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Dr. LouAnn Woodward, the chief executive of Mississippi’s largest medical center, is no longer mincing words about so many Mississippians’ unwillingness to protect their neighbors.

The chief executive of the University of Mississippi Medical Center, long the most outspoken state leader since the COVID-19 pandemic began, delivered a brutal, tough-love message to Mississippi on Tuesday as the state’s hospital system is on its last breath: Get vaccinated. Wear masks. Protect the future of the state. Do better.

Woodward gave the speech as state officials unveiled a second field hospital set up in a UMMC parking garage — a necessity because the large medical center, like every other hospital in the state, has no additional staff capacity to adequately serve the surge of COVID patients. Samaritan’s Purse, a national disaster relief organization, is staffing and funding the second field hospital that will also include ICU beds.

Mississippi, Woodward said, has “failed to respond in a unified way to a common threat” and “failed to use the tools that we have to protect ourselves, to protect our families, to protect our children, and to protect our state.”

Her speech, no doubt, should raise eyebrows across the state with the second-lowest vaccination rate in the nation.

Below is the full transcript of Woodward’s speech:

“I want to thank the Samaritan’s Purse organization for coming to Mississippi, and for assisting us in this disaster response. And I also want to thank all of those who behind the scenes made this happen. And everybody — the army of people that have been out in this garage these last few days, turning it into a real thing.

You know, Samaritan’s Purse right now is responding to a disaster in Haiti — a natural disaster in Haiti. But the response that they are responding to here in Mississippi today is a disaster of our own making.

We as a state, as a collective, have failed to respond in a unified way to a common threat. We have failed to use the tools that we have to protect ourselves, to protect our families, to protect our children, and to protect our state. 

We have an effective and available, a safe, and a free vaccine that we are not using to its fullest capacity. This time last year in press conferences, we all talked about, ‘Boy, if we can just get to that place where we’ve got a vaccine, we’ll get on the other side of this.’ What I have to say to the citizens of Mississippi is we have that vaccine, we have that tool. And we have not appropriately and fully used it. This where we are. We do not have to be here, but this is where we are.

Our healthcare workforce all across the state is traumatized. We are in trouble. I implore you, if you have not yet gotten vaccinated, please do so right away. It is the right thing to do for yourself, for your family, for our children all across the state of Mississippi, and for the future of our state. 

We do not need any mandates to do the right thing. This is a decision each individual can make. 

I have spent a lot of time over these last years defending Mississippi to colleagues across the country. And I have done that with great pride. I love this place. This is my home. I’m proud of Mississippi. But our actions this last year are not easy to defend.

I am grateful that there are resources out there, people that are out there that are willing at this point to come help us. I’m grateful for the D-mat team that’s over in Garage B. I’m very grateful to the Samaritan’s Purse team that will start seeing patients here tomorrow. I’m grateful that these people are willing to come in and help us as a state. 

But I want to say again, and I want to be as clear as I can be: We are not out of this. In order for October and November to look different than August looks and the way that September will look, we have to do something. And what that is: We have to get vaccinated. Wear masks, get vaccinated. Let’s be responsible for ourselves and to each other. Thank you.”

READ MORE: UMMC to open second field hospital, with ICU beds, in parking garage as COVID-19 explodes

The post ‘We are in trouble’: Dr. LouAnn Woodward delivers desperate plea to Mississippians as COVID crisis worsens appeared first on Mississippi Today.

I want Governor Tate Reeves to succeed. We’re in the middle of a medical disaster that features an awful virus that doesn’t care what political party you belong to. It doesn’t care who criticizes who. It doesn’t care what your base thinks. Recently the governor sent out a tweet where he said what is in the cartoon bubble. Haley Barbour didn’t ask for Katrina. But he rose to the occasion, used his connections and leadership ability to help the state recover and Mississippi was better off for it.

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

The numbers are in. Last week’s “Field of Dreams” baseball game, featuring the Chicago White Sox, New York Yankees and a whole lot of corn, was a smash TV hit. The game drew six million viewers, the largest audience for a regular season baseball game in 16 years.

The Sox and Yankees played a helluva game, but the ballpark, carved out of an Iowa cornfield, was the star of the show, with first Kevin Costner and then the two teams seemingly wandering onto the field through row after row of corn.

