Mississippi Rep. Michael Guest was one of the 35 Republicans to break party ranks on Wednesday and vote to create an independent commission to investigate the Jan. 6 Capitol attack.
The bill passed in the House 252 to 175, but it faces an uphill battle in the Senate, where Republicans are determined to stop its passage and eager to move on politically from the deadly pro-Trump riot.
The 35 Republicans who supported the bill included moderate and conservative legislators who held up the bipartisan commission as a balanced and necessary step in acquiring a full understanding of the most violent attack on Congress since the War of 1812.
“We need answers to questions surrounding the events of Jan. 6,” Guest told Mississippi Today in a statement. “I believe the long conversations that have happened over the last few months have produced a commission that is fair and is structured to find actions that Congress can take to prevent another such attack.”
The commission would be bipartisan and composed of 10 members, with both parties appointing half of them. The commission was modeled after the commission that studied the Sept. 11, 2001, terrorist attack, would have subpoena powers and would deliver its findings to Congress by Dec. 31.
The commission bill was the result of bipartisan negotiations between House Homeland Security Chairman and Mississippi Rep. Bennie Thompson and the committee’s Republican ranking member Rep. John Katko of New York.
Katko, who previously worked in federal law enforcement for 20 years, said just prior to the vote that the 9/11 commission made the country “infinitely safer” following the infamous attacks and that the proposed Jan. 6 commission would have the same effect.
“I ask my colleagues to consider the fact that this commission is built to work, and it will be depoliticized, and it will get the results we need,” Katko told reporters on Wednesday.
Despite the bipartisan negotiations, House GOP leadership on Tuesday recommended a “no” vote on the commission bill. Despite authorizing Katko to negotiate with Thompson, House Minority Leader Kevin McCarthy ultimately argued that the commission would duplicate other ongoing congressional investigations and should have included investigations of leftist protests from last summer.
Thompson told reporters Wednesday that the Homeland Security panel kept both Republican and Democratic leadership informed throughout negotiations and made suggested changes to the bill.
“It’s unfortunate that the minority leader has, at the last moment, raised issues that basically we had gone past, and there was no issue on his part,” Thompson told reporters on Wednesday. “But I guess that’s politics.”
Mississippi became the second state in the nation to make all of its residents eligible to receive the COVID-19 vaccine in March 2021. Since then, about 25% of Mississippi’s total population has been fully vaccinated.
Will Stribling, Mississippi Today’s health and breaking news reporter, talked to five Mississippians about what the last year has been like for them and how their lives have changed after becoming fully vaccinated. This is MT Speaks, Mississippi Today’s new video series that connects our reporting with the experiences of Mississippians from across the state. We hope this series not only keeps you informed, but also inspires you to create a better Mississippi.
ITTA BENA — When the pandemic first hit and halted most university operations, faculty at Mississippi Valley State University found themselves with a fleet of unused transit buses that usually took students to and from class.
The unlikely scenario became an opportunity to innovate, though, especially once vaccines started to become available in Mississippi.
“There are segments of our community that are underserved as far as having transportation. Some people don’t have transportation, period. Therefore, we thought this would be a good opportunity for us to provide something to help those citizens out, especially if people want to get the vaccine,” said Sonji Foster, project director for MVSU mass transit.
So the mass transit operation at MVSU pivoted. Instead of sitting vacant while students attended virtual classes, transit buses started picking people up who needed a ride and taking them to designated vaccine locations.
The concept was simple: once a person made an appointment to get the vaccine, they could call MVSU and arrange a ride. As long as the riders gave the transit system 24 hours notice, a transit bus would come pick the person up at whatever location they specified and bring them back home afterward.
In Bolivar County, community activist Pam Chatman has been organizing similar efforts. Instead of utilizing university transit systems, Chatman has worked with local transportation agencies and philanthropic groups to arrange vaccination transportation for people who need it.
Pam Chatman
Chatman advertises around the community that this service is available, which includes what number to call to get a ride. Once a person calls the number to the transportation agency and tells them they need a ride to get vaccinated, that ride is arranged at no cost to the rider. The Community Foundation of Northwest Mississippi made an initial contribution of $2,500 to this effort, which has helped fund the free rides.
While the Delta is not short on people working to solve the vaccination transportation issue, the barriers those organizers face are significant.
Part of the challenge is getting the word out. Because broadband internet and computer access is scarce in the Delta, people rely on churches, community groups and word of mouth to spread information.
But with COVID-19 causing church services to go virtual and group gatherings to diminish, information sharing has slowed.
“A huge barrier is that people seem to not know that we’re doing this. Places where people would normally gather to get the word out, those places are not gathering anymore right now,” Foster said.
To her point, about 25 people have taken advantage of MSVU’s transit system since the opportunity was first announced in March.
