of agenda items that the trustees vote on all at once and often don’t read.
“The funding from MCEC shall be prepaid rent to the Foundation in the amount of Five Million Dollars ($5,000,000) for the leasing of certain USM athletic facilities including but not limited to the to be constructed Wellness Center, Reed Green Coliseum and additional athletic space as agreed upon by USM and the Foundation,” the minutes state.
Mississippi Today attempted to get IHL to respond to the revelation in 2020, but officials insisted that IHL only approved the $1 lease between the university and the athletic foundation, not the $5 million sublease between the athletic foundation and the nonprofit that was attached to it.
The implication was that IHL was not involved in the transfer of welfare funds between the nonprofit and the athletic foundation, even though the plan to use MDHS money to build the volleyball stadium was outlined in the minutes IHL approved.
After attempts from IHL and the university to obscure that fact, Mississippi Today sent an email to both entities stating, “Southern Miss knew and allowed Human Services funds to be used to construct its volleyball center. It did this by letting the foundation rent University property for $5 million. It’s in the October 2017 IHL meeting minutes and neither of you have disputed this.”
IHL Communications Director Caron Blanton doubled down.
“Given that you are determined to print inaccurate information, we are prepared to respond appropriately,” Blanton wrote. “The IHL Board gave USM the authority to lease land to the USM Athletic Foundation, a separate entity with its own board, for $1, period.If you are ‘comfortable’ reporting inaccurate and verifiably false facts, that is certainly your journalistic prerogative.”
“You have not disputed anything I am preparing to write,” Mississippi Today responded. “The IHL board gave USM the authority to lease land to the USM athletic foundation with the understanding that the foundation would then lease it to MCEC for $5 million in MDHS block grant funds to build a volleyball stadium. Therefore, the University and IHL knew that block grant funds would be used to pay for the facility.”
Blanton forwarded Mississippi Today’s email to IHL Commissioner Alfred Rankins, who replied, “There is no need to respond to (Mississippi Today) again regarding this issue,” according to an email the news organization obtained.
IHL never explained what was inaccurate about Mississippi Today’s interpretation of the meeting minutes, nor did it respond to the published story as warned. IHL did not respond to a request for comment for this story.
The volleyball stadium is the single largest known welfare expenditure within the scandal. Nancy New’s son Zach New pleaded guilty in April to defrauding the government for funneling welfare money to the project and disguising it as a lease. But the state chose not to include the volleyball stadium in its civil lawsuit filed in May that attempts to clawback the money.
After the scandal broke and the auditor officially questioned the volleyball stadium purchase in May of 2020, Duff, then an IHL board member, asked a lawyer friend, Joel Johnson, a member of the athletic foundation, to research events surrounding the project’s approval.
“Joel is very upset about the situation with the Mississippi Community Education Center and the lack of transparency with the USM Athletic Foundation and its members,” Duff wrote in an email to Commissioner Rankins. “What these minutes indicate to me is that there was no details of the transaction nor a vote on same. There is zero reference to a lease in this agreement.”
Duff and Favre are listed on the university’s website as honorary members of the athletic foundation’s board of directors, along with Hattiesburg lawyer Bud Holmes, who was representing Favre in the state’s civil case until Favre hired former Donald Trump attorney Eric Herschmann. The most recently available public IRS tax forms for the foundation, which are from 2020, also list Zach New as a member of the athletic foundation board.
Johnson declined to discuss the project with Mississippi Today, citing ongoing litigation.
In his email to Duff, Johnson said the only person to mention Nancy New’s nonprofit to the foundation was USM Athletic Director Jon Gilbert, who attended the July 2017 meeting about the project with Favre and Davis. Gilbert has declined interview requests from Mississippi Today since 2020.
“Shad White and I are having a conversation,” Duff wrote to Rankins in the same email more than two years ago, “and then I am visiting with US Attorney Mike Hurst to learn, if possible the state and federal response.”
“Thanks for sharing,” Rankins responded.
In an interview with Mississippi Today, Duff said he could not recall the specifics of his conversation with Hurst who left the Department of Justice in early 2021. Duff said he thinks he contacted Hurst before the scandal was public.