It was, in a word, beautiful, and harkened back to the splendid “Field of Dreams” movie, starring Costner, which debuted 32 years ago.

What you might not know is this: Three Mississippians played a huge role in the making of that movie.

You probably know about James Earl Jones, born in the Tate County community of Arkabutla, who plays a most memorable role and lends a most compelling presence — but he is not all. The movie was the brainchild of brothers Lawrence and Charles Gordon, born in Yazoo City and raised in Belzoni, the sons of a Jewish furniture store owner. Larry and Charles Gordon produced Field of Dreams. 

Charles Gordon died of cancer last October, but Larry Gordon, 85, is still living and working. And he was watching the evening of Aug. 12 when the first Major League game was played on the same Iowa farm where his iconic movie was shot.

“It was quite something wasn’t it?” Gordon said by phone Tuesday from Los Angeles. “It was a beautiful scene, much like the movie. It was amazing to watch and I think it showed that our movie definitely is still relevant.”

“Field of Dreams” has stood the test of time. It has become almost like our generation’s “It’s a Wonderful World.” Who would have thought that a movie, made in Iowa, about farming, baseball and with so much implausible fantasy mixed in, would become such an American treasure?

Larry Gordon and I first spoke back in 1989 just after Field of Dreams debuted. The beloved Mississippi writer Willie Morris, like the Gordon brothers a Yazoo City native, put us together. Gordon had produced more than 200 films, many highly successful, but said “Dreams” was by far his favorite. 

“It’s not about the money,” he told me then. “It’s really not. It’s the way people react to this movie. It touches people.” 

Gordon told me about a conversation with Major League pitcher Ron Darling, then with the Mets, who watched the movie one afternoon before pitching that night. “Ron told me he cried like a baby at the end of the movie, and was so inspired that he went out and pitched a shutout that night,” Gordon said.

Recently, Gordon was at dinner in a group with NBA superstar LeBron James. The conversation turned to movies and James said Field of Dreams was his favorite.

Said Gordon, “The Dallas Cowboys might be America’s team, but I often feel like Field of Dreams has become America’s movie.

So much about the movie works: the scenery, the casting, the fantastical story itself. We have author W.P. Kinsella to thank for the story. The movie is based on Kinsella’s book, “Shoeless Joe.”

Larry Gordon read the book and was instantly smitten. “I knew I was gonna make a movie,” he said. It wasn’t that easy. Gordon figures he knocked on more doors than he can count to raise funding for the project.

Phil Alden Robinson, also smitten by the book, wrote the screenplay and directed the film. The obvious story is that Costner’s character risks his farm to build his own baseball field. The underlying story is about the relationships of fathers and sons. Costner’s character longs to mend a fractured relationship with his long-dead father. And that’s where the movie really hits home with Larry Gordon.

You see, Gordon left Belzoni to attend first Tulane and then Ole Miss law school. In 1959, he left for Hollywood where he basically was doing odd jobs, working as an errand boy, eking out a living. His father pleaded with him to come back to the Delta and eventually inherit the furniture store. Gordon had other dreams.

“My father was bitterly disappointed in me,” Gordon said. “He thought what I was doing made no sense.”

A letter his father wrote to a friend in 1959 still hangs, framed, in Gordon’s office. In the letter, his father says Larry needs to learn he searching for something that doesn’t exist, that he needed to return to Mississippi and make something of himself. Shortly after the letter was written, Larry Gordon’s father died suddenly and unexpectedly.

When the letter reached Gordon more than a quarter century later, he was the president of 20th Century Fox.

All that makes Larry Gordon’s answer to one of my questions make all the more sense. What was he thinking as he watched the “Field of Dreams” game last week?

Answered Gordon, “You know, I was wishing my father was watching with me.”

The post Native Mississippian Larry Gordon lives a dream with Field of Dreams appeared first on Mississippi Today.

View our chart showing the number of COVID-19 vaccinations — including first and second dose — reported in Mississippi each week since the week of Dec. 19, 2020, when vaccines first became available in the state. As of Wednesday, 36% of Mississippians were fully vaccinated, according to the Mississippi State Department of Health. View all of our latest COVID-19 in Mississippi case, death and vaccination data.

The post Data: Mississippi COVID-19 vaccine doses by week appeared first on Mississippi Today.

Dear Samaritan’s Purse,

Thank you for helping Mississippi out during our time of need.

