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Gov. Tate Reeves on Thursday signed a bill into law that will allow thousands of people in prison in Mississippi to become eligible for parole — an effort to address the state’s prison crisis of overcrowding, inhumane conditions, harsh sentences and federal scrutiny.

Reeves’ approval comes after he vetoed a similar measure last year, with some law enforcement, prosecutors, lawmakers and others saying it went too far.

“Criminal justice reform,” Reeves said on social media Thursday. “It means a lot of different things to different people. A measured approach to 2nd chances is good — a knee-jerk reaction can harm public safety. My #1 focus in these troubling times will always be to protect MS communities.

“My conservative (legislative) friends that voted against this bill did so based on valid concerns,” Reeves said. “I share many of them which led to last year’s veto. I also believe in 2nd chances. I trust my Parole Board appointees to make wise decisions. SB2795 was not an easy call for me. But, at the end of the day, I believe it meets my standard for a measured approach, & with proper implementation, it can be a net positive for MS. Therefore I signed SB2795 into law earlier today. May God bless Mississippi!”

Among the problems cited by Reeves last year when he vetoed similar legislation is that it would grant parole for those convicted of murder and sex offenses. Legislators said those issues were fixed in this year’s version of the bill.

Currently, people convicted of nonviolent crimes in Mississippi must serve at least 25% of their sentence before parole eligibility. The new law says that for crimes committed after June 30, 1995, a person would have to serve at least 25% or 10 years before eligibility.

The bill would make those convicted of armed-robbery parole eligible after serving 60% of their sentence or 25 years, whichever is less. Currently armed robbers convicted after 1995 are not eligible for parole. In addition those convicted of car-jacking and drive-by shootings would have the same parole eligibility standards.

Those convicted of violations deemed violent crimes committed without a weapon, such as simple robbery or burglary, would be eligible for parole after serving 20 years or 50% of their sentence, whichever is less. They currently have to serve 50%. And some convicted of possession of drugs or of selling drugs and those convicted of some other nonviolent crimes would be eligible after serving 10 years or 25%, whichever is less.

“It gives those inmates some hope – hope that one day they might get out if they live up to the conditions spelled out in the bill,” said Sen. Juan Barnett, D-Heidelberg, the author of the bill. “It is not a get out of jail free bill. You have to earn your way out.”

Barnett said as many as 3,000 of the state’s roughly 17,000 people now in prison could become eligible for parole within three to five years under the new law.

“And it is good for the taxpayers of Mississippi because it provides the opportunity to save some money and correct a system that is not working. It is an overall good bill for the state of Mississippi.”

House Judiciary B Chair Nick Bain, R-Corinth, has worked in recent years to ease sentencing guidelines to reduce the prison population so that the state can better deal with a potential lawsuit by the U.S. Department of Justice over the conditions of the Mississippi prisons.

“I think we took a big step today moving the needle toward fixing our Corrections system,” Bain said. “I think we sent a message that we are serious about fixing our problems.”

In Alabama, a similar prison crisis has resulted in taxpayers facing a $1 billion bill to meet federal mandates to fix the system.

Barnett added, “A lot of people worked on this – Republicans and Democrats. It shows we can put politics and partisanship behind us and work for the good of the state.”

Criminal justice reform in Mississippi — with the second-highest incarceration rate in the country — has been supported by a growing coalition of conservative and progressive groups.

“Legislative leadership and stakeholders from across the criminal justice system worked very hard this year to craft meaningful parole reform that puts public safety first while providing opportunity for rehabilitated individuals to earn redemption,” said Russ Latino, president of the conservative-leaning Empower Mississippi. “In signing this bill, Gov. Reeves is helping to address the overcrowding problems created by the Clinton-Biden Crime Bill in the mid-1990s. It should be seen as a signal to the Department of Justice that we are prepared to get our own house in order, without costly federal intervention. This is a smart on crime, soft on taxpayer conservative reform.”

FWD.us state director Alesha Judkins in a statement said: “Today is a big day for Mississippians across the state, particularly for people and families who sadly, know firsthand just how devastating the state’s incarceration crisis is, and who have, alongside other advocates, pushed to ensure meaningful opportunities for release for their loved ones. 

“These reforms will help Mississippi begin to address its dangerously high prison population and high imprisonment rate. By expanding parole eligibility, the state has joined several other Southern states in passing common-sense criminal justice reform measures that have safely reduced prison populations and decreased crime rates at the same time.”