“If I remember the conversation, I think I just said, ‘Mike, I don’t know what is going on about this, but the athletic foundation was not aware of it, the IHL was not aware of it, and perhaps somebody needs to check into it,’” Duff said.
Duff said he is still trying to understand how the misspending happened but that the “key statement” is he thinksthe athletic foundation was not aware of the sublease with Nancy New’s Mississippi Community Education Center.
The sublease with MCEC was signed by Athletic Foundation President Leigh Breal.
“You’re dealing with the foundation, you’re dealing with USM, you’re dealing with IHL, you’re dealing with the state,” Duff said. “I can be wrong in some of my specifics, that’s why I’m trying to couch myself. Something that I think is a fact might not be a fact. Basically me saying USM should pay back something – probably the foundation is the one that got the money, it’s just USM ended up with the building.”
Editor’s note: Mississippi Today Editor-in-Chief Adam Ganucheau’s mother signed off on the language of a lease agreement to construct a University of Southern Mississippi volleyball stadium. Read more about that here.
University of Mississippi Medical Center officials on Friday said negotiations to take over the struggling Greenwood Leflore Hospital have ended, and an agreement is not possible.
Without an agreement with UMMC, the hospital could close before the end of the year.
“Despite the best efforts of all parties involved, it has become clear to us that an agreement between the University of Mississippi Medical Center and Greenwood Leflore Hospital will not be possible,” said Dr. Alan Jones, associate vice chancellor for clinical affairs at UMMC.
He said an agreement is not possible due to several factors, the primary one being “the current realities of health care economics that all health systems are facing in this challenging environment.”
Greenwood City Council President Ronnie Stevenson told Mississippi Today that UMMC’s decision came as a shock when he learned about it around lunch time on Friday.
UMMC and Greenwood Leflore had been in talks over a potential partnership agreement since the summer. Greenwood Leflore’s interim CEO Gary Marchand told staff last week that any agreement would not be ready before early 2023, despite earlier hopes of completing the process by the end of the year.
The Greenwood City Council and Leflore County Board of Supervisors, the joint owners of the hospital, voted last week to put up nearly $10 million to cover outstanding Medicare debts and deferred maintenance costs that UMMC said it did not want to shoulder if it took over operations.
“I am very disappointed in their decision,” Stevenson said. “They have held us up for months, thinking this was going to go through, and we as a city and a county met all their demands or agreed to meet all their demands, and for them to pull out at the last minute, leaving us dry like this — it’s just difficult to digest right now.”
Stevenson said local leaders are not aware of another potential partner to operate the hospital.
“We did not have a Plan B,” he said. “But we’ve got to go find one.”
In the meantime, the hospital will likely have to keep cutting jobs and services in an effort to keep the doors open as long as possible, he said.
Leflore County Board of Supervisors President Robert Collins said in a statement that the supervisors had “always been concerned” that a deal between UMMC and the Greenwood Leflore Hospital would not go through.
“Understanding that we are not healthcare experts we have retained the consulting services of Samuel Odle and (sic) experienced healthcare executive,” the statement said. “Mr. Odle’s role is to view the situation and advise the Supervisors and Community on feasible options for maintain (sic) healthcare in our community.”
Marchand told employees on Friday morning that the hospital would lay off up to 80 employees to reduce costs as negotiations with UMMC continued. The memo contained no indication that the partnership agreement had been taken off the table.
A press release from Greenwood Leflore Hospital suggests the decision came as a surprise to hospital officials.
“Although we certainly can understand and appreciate the challenge of providing healthcare services in the post-pandemic era, this decision was not expected based on the progress that had been made regarding a lease transaction,” the statement said. “The financial realities of providing healthcare services are impacting both organizations.”
When asked whether the state would step in to help the hospital, Lt. Gov. Hosemann said he is disappointed the parties couldn’t reach an agreement.
“The financial issues facing healthcare are becoming universal in our state. We need a universal plan to address them,” he said in a statement to Mississippi Today.