Mississippi

The post Marshall Ramsey: Good Samaritan appeared first on Mississippi Today.

Beginning Monday, all schools in Smith County School District will shut down for a two-week period due to high numbers of COVID-19 cases and quarantines, a school member said.

The decision by the school board Tuesday comes on the heels of the death of a Raleigh 8th grader over the weekend. Mkayla Robinson died just days after being diagnosed with COVID-19.

Board member Jay Arrington said the school board met via phone on Tuesday and voted unanimously to shut down the schools beginning Monday, Aug. 23. The board made the decision to delay the two-week shutdown until Monday so parents had time to make plans and find child care.

Unlike last year, the Mississippi Department of Education is requiring schools to offer in-person learning as the primary mode of instruction this year. Schools also stand to lose out on federal relief funding if they do not operate primarily in person, though schools are allowed to operate virtually for a time in the event of COVID-19 outbreaks or other emergency events.

The district will not be implementing virtual learning because of connectivity issues for many of their students, Arrington said. He estimates only about 25% of students in the rural district have reliable internet access.

The 2,443 student district reported 104 positive cases in students, teachers and staff and nearly 700 people quarantined on Tuesday.

He said several schools, including Mize and Taylorsville which he represents, are struggling with adequate staffing.

“We have a lot of staff that are positive or quarantined, and we cannot operate the schools,” said Arrington.

A request for comment from Superintendent Nick Hillman was not immediately returned Tuesday afternoon.

Several community members gathered at Raleigh High School Sunday morning following Robinson’s death. Among those was Pastor Ronald Wilbon, Robinson’s cousin, who spoke to the crowd. Signs stating “America please shut it down!” were propped up against the front of the school as Wilbon spoke.

Arrington said students will be making up the days during a holiday break or extending the school year.

The post Smith County schools, which lost a student last week, to shut down due to COVID appeared first on Mississippi Today.

Mississippi Development Authority Director John Rounsaville’s announced resignation on Aug. 13 came after a state investigation into reports he sexually harassed and touched three subordinate female MDA employees at a Biloxi bar during a business conference in July, sources familiar with the investigation and incident told Mississippi Today.

Following the investigation, a recommendation was made to the governor on July 29 that Rounsaville’s employment be terminated, the sources said.

Gov. Tate Reeves, who appointed Rounsaville to the post in January, announced in an Aug. 13 press release that Rounsaville would be “stepping down to pursue new opportunity” effective Aug. 31 and praised Rounsaville’s “leadership at MDA.” The release quoted Rounsaville saying he wanted to spend more time with his wife and children and less time traveling.

When asked for comment, Rounsaville on Tuesday sent Mississippi Today a written statement: “I didn’t live up to my own standards or MDA’s standards. My behavior was not reflective of my character. I deeply regret that, and I apologize to everyone involved. I believed voluntarily resigning was the appropriate consequence. And, it was my hope to save MDA, my colleagues, and my family further embarrassment by doing so.”

Reeves’ office did not immediately respond to questions about Rounsaville’s resignation. Those questions include why the resignation announcement came 15 days after the final report that recommended Rounsaville’s termination, and why Rounsaville was allowed to stay on at the job for another two weeks after that. Reeves has been traveling frequently and was out of the state at times during the investigation. He returned sometime midweek before Rounsaville’s Friday resignation.

Often, when state employees resign, they make it effective at a month’s end to accrue more service time in the state retirement system. As MDA director, the state’s lead economic development official representing the state across the country and abroad, Rounsaville makes a state salary of $180,000 a year. MDA directors typically also receive a stipend from a consortium of private businesses under a 2012 state law. The total amount cannot exceed $250,000.

The incidents in question occurred on July 9, when Rounsaville, other MDA employees and economic development officials from across the state attended the Mississippi Economic Development Council annual conference at the Beau Rivage Casino Resort in Biloxi. Sometime in the early morning hours of July 9, Rounsaville and others were drinking in a still-crowded casino bar.

Sources said Rounsaville appeared intoxicated and propositioned the three female MDA employees for sex and rubbed against or touched them. One state government official familiar with the incident described it as Rounsaville being “obnoxious and drunk, hanging on to them and making inappropriate comments,” but said it was an isolated incident and out of character for Rounsaville, whom they otherwise defended.