But the measure was a tough sell in the Legislature — other criminal justice bills died this session — and faced opposition from some law enforcement and other groups who said it would allow dangerous criminals out early and ignores the rights of victims of crimes.

READ MORE: Reeves vetoes education budget, criminal justice reforms, COVID-19 spending

“I don’t have a problem with giving people a second chance,” said Sen. Angela Burks Hill, R-Picayune. “But this includes violent crimes, not just nonviolent. These people were sentenced under one set of rules, with victims told how long they’d get and judges issuing sentences thinking they were based on day-for-day, and now the rules changed. It sends a mixed message to victims. I’m not for letting armed robbers and armed carjackers out after 60% of their sentence.”

Hill said Reeves staff had told several senators that Reeves said he would veto the bill

Sen. Chad McMahan, R-Guntown, said he voted against the bill because he was urged to by constituents and law enforcement in his district.

“I represent my district. The governor represents the state as a whole and a majority of senators across the state supported the bill,” McMahan said, adding he would support an early release program that required people who gained the release to work and have a mentor.

The post Gov. Reeves signs parole eligibility bill, after last year’s veto appeared first on Mississippi Today.

Greatest athlete in Ole Miss history? My guess in 99% of Rebels would blurt “Archie Manning” before the question is completed.

Hard to argue: Manning was an All American quarterback and also an outstanding shortstop in baseball. And then there’s Jake Gibbs, also an All American quarterback so gifted in baseball the New York Yankees paid him $100,000 to sign to play baseball instead of football. That was back when Mickey Mantle was the highest paid player in baseball at a salary of 100 grand.

Manning vs. Gibbs is an argument I’ve heard many, many times through the years. Charlie Conerly, still another All American quarterback and a slugging center fielder, surely deserves to be part of that conversation. At Ole Miss, quarterbacks always seem to take center stage.

But the guy who is quite possibly the greatest athlete in Ole Miss history didn’t even play football — not at Ole Miss, anyway. He would be Donnie Kessinger, whose baseball jersey No. 11 will be retired Thursday night when the Rebels play LSU in the first of a three-game series. The truth is, Ole Miss could have done a two-for and retired Kessinger’s basketball jersey (23) at the same time. He was that good — a consensus All American in both sports.

How good was Kessinger? Glad you asked:

• His .436 batting average in 1964 remains the best in Ole Miss history. His .400 career batting average remains the highest, as well. Yes, and he was a better fielder than hitter, a six-time All-Star shortstop for the Chicago Cubs, twice a Golden Glove winner as the best fielding shortstop in the league. He once set a Major League record, playing 56 consecutive games at shortstop without committing a single error.

• In basketball, he twice led the Southeastern Conference in scoring and had a career scoring average of 22.2 points per game. In 1967, after Kessinger had played for the Cubs for three seasons, Babe McCarthy, coach of the New Orleans Buccaneers in the old American Basketball Association, flew to Chicago to offer Kessinger a basketball contract. Never mind that Kessinger hadn’t played basketball in several years. McCarthy had coached against Kessinger when McCarthy was at Mississippi State. He knew what Kessinger could do.

• Yes, some Ole Miss fans surely will say: “But Kessinger didn’t play football.” Well, here’s the thing: He could have. He was an All-State quarterback at Forrest City, Ark., and led his team to an undefeated state championship season as a senior.

Count Larry Higginbotham, who pitched at Ole Miss when Kessinger played shortstop, among those who believe Kessinger could have played football — “or run track” — at Ole Miss. “Don was such a great athlete, he could have done anything he wanted,” Higginbotham said.

“We always heard that Coach (Vaught) had tried to get Don to come out for football but that Don was dead-set on baseball as a career,” Higginbotham said. 

Said Kessinger himself, “I’d see Coach Vaught around campus and he’d say something like, ‘When are you gonna come out and get behind center.’ I never knew if he was joking or not, but I had my mind made up about pro baseball. That was my dream. Besides, it wasn’t like Ole Miss had a shortage in quarterbacks back then with Glynn Griffing, Doug Elmore, Jim Weatherly and all those guys.”

Kessinger no doubt could have played wide receiver, too. He was quick and fast, a great leaper with great hands — “quickest, surest hands I ever saw,” Higginbotham said.