Speaker of the House Philip Gunn did not immediately respond Friday afternoon. State lawmakers traveled to Jackson this week for a special session to pass a $246 million tax incentive deal to help an out-of-state corporation expand operations in the state. Gov. Tate Reeves, who focused his public comments this week on the project’s job creation, did not include policies for rural hospital closures or any other pressing needs the state faces in his special session call.
Officials from both hospitals said they will continue discussing physician services in Greenwood and Leflore County, including UMMC’s operation of a general pediatrics clinic and an OB-GYN clinic. UMMC will soon also run an internal medicine and primary care clinic in the area.
“We will continue to evaluate other opportunities as they arise in order to maintain some health care services in the community,” said Jones.
Stevenson said the hospital is critical to Greenwood and Leflore County.
“This community needs a hospital,” he said. “We don’t want to have to rush to Jackson … We want to save lives here, and having a community hospital will save lives.”
Since 2005, five rural hospitals in Mississippi have closed.
State Health Officer Dr. Daniel Edney alluded to the ongoing threat to Greenwood Leflore Hospital during the state board of health meeting last month, when he described health care infrastructure in the Delta as “very fragile” and said at least six hospitals in the region are facing dire financial challenges. At the time, negotiations between UMMC and Greenwood Leflore appeared to be on track.
“Despite what’s been reported in the media, currently there are no solutions for those hospitals,” he said. “No one’s coming to the rescue.”
Editor’s note: Kate Royals, Mississippi Today’s community health editor since January 2022, worked as a writer/editor for UMMC’s Office of Communications from November 2018 through August 2020, writing press releases and features about the medical center’s schools of dentistry and nursing.
The state awarded $180 million in matching American Rescue Plan Act funds on Friday for water, wastewater and storm water projects.
The amount includes $35.6 million for Jackson, exactly what the city applied for last month from the Mississippi Department of Environmental Quality, which is administering the match program known as the Municipality & County Water Infrastructure Grant Program, or MCWI.
In total, the $180 million MDEQ awarded on Friday is less than half, 41%, of the $435 million that cities and counties applied for from the fund. The first round of awards leaves $270 million remaining in the MCWI fund. MDEQ clarified that $180 million was the maximum amount it could award in the first round of funding under SB 2822. A release from Sen. John Horhn, D-Jackson, said that the agency will begin a second round of funding in the spring.
The dollar-for-dollar match gives Jackson, which has said it needs $2 billion to fix its drinking water and wastewater systems, a total of $71.3 million in ARPA money for the following water projects:
• Jackson J.H. Fewell Plant Filter and Transmission Line Project Drinking Water ($8.8 million from MCWI) • Jackson O.B. Curtis Raw Water Pump Replacement Drinking Water ($1.65 million) • Jackson O.B. Curtis/J.H. Fewell Chemical Feed Automation Drinking Water ($1.45 million) • Jackson O.B. Curtis General Filter Upgrade Project Drinking Water ($8.8 million) • Jackson J.H. Fewell General Pump Repair and Replacement Drinking Water ($2.75 million) • Jackson West Bank Interceptor Sewer Line Repair and Rehabilitation Project Wastewater ($7.5 million) • Jackson Mill Street Sewer Basin Reconstruction Wastewater ($4.7 million)
Horhn said on Friday that “we are looking for the state to do more once the regular session begins in January.”
Overall, 130 projects around the state received funding: $93 million went to 76 wastewater projects, $47 million went to 36 drinking water projects, and $35 million went to 18 storm water projects.
Rankin County received the most money for a single project, getting $14.5 million for its “watershed protection and restoration program.” Meridian received the next highest project award with $8.9 million to improve its wastewater system as required in a federal consent decree.
See the table below for a full list of awarded projects:
Editor's note: This story has been updated to include a clarification from MDEQ and a full list of projects receiving funding.
When news broke in 2020 that the new volleyball stadium opening on University of Southern Mississippi’s campus that year had been built with federal welfare funds, university officials said it would work to use the facility to help needy families.
“Southern Miss Athletic Foundation is looking forward to initiating conversations with the appropriate state agency and leaders about how its athletics facilities, including the Wellness Center, can be used to the benefit of Mississippi families and individuals in the spirit of the original agreement,” USM spokesperson Jim Coll told Mississippi Today in an February 2020 email.