Sources said the women were reluctant to report the incident, but that more than one non-MDA economic development official who witnessed it vowed they would report it if the women didn’t.

The women reported the incident to MDA’s human resources office the following week, the sources said. State government procedure for when such allegations are made against a department director is for the state personnel director, not the agency HR department, to investigate. As MDA director, Rounsaville reports directly to Reeves.

State Personnel Board Director Kelly Hardwick notified Rounsaville and the governor’s office of the complaints and started an investigation into the matter, sources said. Hardwick completed his investigation and submitted a report to Reeves on July 29, including a recommendation that Rounsaville either be fired or resign, the sources said. They said the investigation concluded there was no cause for state criminal or legal action against Rounsaville.

Citing an exemption of personnel records from the state’s open records laws, the state personnel director would not supply Mississippi Today a copy of the final report from the investigation into Rounsaville’s actions.

Hardwick, in a statement, said: “It is my understanding of state law that matters related to personnel issues are not public records. So then, I cannot share or disclose any information related to the investigations that I conduct without permission. I have no further comment on this matter.”

Mississippi Today also sent a request for correspondence and other records about the matter to Reeves’ office, which did not immediately respond to the request or questions.

The three women are still employed at MDA, and sources said to their knowledge none have filed criminal complaints or taken legal action against the state or Rounsaville.

It is Mississippi Today’s policy not to name alleged victims of sexual harassment or assault.

Under state personnel regulations, Reeves has great authority over direct-report officials and was not bound by the personnel recommendation to fire Rounsaville, ask him to resign or take any other disciplinary action.

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MDA is the state’s lead economic and community development agency. As agency head, Rounsaville was overseeing about 300 employees. MDA works to recruit new businesses to the state and retain and expand existing industry and manages the state’s energy programs. MDA also promotes Mississippi as a tourism destination.

Reeves had appointed Rounsaville as permanent MDA director after he had served as interim since May of 2020.

Rounsaville previously served as state director for USDA Rural Development for the President Donald Trump administration, a post he also held from 2006 to 2008 under President George W. Bush. Rounsaville served as deputy chief of staff and other roles for former U.S. Rep. Chip Pickering and as a policy adviser to former Gov. Haley Barbour.

Rounsaville is a decorated military veteran, serving as a JAG and major at the 186th in the Mississippi Air Force National Guard. He is a master’s graduate of Mississippi State University and received a law degree from the University of Mississippi.

In 2017, then-Gov. Phil Bryant issued an executive order that requires all state employees to take online sexual harassment training, after the state Department of Public Safety and Mississippi Bureau of Narcotics paid settlements in two separate lawsuits alleging sexual harassment, discrimination and retaliation. Two high ranking DPS officials resigned over one of the cases, but not until after news reports came out months after the settlements.

At the time, Bryant said: “Everyone deserves a workplace free from intimidation and hostility. I will not tolerate sexual harassment in those agencies that fall under my control.”

The post Sexual misconduct allegations led to MDA director John Rounsaville’s resignation appeared first on Mississippi Today.

This photo gallery is part of our new initiative, MT Listens. Learn more about the project here or be part of it by taking our survey.

Take a virtual stroll through Yazoo City, a historic Mississippi community, through the lens of Mississippi Today photojournalist Vickie King.

Yazoo City is just one of five communities our newsroom is focusing on for our community listening project, MT Listens. The others are Canton, Forest, Moss Point and New Albany.

Be part of this project.

If you live in Canton, Yazoo City, Forest, Moss Point or New Albany, please take a minute to fill out the below survey, or share it with someone you know.

The post Photo gallery: Yazoo City, the Gateway to the Delta appeared first on Mississippi Today.

The median salary for Mississippi school district superintendents was $120,000 for the 2020-21 academic year, according to data the state Department of Education sent Mississippi Today.

Tupelo Public School District’s Robert Picou was the highest paid superintendent, making $219,000, followed by Jackson Public School District’s Errick Greene with $215,000.

Generally, superintendents of districts with larger student bodies earned larger compensations; DeSoto County School District, JPS, and Rankin County School Districts have the biggest enrollments and are among the top of the salary list.

While most of the 144 superintendents in the dataset worked full-time, several part-time ones still earned large salaries. Coahoma County School District’s Ilean Richards and North Bolivar Consolidated School District’s Maurice Smith, for example, both made six figures despite being listed as part-time.