Higginbotham remembers one time at the old Ole Miss baseball field when an opponent lifted a foul ball behind the bleachers on the third base side. From shortstop, Kessinger dashed off the diamond, around the bleachers, and caught the ball. “There weren’t many people there,” Higginbotham said, “but he got a standing ovation.”

Archie Manning remembers watching as a young teen Don Kessinger play basketball in the old gym at Ole Miss. “What I remember is that it seemed like his hands dangled down around his knees because he had such a long wingspan,” Manning said. “And I remember he was far and away the best player on the floor, one of the best athletes I’ve ever seen to this day.”

Years later, when Kessinger was with the Cubs and Manning was at Ole Miss, the two practiced baseball together. “Leo Durocher wanted Don to to switch-hit and learn to bat left-handed,” Manning said. “I wanted to switch-hit and learn to hit right-handed. I remember the two of us in the gym, pitching to each other with tennis balls.”

My own memories of Don Kessinger begin with watching him play for those great Cubs teams of the 1960s with Ron Santo at third, DK at short, Glenn Beckert at second, Ernie Banks at first, Randy Hundley behind the plate and slugging Billy Williams in the outfield. Kessinger remains the best I ever saw at going deep into the hole, back-handing a ground ball on the outfield grass, leaping and simultaneously throwing a strike to first base. It was like ballet.

Since then, I have covered Kessinger as the Ole Miss baseball coach, his sons Keith and Kevin as terrific Ole Miss athletes and grandson Grae, soon to be a Major League shortstop. And here’s the thing about all those 40-plus years of knowing Don Kessinger: As great an athlete as he was, he remains a nicer person — modest almost to a fault. You’d never learn from him he was two-sport All American or a six-time All-Star shortstop.

“I owe so many people so much,” Kessinger, 78, said Wednesday. “I’ve been blessed and fortunate.”

Those of us who watched him play surely can say the same.

The post Was Don Kessinger the best Ole Miss athlete ever? So glad you asked. appeared first on Mississippi Today.

Jackson resident Omar Travis was released from prison about four years ago after being convicted of receiving stolen property. Before that, in 1991, he was convicted on a burglary charge.

This legislative session, Travis was among the 21 former people convicted of felonies who House leaders decided should have their voting rights restored. The only way to have voting rights restored in Mississippi is through legislative action or gubernatorial pardon, which is why Travis was relieved when the House passed his suffrage bill.

But Senate leaders killed his bill along with 18 others, ultimately deciding to pass just two of the House’s proposed suffrage bills.

Travis, who now works as a mental health technician counseling troubled youth in a clinic setting, was obviously disappointed by the outcome.

“This country was founded on no taxation without representation,” Travis said. “We are supposed to be ‘returning citizens.’ That is the phrase that has been coined. But why should a citizen not have the right to vote?”

Mississippi is in the minority of states — less than 10 — where voting rights are not automatically restored for people convicted of felonies either after they complete their sentence or at some point after completing parole or probation. 

The state now denies a higher percentage of its residents the right to vote because of felony convictions than any state in the country, according to a recent study. In Mississippi, 235,150 people — or 10.6% of the state’s voting age population — have lost their right to vote, according to a recent study by The Sentencing Project, a national nonprofit that advocates for voting and criminal justice issues. Since 2016, Mississippi has moved from second to first highest percentage in the nation.

And there are grave effects particularly on Black Mississippians. The prohibition on voting is part of the 1890 Mississippi Constitution — added as one of several attempts to prevent Black Mississippians from voting. With African Americans still being disproportionately convicted of crimes, that continues to be the effect of the disenfranchisement language.

A 2018 analysis by Mississippi Today found that 61% of the Mississippians who have lost their rights to vote are African American, despite the fact that African Americans represent 36% of the state’s total voting-age population.

Had the Senate had passed those 21 House proposals this year and sent them to Gov. Tate Reeves, it would have been the most bills restoring suffrage to people convicted of felonies passed by the Legislature since 2004. That year, 34 people had their voting rights restored through the legislative process.

Sen. Joey Fillingane, R-Sumrall, said when he was appointed by Lt. Gov. Delbert Hosemann to chair the Judiciary B Committee, he discussed with Hosemann what criteria should be used in passing suffrage bills out of the committee.

Fillingane said it was agreed that the committee would steer clear of bills restoring voting rights to those convicted of violent crimes and those convicted of embezzling public funds. That was the criteria, Fillingane said, used during the 2021 session, resulting in the Senate passing only two of the 21 bills approved by the House.