Nearly three years later, that hasn’t happened. Now, in response to mounting pressure from its own faculty, public officials and the media, USM continues to ignore the idea of returning the funds, saying instead in a statement Thursday morning that it is working on a proposal to allow the welfare department to utilize space on campus to provide programming to the underserved community.
But within hours, that proposal was apparently dead. The Mississippi Department of Human Services released its own statement Thursday afternoon saying it believed such an arrangement would be against the federal laws that govern the funds in question, the Temporary Assistance for Needy Families (TANF) block grant.
“As noted in prior audits, use of TANF funds for the construction of brick and mortar building projects has never been authorized by law,” reads the welfare department’s statement. “MDHS cannot accept USM’s offer to utilize the building constructed with TANF funds in lieu of repayment of the funds, because we believe it to be a continued violation of the law and the purpose of the TANF program to help lift needy families out of poverty.”
USM did not respond to a request for comment regarding the MDHS statement and has declined to speak further on the welfare scandal, including whether it plans to return the funds.
The volleyball stadium is not included in MDHS’s ongoing civil lawsuit, which currently attempts to claw back roughly $24 million in welfare funds from 38 individuals or organizations. Though MDHS Director Bob Anderson has alluded to the possibility of pursuing the volleyball project, the agency’s recent statement is the most unequivocal on its stance about the illegality of the expenditure.
Elizabeth Lower-Basch, deputy director for policy for the Center for Law and Social Policy and national TANF expert, told Mississippi Today that even if a building were to benefit needy families — low-income housing development, for example — the use of TANF funds on construction is strictly prohibited by federal law.
“So even if Mississippi wanted to reach and try to argue that providing tennis lessons to teens from families with low incomes would keep them busy and prevent unplanned pregnancies, they could only use TANF funds to pay usage fees and not for construction of the facility,” she said in an email.
Federal regulations around welfare spending are otherwise notoriously lax, allowing states to use the money on a variety of programs they say will reduce or prevent poverty. But Lower-Basch, who has worked on TANF and other safety net policies for over 25 years, said she has not seen another state use TANF funds in quite this way before.
“Mississippi should not try to justify its past misuse of the TANF program and instead commit to using TANF funds for their intended purpose – helping parents raise their children with the economic security they need to thrive,” Lower-Basch wrote.
MDHS also said it was unable to comment further because of ongoing investigations. It did not answer whether it now plans to add the athletic foundation, which received the funds to build the facility, in the civil suit. The agency fired the private attorney, former U.S. Attorney Brad Pigott, it initially hired to bring the civil suit after he subpoenaed the athletic foundation for its communication with various figures, including former Gov. Phil Bryant, in an attempt to get to the bottom of how welfare money was funneled to a volleyball court. Defense attorneys have also made the stadium an issue of the case, subpoenaing Bryant himself for records related to the deal.
Retired NFL quarterback Brett Favre, whose daughter played volleyball at Southern Miss, was the inspiration behind the new stadium. Text messages show he pushed various officials, including Bryant, for funding for the project in 2017.
After a meeting at USM between Favre, welfare officials and athletics department officials in July of 2017, MDHS and USM legal counsel negotiated a lease agreement that would allow a nonprofit founded by Nancy New to pay $5 million in welfare funds to the Southern Mississippi Athletic Foundation to rent university athletic facilities that it would use to conduct programming. The facilities were used for just one event, a Healthy Teens rally, according to records retrieved by Mississippi Today. Nancy New’s son, Zach New, pleaded guilty to fraud for using TANF money on construction, disguising it as a lease agreement.
None of the six people arrested in connection with the welfare scandal in February of 2020 is expected to have a trial. Five defendants — Nancy New, Zach New, former MDHS Director John Davis, former professional wrestler Brett DiBiase and nonprofit accountant Anne McGrew — have pleaded guilty and agreed to testify for the prosecution. A sixth defendant, former MDHS procurement officer Gregory “Latimer” Smith, entered a pre-trial diversion program in October. No one else has been charged criminally, but officials have said the investigation is ongoing.