Chatman agreed that information access has been one of the barriers with helping people take advantage of the vaccination transportation system and with setting up appointments to get vaccinated at all.
“That’s why I say it’s so important that churches and community organizations get involved in spreading the word because there’s a lot of parts of Mississippi rural that do not have the computers or broadband to schedule an appointment,” Chatman said.
Meanwhile, Mississippi’s vaccination rate has plummeted since peaking in late February.
MSDH reported on Wednesday that 999,042 people in Mississippi — over 33% of the state’s population — have received at least their first dose of COVID-19 vaccine. Nearly 870,000 people have been fully inoculated since the state began distributing vaccines in December.
Mississippi continues to rank last in the nation in the share of its population that has been vaccinated, and the state’s vaccination rate has dropped nearly 75% from its peak in late February. Fewer than 1,000 Mississippians ages 12-15 received their first dose of the Pfizer vaccine in the week following its approval for that age group.
“We know that there is an issue, there is a concern,” Chatman said about vaccination access. “And so, it’s up to us as Mississippians to try all of us to help these people in rural areas.”
The Supreme Court’s elimination of the Mississippi medical marijuana program halted millions of dollars worth of planned in-state spending and job creation, leaving many business owners with little to show for their months of investment and efforts.
Steve Merritt, the chief operating officer for Southern Sky Brands, has called off an $1 million steel order with a Mississippi company. The materials were for the grow facility he intended to start building in Canton.
GrowGeneration, one of the nation’s leading marijuana business suppliers, said it has stopped investing in its Mississippi projects. The Denver-based company had already leased property in Jackson and was considering more.
Quentin Whitwell, a healthcare executive working to create cannabis testing facilities, has an outfitted laboratory in Marshall County waiting on the go-ahead to hire employees. Now, it will continue to sit vacant.
“Tens of millions of dollars have already been spent in anticipation of the program and hundreds of millions of dollars have been raised,” Whitwell said. “The state stands to lose one of its highest GDP producing industries because of a politically driven court decision.”
Last week, Mississippi’s Supreme Court struck down the ballot initiative process that voters used to pass the medical marijuana program. Despite 74% of Mississippains voting to change the state constitution to include the medical marijuana program, its future is in limbo.
“This is not only an affront to voters, but to patients and to the businesses and people who were investing in Mississippi, ready to open in Mississippi,” said Ken Newburger, the executive director of the Mississippi Medical Marijuana Association. “They’re all, at worst, at a loss and, at best, a time lag.”
The program’s supporters are pushing the Legislature to hold a special session to fix the initiative process and adopt the medical marijuana program. Gov. Tate Reeves has said he’s “a long way” from deciding whether to hold that special session. Lt. Gov. Delbert Hosemann said he thinks lawmakers could pass a new medical marijuana program in a special session.
Plenty of entrepreneurs already have several thousands of dollars of their own money tied up in preparing for the program, which was expected to begin in August.
“Most people didn’t think this was a possibility,” Newburger said. “We believed so wholeheartedly in the democratic process.”
While most medical marijuana-related businesses in the state are now holding off on major planned expenses, many are still moving forward at least with planning. On Tuesday, the Mississippi Medical Marijuana Association hosted a workshop on how to use sales software inside dispensaries. Newburger said 90 people attended.
One of them was Cindy Ayers-Elliott, who owns and operates Foot Print Farms in west Jackson. The urban farmer’s experience lies in fruit and vegetables and ensuring fresh produce is available to her community’s food deserts.
She said she has already spent $70,000 as she researched and prepared for the cannabis program. Her research isn’t just for her own benefit, but because she wants to be able to share what she learns with smaller farmers and farmers of color. She sees the program as a way to create new wealth in the state with marijuana as a cash crop.
“It’s a clear pathway as an economic engine to help create entrepreneurs, more business owners, more opportunities for a new caliber of training for our workforce, so we can have a livable wage in this state,” she said. “Something is wrong with the jobs we have here and we continue to repress opportunities.”
Merritt used to work for an agricultural company that specializes in building cannabis grow rooms before he joined Southern Sky Brands, a Mississippi company that hopes to grow and distribute medical marijuana.
He estimates he’s had his hands in the construction of about 150 marijuana growing facilities across the country. But all the planned construction for his own 70,000-square-foot facility in Canton is on pause. The construction workers who were hauling dirt have been put on hiatus.
Marcy Croft, an attorney and founder of the Mississippi Cannabis Trade Association, said there are tens of millions of dollars now held up in businesses that were rearing to support the industry from construction and real estate to testing centers, waste disposal and transportation.
“All of that promise, all of that passion, all of that money, all of that drive and all the jobs for the Supreme Court to pull the plug — it’s just devastating,” Croft said.