House Judiciary B Chair Nick Bain, R-Corinth, who passed the 21 bills ultimately approved by the House out of his committee, said the criteria used by the Senate Judiciary B Committee was basically the same as what he used.

“We did pass some convicted of violent crimes, but they were old convictions,” Bain said.

The events of the 2021 session highlight the chaotic and inefficient manner of tasking the Legislature with restoring voting rights on a case-by-case basis.

Norman Ivey of Florence is in the same boat as Travis. The House passed his suffrage bill in the 2021 session, but the Senate ultimately killed it. Ivey said he was convicted of multiple crimes: burglary of an occupied dwelling, aggravated assault and possession of precursor chemicals to manufacture crystal meth.

“I spent all my junior years locked up before then,” Ivey said. “I was raised by drug addicts… I did not stand a chance.”

Despite those odds, Ivey eventually did turn his life around. Ivey now has a job and questions why he should not have the right to vote like other taxpaying citizens. Ivey said he has been trouble-free for about 12 years, owns a plumbing business and works with a non-profit tutoring troubled youth.

“What do you have to do to get this right back?” Ivey asked. “I pay taxes regularly. I have a business I pay taxes on. I pay taxes on my house. Yet people say I have no say in who represents me. I have no voice.”

Both Travis and Ivey credited their Christian faith in turning their lives around. The 2021 session was the third for Travis to attempt to get a bill passed to have his voting rights restored. The 2021 session was Ivey’s first attempt to regain his voting rights.

The Constitution contains a list of crimes for which a person convicted of a felony loses voting rights. Disenfranchising crimes include: arson, armed robbery, bigamy, bribery, embezzlement, extortion, felony bad check, felony shoplifting, forgery, larceny, murder, obtaining money or goods under false pretense, perjury, rape, receiving stolen property, robbery, theft, timber larceny, unlawful taking of a motor vehicle, statutory rape, carjacking and larceny under lease or rental agreement.

There are other crimes, such as crimes connected with the sale of drugs, where a person convicted of a felony does not lose the right to vote and actually is eligible to vote while incarcerated.

“Until recently, I didn’t even know what path to take” to get voting rights restored, Ivey told Mississippi Today.

The two bills that did pass this year were allowed to become law without Gov. Reeves’ signature. Bain, the House committee chairman, said he plans to have hearings on the issue this summer.

Rep. Chris Bell, the Jackson Democrat who sponsored the suffrage bill for Travis, said people should have their rights restored at some point after finishing their sentence “after they have paid their debt to society.”

“We’re always talking about second chances,” Bell said. “But having voting rights restored is giving someone a second chance.”

The post Mississippi Senate killed 19 House bills to restore voting rights appeared first on Mississippi Today.

In this week’s Mississippi Stories, Mississippi Today Editor-At-Large Marshall Ramsey sits down with Rhea Williams-Bishop, Director of Mississippi and New Orleans programs for the W.K. Kellogg Foundation (WKKF). A lifelong Mississippian raised in Carthage and educated at Jackson State University, Williams-Bishop has always had her foot in the philanthropic and public service worlds. Five years ago, she was named to her current post. Williams-Bishop talks about the WKKF’s mission (founded in 1930, the WKKF has been a big part of Mississippi since 1940 and expanded its efforts in the late 2000s) and what the future holds. Will Keith Kellogg believed that children should have equal opportunity to thrive. Williams-Bishop explains how the WKKF empowers Mississippians to do just that by supporting dialogue, developing leaders, investing in the community and advocating for a better Mississippi. 

To see more Mississippi Stories episodes, click here.

To find out more about the WK Kellogg Foundation, click here.

The post Mississippi Stories: Rhea Williams-Bishop appeared first on Mississippi Today.

The jury in the trial of Derek Chauvin, the Minneapolis police officer who killed George Floyd in 2020, found him guilty Tuesday on all three charges he faced: second degree unintentional murder, third degree murder and second degree manslaughter.

The murder of Floyd sparked racial justice protests across America last year and spurred a national reckoning on racism in government. Thousands of Mississippians took to the streets to protest racial injustices, including the June Black Lives Matter rally in Jackson which many historians believe was the largest Mississippi civil rights demonstration since the 1960s.

The movement inspired several changes in Mississippi, including the legislative decision to change the state flag, which flew for 126 years and prominently featured the Confederate battle emblem.