Of the full-time superintendents, 87% made at least six figures.

For comparison, Mississippi’s average teacher salary was $46,843 in 2019-20. The median superintendent salary is two and a half times that amount.

The post How much does your school’s superintendent make? appeared first on Mississippi Today.

Halfway down Mississippi State University’s COVID-19 “Vaccine FAQ” page is the question, “are students going to be required to be vaccinated?” 

MSU’s answer, in short, is no: While it encourages students to get vaccinated for COVID-19, the university says that it can’t require the shot without action from the Institutions of Higher Learning, the governing body for Mississippi’s public universities.

“Mississippi law and IHL Board policies require that students obtain certain vaccinations before attending IHL institutions,” the answer reads. “This does not currently include the COVID-19 vaccine. Unless and until state law and IHL Board policy is amended, the University does not have the legal authority to require any additional vaccinations.” 

That’s not the case, IHL spokesperson Caron Blanton told Mississippi Today. 

While the COVID-19 vaccine is not presently listed in IHL’s immunization policy, Blanton wrote in an email that does not mean Mississippi’s public universities cannot require it. 

IHL’s immunization policy “represents the minimum requirements that must be enforced by the universities,” Blanton wrote. “Additional requirements are not prohibited.” 

Across the nation, more than 700 schools are requiring students or employees to receive the COVID-19 vaccine before the start of the fall semester, according to the Chronicle of Higher Education. To date, no college or university in Mississippi is requiring students to receive the vaccine, though some are incentivizing it.

In a second email to Mississippi Today, Blanton elaborated that although “the general practice has been for IHL institutions to not impose additional requirements because (IHL’s) immunization requirements were crafted based on recommendations from the Mississippi State Department of Health,” the board’s policy “does not prohibit IHL institutions from imposing additional vaccination requirements.” 

Past instances where IHL’s institutions have required additional vaccines beyond those specified in the board’s policy “have been limited to students working towards their program of study in a clinical setting (i.e., nursing and medical students),” Blanton wrote. 

IHL’s current immunization policy requires Mississippi college students, with few exceptions, to provide proof that they have received two doses of the measles, mumps and rubella vaccine. Students who are involved in health education programs must also show proof of the hepatitis B vaccine. International students must also show they have been screened for tuberculosis in the United States before the first day of class. 

Mississippi Today also asked Blanton about a report in The Oxford Eagle that said, “The decision was made by the Institutions of Higher Learning to not require students at any of its eight universities to receive the vaccination.” 

“That is not correct,” Blanton wrote. “The Board has not taken action to amend its vaccination policy.”

Mississippi Today first reported in June that IHL’s immunization policy does not bar the public universities from requiring students to get the COVID vaccine. But university officials continue to say they can’t legally require the vaccine. 

At a meeting of University of Mississippi’s vaccine task force last week, Noel Wilkin, the provost and executive vice chancellor for academic affairs, said that IHL must permit any vaccine mandates. His reasoning was based on “reading of the regulations and historical practice,” Joshua Sharp, a professor of pharmacology at UM and a member of the vaccine task force, told Mississippi Today. 

Mississippi Today asked MSU and UM whether they intend to require the COVID-19 vaccine, given IHL’s statements that they are not barred from doing so. 

Sid Salter, MSU’s director of public affairs, said the university arrived at its interpretation by looking at “the policies that have existed before COVID, and we looked at the policies that have been approved since COVID.” 

“We also have consistently monitored federal and state public health guidance, and we have maintained a vigilant monitoring of local conditions,” he added. “But our legal team and our administration does not interpret the latitude you suggest that we have in the same way that you do.” 

Salter would not say which policies MSU looked at specifically, responding only that the university has “spoken to these issues to the extent that we’re going to speak to them.” 

Lisa Stone, UM’s strategic communications director, told Mississippi Today via email that, “While the university urges everyone who is eligible to get vaccinated, the Oxford and regional campuses of the University of Mississippi do not currently require the COVID-19 vaccine for employment or enrollment.”

Classes start this week at Alcorn State University, Delta State University, Mississippi State University, Mississippi University for Women, and Mississippi Valley State University.

The post Fact-check: Mississippi universities say they can’t require the COVID vaccine. IHL says they can. appeared first on Mississippi Today.