GrowGeneration announced it leased a 40,000-square-foot warehouse in Jackson in April. The company’s leadership said at that time it hoped Mississippi could be the gateway for medical marijuana in the South.
The company’s president Michael Salaman now estimates the medical marijuana market in Mississippi won’t be live until 2022. GrowGeneration won’t make any further investments in the state until that market “becomes reality,” Salaman said in a statement. He also said he hopes his company is able “bring jobs and services” as it planned.
Whitwell, who hopes to help run up to four labs in the state, said his facilities would attract scientists, technicians and workers with doctorate degrees. These are high-paying jobs — the kind that could attract, or keep, young professionals in Mississippi. Each lab would hire up to 20 workers.
Croft, the trade association founder, said retail and grow operations have discussed starting wages of entry-level jobs of $15 per hour, more than double the federally mandated minimum wage.
Jackson farmer Ayers-Elliott’s preparation plans for the medical marijuana program have shifted. Now her focus is on organizing and educating voters on the Supreme Court’s decision to recall the ballot initiative process.
“This is not just about growing marijuana,” she said. “It’s silencing the people’s voices.”
The Holmes County Consolidated School District, one of the state’s most troubled districts that is under investigation by the state education department, has a new superintendent — a former principal who has never held a district-level position and has been in Holmes County less than two years.
Debra Powell, the new superintendent, is also a colleague of former Holmes County Superintendent James Henderson, whom she worked with in St. Louis Public Schools for several years. Henderson, who was Powell’s boss in St. Louis and hired her as a middle school and high school principal in Holmes County, came under fire in a scathing report by the state auditor’s office that revealed widespread problems in the district, including a lack of background checks for employees and misappropriation of funds.
The Board of Trustees last week voted 4-1 to appoint Powell as the superintendent beginning in the fall of this year. Before coming to Holmes County in 2019, Powell worked as the principal at Paseo Academy of Fine and Performing Arts in Kansas City, Missouri. Before that, she was principal of Vashon High School in St. Louis. The longest she ever served as principal at one school is two years.
Board President Louise Winters said she is not concerned by Powell’s connection to Henderson, and that the board chose the best candidate based on responses it received from a community survey.
“Dr. Powell was the closest to what the survey (responses) and our stakeholders wanted,” Winters said, noting there were over 20 candidates brought forth by the Mississippi School Board Association. The association conducted the search on behalf of the district, Winters said.
Powell will earn an annual salary of $125,000 to oversee the district of about 2,600 students, according to her contract. She is also eligible for a pay raise if both a state-approved teacher pay raise and “a performance-based measure of growth and student achievement” occurs.
She will also be provided a car “for her use in conducting the business of the district.”
Rayford Horton, the one “no” vote for Powell, said he believed other candidates had stronger records of improving struggling schools and districts. Holmes County has been rated as failing every year since 2016. School districts may be eligible for state takeover after two consecutive years of an ‘F’ rating, but Holmes County has so far escaped that fate.
Shella Head, president of the newly formed community engagement council for the school district, said at a board meeting she had concerns about how the board went about selecting the superintendent.
“There’s nothing in her background to show she has supervised a school district, as in understanding the day-to-day operations, state and federal funding, test scores — all of the different variations you have to deal with to move a school district forward,” Head said. “Holmes County is in a critical situation. We don’t need on-the-job training … We need somebody who knows what they’re doing and has been proven to know what they’re doing.”
It’s hard to say whether Powell improved students’ academic performance at the two schools where she was principal in Missouri. The state underwent a change in testing in 2017, the year she left Vashon High School and started at Paseo, so results from 2017 are not comparable to the years prior and after.
According to 2019 school performance results for Paseo Academy of Fine and Performing Arts, the school did see improvements in certain academic areas such as English and science, and is on track to make improvements in math.
It received less positive scores for improvement in the area of college and career-readiness, which the state measures by percentage of graduates defined as college or career-ready; percentage of graduates that earned Advanced Placement or vocational credits; and percentage of graduates employed or furthering their education six months after graduation.
Before working as principal at Paseo, she served as principal from 2015 to 2017 at Vashon High School in St. Louis. In 2016, the school achieved a score of 50.5 points out of 140 possible points on its annual performance report. The data for 2017 for the school was incomplete.
Powell introduced herself at the school board’s May meeting.
“We (the superintendent and board) are just six people. We will not move this district from ‘F’ status on up if you, the people, don’t lock arms with us to join us in what we’re going to be doing,” said Powell. “I’m excited and I know that we can do it.”
Winters is optimistic about the district’s future with Powell.
“I do know when you’re surrounded by positive people, you can get where you’re trying to get,” she said.
The “Yes on 76” campaign to expand Medicaid in Mississippi through a ballot initiative has been officially suspended — a pro forma move since the state Supreme Court last week nullified the state’s ballot initiative process with a ruling striking down medical marijuana Initiative 65.