Here are reactions from Mississippi leaders on the verdict. This article will be updated.

U.S. Rep. Bennie Thompson, Democratic congressmen representing Mississippi’s 2nd congressional district: “May this verdict be a step forward in the fight for equity and justice for all. May the family of George Floyd be at peace with the jury’s decision.”

Derrick Johnson, president/CEO of NAACP and Mississippi native: “We will not rest until all in our community have the right to breathe.”

Jackson Mayor Chokwe Antar Lumumba: “No action can restore the life of George Floyd to his family. I’m grateful for the statement that this verdict makes to those who seek to kill us and deny us humanity, but we are still grieving that it came at the cost of the life of a father, brother, son, and friend. What gives me hope is not the verdict, but the folks on the ground who supported the Floyd family, raised funds, educated, and demanded justice. If there is anything to be celebrated, it is that work. May we remember George Floyd as more than a symbol of the injustices we suffer.”

Mark Keenum, president of Mississippi State University: “The death of George Floyd demanded justice. Police have a fundamental duty to protect and safeguard the rights of all citizens. As I said a year ago, racism is evil. It is a sin. We must replace this evil with the good. Our task, I believe, is to ensure to the best of our abilities that we have far more good than evil in the hopes that good will drown out evil.” (Click here to read Keenum’s full statement.)

The post Mississippi officials react to guilty verdict for officer who killed George Floyd appeared first on Mississippi Today.

The post Marshall Ramsey: Bypass appeared first on Mississippi Today.

As COVID-19 cases and hospitalizations are again beginning to trend upward in Mississippi, health experts are doing everything they can to spread a message: get the vaccine.

Some politicians, meanwhile, continue to craft their own expedient messaging, trying to instill the obvious importance of the vaccine while hedging to appease their more right-wing supporters. Put more directly, they’re trying to score cheap political points at the expense of sharing critical public health warnings.

In a single tweet on Monday, Mississippi Gov. Tate Reeves showed he is among the chief subscribers of this strategy.

The last sentence of the tweet is perhaps the exact tone health officials wish politicians with tens of thousands of ardent followers would take: “Take the vaccine and this will all be behind us.” That advice couldn’t be more important in Mississippi, which ranks last in the nation in residents receiving at least one vaccine dose and in the bottom five states in residents completely inoculated.

But the message was overshadowed by some careful political framing from Reeves. In the tweet, the Republican governor managed to pander to several different camps on several different issues — and even a couple issues that put him at odds with health experts.

First, he highlighted political tension between conservatives and Major League Baseball, which recently moved its All Star Game from Atlanta after Georgia lawmakers passed legislation that makes it more difficult to vote in that state.

Reeves used that MLB decision as the framing to compare Mississippi State’s record weekend baseball game attendance with weekend attendance at Yankee Stadium. Never mind that the Yankees have the worst record in the American League this year and their fanbase is fuming, the state of New York has continued imposing a 10% stadium capacity as COVID-19 continues to spread there.

New York has the third-highest average weekly cases in the nation. New York City, home of Yankee Stadium, has seen an average of 10,743 cases per 100,000 people the past week.

Mississippi, meanwhile, has no stadium capacity restrictions after Reeves rescinded them in March. Mississippi State hosted Ole Miss in Starkville this weekend, and the New Dude was packed. Few people were wearing masks, which has some health officials worried.

After a brutal winter spike, Mississippi currently has a lower rate of COVID-19 spread than New York and many other states. But Mississippi’s confirmed cases and hospitalizations are currently trending up, prompting health officials to reiterate that mask wearing and social distancing guidelines should be followed until people have been vaccinated.

Reeves also didn’t miss the chance to get a shot in at Democratic President Joe Biden, who several weeks ago said Reeves and Texas Gov. Greg Abbott exhibited “Neanderthal thinking” for rescinding their states’ COVID-19 precautions. Reeves spun the president’s comments to suggest Biden called all Mississippians “Neanderthals,” and he has hardly skipped an opportunity to perpetuate that moment in the national political spotlight.

Reeves also conveniently omitted the fact that he, too, locked down his state as the first wave of COVID-19 infected and killed thousands of Mississippians. Even after that first wave, he imposed business restrictions and ordered residents to wear masks in public. Those decisions continue to draw him scorn from even the most conservative Mississippians who Reeves is attempting to appease.

“The only reason Mississippi is fully open is because you resisted the bad ‘public health’ policy decisions from our Governor,” Robert Foster, a conservative Republican who ran against Reeves in 2019, wrote on Facebook the same day of Reeves’ tweet. “Make no mistake, if the resistance had not been so strong we would still be partially locked down and with a statewide mask mandate like other states.

“(Reeves) is a career politician, he squirms at the thought of losing votes and goes whichever way the wind blows the strongest,” Foster continued. “Make him feel it, put it to him.”

There were more than 91,000 vaccine appointments available in the University of Mississippi Medical Center portal as of Tuesday at noon. As Reeves continues fighting political battles at the expense of public health messaging, health experts are fighting to avoid a deadly fourth wave.

“Fighting the COVID pandemic hasn’t been easy this whole time… we’ve got a little ways to go on this, so keep fighting,” Dobbs said on April 13.

MAP: Where Mississippians can get the COVID-19 vaccine.

The post Gov. Tate Reeves buries critical COVID-19 message while pandering appeared first on Mississippi Today.

Milwaukee Tool will construct a 500,000-square-foot plant in Grenada County, creating 800 new jobs within eight years and adding another 400 jobs to its existing Mississippi locations.

“When an industry leader such as Milwaukee Tool chooses to grow its footprint in Mississippi by building a new manufacturing facility — in addition to its existing facilities — it sends a strong message to the world that we take business seriously and work hard to ensure companies’ long-term success in our state,” Gov. Tate Reeves said in a press release Tuesday.

The company is investing $60 million in its Grenada County expansion, part of a decade-long expansion that has seen the company grow from 526 jobs in Mississippi in 2010 to more than 2,343 in 2020. The Wisconsin-based company has sites in Greenwood, Jackson and Olive Branch.

Milwaukee Tool Group President Steve Richman in statement said “the state of Mississippi has continued to be a valuable partner.”

“We look forward to bringing more jobs to this state,” Richman said.

Taxpayers, through the Mississippi Development Authority, will provide the company a $26 million grant for construction of the plant, in exchange for the company meeting its promised investment and job creation. Grenada County and the Tennessee Valley Authority also are providing assistance.

MDA Director John Rounsaville said the Greater Grenada Partnership, Grenada County, Delta Strong, Tallahatchie Valley Electric and TVA helped bring the new operations and jobs to the area.

The post Milwaukee Tool expands in Mississippi, says it will create 1,200 jobs appeared first on Mississippi Today.

Mississippi’s state-funded pre-kindergarten program has again received high marks in a national report that measures the quality of state-funded education for 3- and 4-year-olds nationally.

The National Institute for Early Education Research (NIEER) identified Mississippi as one of only six states in the nation whose pre-K program meets all 10 quality standards for early childhood education.

But despite the program’s high quality, access remains an issue: It currently only serves 8% of 4-year-olds in the state.

Mississippi’s state-funded pre-K is also referred to as Early Learning Collaborative programs, which are partnerships among school districts, Head Start agencies, childcare centers and nonprofit groups. There are currently 18 collaboratives serving more than 3,000 children across the state.

The Mississippi Legislature recently doubled the state’s funding for the program from about $8 million to $16 million, but according to NIEER, more funding is still needed.

“Mississippi sets an example of policies to support high quality preschool, but funding is too low to allow programs to implement those policies well,” said Steven Barnett, NIEER’s founder and senior co-director. “Increased funding is needed to ensure quality and expand access to more children who can benefit from the program.”

Mississippi ranks 39th in the nation for pre-K access for 4-year-olds and 42nd in state spending per child at about $2,187 per child in the 2019-2020 school year.

The Early Learning Collaboratives Act of 2013 established the first state-funded, voluntary pre-K program. It provides funding to local communities to create, support and expand quality early childhood education and development services. The Legislature has increased funding over the years.

“This success is through both design via our strong pre-K law as well as hard work on the part of the pre-K programs. When NIEER upgraded their benchmarks in 2017, Mississippi again strove to meet higher standards,” said Rachel Canter, executive director of Mississippi First, a nonprofit that wrote Mississippi’s law. “With the passage and signature of House Bill 1123 in the 2021 session, these higher standards are again enshrined in our law to ensure quality for years to come.” 

Sen. Brice Wiggins, a supporter of the law since its creation in 2013, said he is thrilled the state continues to be a leader in early education. 