The campaign, backed by the Mississippi Hospital Association and other groups, had just kicked off its drive last week to gather 106,000 signatures and put expansion on the 2022 midterm ballot. But the Supreme Court on Friday ruled the state’s ballot initiative process is “unworkable and inoperative” unless and until lawmakers and voters fix state law and the constitution. The ruling also halts initiative drives to allow a vote on the retired state flag with a Confederate battle emblem on it, to legalize recreational marijuana, to enact early voting and to adopt term limits for politicians.
Some lawmakers and many voters are calling on Gov. Tate Reeves to call the Legislature back into session to deal with both issues. He said he’s open to the idea, but is “a long way” from making that decision.
In a statement Wednesday, the Medicaid expansion campaign said: “We fully support the call for a special legislative session to restore the constitutional right of Mississippians to vote directly on the issues of importance, including Medicaid expansion, and we will pursue every avenue possible to restore the rights of voters in this state.”
The group said it will also continue to urge lawmakers and the governor to expand Medicaid to cover more than 200,000 working poor uninsured Mississippians.
“Our broad coalition of doctors, nurses, businesses and faith leaders and voters from across the political spectrum is not going away,” the statement said. “We will keep up the fight until Mississippians receive the healthcare they need.”
In this edition of Mississippi Stories, Mississippi Today Editor-At-Large Marshall Ramsey sits down with Tupelo businessman, philanthropist and former Mayor Jack Reed, Jr..
Jack joined Tupelo’s Reed’s in 1980 after several years practicing law in Tupelo. He became President in 1987. Jack was born and raised in Tupelo. He graduated with honors from both Tupelo High School and Vanderbilt University. At the University of Mississippi School of Law he served on the Editorial Board of the Mississippi Law Journal and as President of the Law School Student Body. Following a pathway walked by his father and Chairman, Jack Reed, Sr., and his grandfather and founder R. W. Reed, Sr., Jack had devoted much time and energy to putting back into his communities – both local and state. He has served as Chairman of the Community Development Foundation, the United Way of Greater Lee County, Northeast Mississippi Habitat for Humanity, The Free Clinic, the Kiwanis Club, the Downtown Tupelo Main Street Association, and the Mississippi Economic Council. Jack and his wife Lisa have two children — a daughter Kirk Reed Forrester, who with her husband Tate has two daughters and two sons, Bess, Reed, Mack, and Sam; and a son Jack, with his wife Ashley, has a son named Jack.
His personal Motto is “God wants life to be a party; it’s up to us to make sure that everyone is invited.”
Pressure from citizens and top politicians is growing for lawmakers to return to Jackson for a special session to fix the ballot initiative process after the Supreme Court struck it down along with the medical marijuana program passed by voters last year.
But Gov. Tate Reeves, who is the sole elected official with the power to call lawmakers to Jackson before the next regular session begins in January 2022, says he is “a long way” from making that decision.
“(A special session) is something we are certainly willing to consider,” Reeves told Scott Simmons at WAPT in Jackson on Tuesday. “We are a long way from being able to make that decision.”
There are two main issues at play because of the Supreme Court ruling, and both could be taken up in a special session if Reeves wants. First, the state currently has no ballot initiative process, which allows citizens to vote on constitutional changes without legislative approval. Second, the medical marijuana program enshrined in the state constitution by 74% of voters in November 2020 was effectively killed by the Court.
On the ballot initiative process, Reeves told WAPT: “We have three branches of government, and it is the judicial branch’s job to interpret the law. I don’t know that I would have ruled one way or another, but I respect the court and the roles they play, and so now, it is incumbent on the legislative branch to come back and fix this process.”
On the marijuana program, Reeves said: “The people have spoken. They made their voice heard and voted overwhelmingly to have a (medical marijuana) program and Mississippi should have that.”
This week, Lt. Gov. Delbert Hosemann, who presides over the Senate, and House Speaker Philip Gunn both publicly supported the notion of a special session.
Hosemann said lawmakers could pass a marijuana program during a special session, but that they can handle the ballot initiative process during the 2022 regular legislative session.
Gunn, in public comments, has said that lawmakers should reconvene for a special session to deal with the ballot initiative process, but he has not said recently whether he supports lawmakers passing a medical marijuana program.
There have also been questions about how quickly any change to the constitution could be implemented if lawmakers pass a ballot initiative fix. Changing the constitution in the Legislature requires a two-thirds vote of both chambers, followed by approval by voters on a statewide ballot. Both Reeves and Hosemann have suggested that a vote to approve the change couldn’t occur until 2022. But lawmakers could call a special statewide election at any point to ask voters to approve the change.
Lawmakers can, however, pass a medical marijuana program themselves at any time without needing a vote of the people.