“…the 2013 ELC law wrote these benchmarks into the law and Mississippi has been at the top nationally ever since,” he said, noting the benchmarks were updated in addition to the increased funding this year thanks to the support of the education committee chairmen and Lt. Gov. Delbert Hosemann.

“Thinking back to 2013, there were those, some from my own party, who did not believe in what we were doing,” said Wiggins, a Republican. “But, in bi-partisan fashion, the legislature came together and passed it; the nation has been looking up at us ever since. We cannot rest on our laurels and I for one will continue to fight for our children’s success.” 

READ MORE: How public education fared during the 2021 legislative session

The post Though access remains low, Mississippi pre-K earns high quality marks appeared first on Mississippi Today.

Mississippi voters’ right to change the state constitution hangs in the balance with the state Supreme Court, at a time when numerous groups are eyeing the ballot initiative as a way to overcome legislative fiat or recalcitrance.

It’s also coming at a time when political leaders and experts nationwide are wondering if ballot initiative and referendum is getting out of hand, at least in some states.

The 2020 passage of medical marijuana Initiative 65 helped inspire current movements to undo the Legislature’s removal of the Confederate-themed state flag, and to expand Medicaid and early voting over opposition from the state GOP legislative leadership.

It has also prompted some talk at the Capitol of taking other issues directly to voters — such as the House income tax for sales tax swap that died without a vote in the Senate or the creation of a sportsman’s fund with diverted sporting goods sales taxes, which likewise died in the Senate despite public support.

But a challenge to Initiative 65 is pending before the state’s high court on whether the process to put initiatives on the ballot is constitutionally flawed. This decision will be of great moment for current and future efforts, just at a time when Mississippi’s ballot initiative process, for good or ill, appears to be coming into its own. An adverse ruling to Initiative 65 could halt or even eliminate Mississippians’ ballot initiative rights.

READ MORE: Supreme Court must decide if wants to take ballot initiative away from people — again.

In seasons past, the process was so arduous, compared to many other states’ initiative and referendum requirements, that few issues made it to the ballot, and even fewer became part of the state constitution. Gathering the tens of thousands of required signatures, maneuvering the legal ins and outs and overcoming at times the Legislature’s right to challenge or hamstring an initiative with an “alternative” measure were hills too steep to climb, particularly for any true citizen-led initiative.

Medicaid expansion is the state’s 76th effort to receive initial approval since ballot initiatives were authorized in 1992. The vast majority never make it to the ballot. Only three have successfully amended the constitution, including Initiative 65 last year.

But the emergence of social media for campaigning and fundraising and of more, well-organized and funded interest and advocacy groups has raised the prospect of more successful ballot initiatives. Initiative 65 typifies that.

This phenomenon is not unique to Mississippi. The other 25 states with initiative and-or referendum (referendum is the ability of voters to strike down legislative action) are seeing growing use of these rights, some exponentially. In California, which also allows city and county local initiatives, one recent statewide ballot had 17 initiatives, and a guide mailed to voters to explain them was 224 pages long.

Such expansion has, in some cases, thwarted legislative policymaking or given undue influence to wealthy special interest groups — not the grassroots “of the people” efforts that initiative and referendum was supposed to empower. It also creates some niche efforts, such as banning plastic bags or legalizing use of psychedelic mushrooms, that by design of a representative democracy would have been a legislature’s domain. In states such as Mississippi, where voters can amend the state constitution but not state law, initiatives bring the risk of adding statutory language to a document where it doesn’t really belong, such as 2,500 words about medical marijuana now plunked into the state constitution, pending the high court’s ruling.

This has some states considering reining in or doing away with voter initiative and referendum rights, and it renews age-old philosophical and political debate about the function of democracies.

Voter initiatives, a creation of the early 20th Century progressive movement, gave citizens the ability to overcome the influence of big money interests on legislatures, and can still serve as a valuable backstop.

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

The state Supreme Court will be ruling on the constitutionality of a very specific, procedural issue with the process of gathering signatures to put an initiative on Mississippi ballots. But its implications, particularly if it rules against Initiative 65, are great and it could put at least a temporary halt to Mississippi ballot initiatives until lawmakers and voters could address the process.

This might also bring a major reevaluation of Mississippi’s ballot initiative right, and whether it’s serving its intended purpose or should be overhauled.

PODCAST: Medical marijuana decision has major implications for Mississippi voters’ rights

The post Is the Mississippi ballot initiative working as intended? appeared first on Mississippi Today.