The Mississippi Department of Corrections is moving state inmates to a privately operated prison in Tallahatchie County following recent outbursts of deadly violence in multiple Mississippi prisons.
Sources in the law enforcement community confirmed the transfers to the Tallahatchie County Correctional Facility to Mississippi Today.
The number of prisoners who have been moved and when the transfers began are unclear.
Officials with the corrections department and Gov. Phil Bryant’s office did not immediately respond to requests for comment Wednesday morning.
Nashville-based CoreCivic currently owns and operates the prison, located in the town of Tutwiler. A spokeswoman for CoreCivic referred questions about the matter to the state department of corrections.
(Editor’s note: Mississippi Today board member and donor Charles Overby has served on the CoreCivic board of directors since December 2001.)
CoreCivic, formerly known as Corrections Corporation of America, has owned the facility since 2000. The company is one of the country’s two largest correctional firms and the company has prospered in recent years as President Donald Trump has promised a tough-on-crime agenda, including immigration and immigrant detention.
The facility began housing federal immigration detainees in the summer of 2018.
In 2013, CoreCivic (then CCA) lost its contract with the state of Mississippi to operate the 1,000-bed Wilkinson County Correctional Facility. The contract was awarded to Utah-based private operator MTC instead, then the only prison contractor for state-owned facilities.
CoreCivic has donated to the campaigns of both Bryant and his incoming successor Lt. Gov. Tate Reeves in recent elections. In 2015, company donated $1,000 to each campaign. Last year, CoreCivic contributed $1,000 to Reeves’s gubernatorial campaign; the company did not contribute to the campaign of Reeves’s Democratic opponent, Jim Hood, per records from the National Institute on Money in Politics.
This article first appeared on Mississippi Today and is republished here under a Creative Commons license.
Good morning Tupelo! Today is Wednesday, January 8, 2020. It is the 8th day of the year. There are 358 days left in the year (don’t forget this is Leap Year!) and 70 days left of winter! Valentine’s Day is in 37 days, and Spring starts in 71 days.
If you’d like to become a sponsor of our daily Rundown, please contact joshua.ballard@ourtupelo.com or call 662-260-1498
HAPPENING TODAY
Today in Tupelo, here are the things going on around town:
Miranda Lambert’s Little Red Wagon Tour is partnering with the Tupelo-Lee Humane Society to help them get what they need to take care of all those sweet animals! From now until January 10, 2020, you can bring donations to Steele’s Dive to be entered into a drawing for two free tickets. There will be two drawings held on January 10 for the January 16th concert, meaning that there will be two lucky winners who will receive a free pair of tickets EACH.
We have a free family four-pack of tickets to see the Harlem Globetrotters at the Bancorpsouth Arena on January 13 to give away to our followers here at OurTupelo! As a bonus, these four tickets also come with Magic Passes! We’ll be running this promotion though January 11, and announcing the winner at noon-ish on that day. Make sure to check out the pinned post on our Facebook page for details on how to win!
Join Chick-Fil-A for Breakfast and BINGO every Wednesday. Tell your parents or grandparents about it! Kids are also welcomed guests! All first time bingo guests may receive a free coffee!
There will be a short program to celebrate the 85th birthday of the King of Rock and Roll at the Elvis Presley Birthplace at 1 p.m.. Cupcakes and drinks will be served. All tickets are free, and the event will be livestreamed on Facebook Live.
If we missed listing an event you know of, let us know!
Want us to know about something coming up? Just tag our Facebook page, or you can even mark us co-host on an event you are having on your Facebook event listing. You can also send us a message on our Facebook page, or shoot us an email at submit@ourtupelo.com and we will help you share it.
Be sure to check out our extended calendar of events as well, for upcoming happenings in the area!
Have a great day and get out there and enjoy Our Tupelo!
* We update all listings periodically as new information becomes available.
Good morning Tupelo! Today is Tuesday, January 7, 2020. It is the 7th day of the year. There are 359 days left in the year (don’t forget this is Leap Year!) and 71 days left of winter! Valentine’s Day is in 38 days, and Spring starts in 72 days.
If you’d like to become a sponsor of our daily Rundown, please contact joshua.ballard@ourtupelo.com or call 662-260-1498
HAPPENING TODAY
Today in Tupelo, here are the things going on around town:
Miranda Lambert’s Little Red Wagon Tour is partnering with the Tupelo-Lee Humane Society to help them get what they need to take care of all those sweet animals! From now until January 10, 2020, you can bring donations to Steele’s Dive to be entered into a drawing for two free tickets. There will be two drawings held on January 10 for the January 16th concert, meaning that there will be two lucky winners who will receive a free pair of tickets EACH.
We have a free family four-pack of tickets to see the Harlem Globetrotters at the Bancorpsouth Arena on January 13 to give away to our followers here at OurTupelo! As a bonus, these four tickets also come with Magic Passes! We’ll be running this promotion though January 11, and announcing the winner at noon-ish on that day. Make sure to check out the pinned post on our Facebook page for details on how to win!
Old Venice Pizza Co in Tupelo will be hosting Tuesday Night Trivia tonight at 6pm.
In Fulton, check out STEM Story Time at the Itawamba County Pratt Memorial Library in Fulton, every Tuesday at 4:00 p.m..
MUSIC & ENTERTAINMENT
Steele’s Dive will have Matt Nolan tonight from 7 until 10 p.m.
If we missed listing an event you know of, let us know!
Want us to know about something coming up? Just tag our Facebook page, or you can even mark us co-host on an event you are having on your Facebook event listing. You can also send us a message on our Facebook page, or shoot us an email at submit@ourtupelo.com and we will help you share it.
Be sure to check out our extended calendar of events as well, for upcoming happenings in the area!
Have a great day and get out there and enjoy Our Tupelo!
* We update all listings periodically as new information becomes available.
by Kayleigh Skinner & Adam Ganucheau, Mississippi Today, January 6, 2020
Mississippi Department of Corrections Commissioner Pelicia Hall and other department officials sat across the table from lawmakers at the Capitol less than one year ago and issued a bleak warning: Without additional funding, the department couldn’t adequately staff the state’s prisons and guarantee the safety of more 19,000 inmates or prison workers.
“I’m almost at capacity in my facilities. That’s not a good place for us to be in in the state of Mississippi,” Hall told lawmakers in a Jan. 16, 2019 House appropriations subcommittee hearing for her department.
Hall continued: “We expect that our correctional staff and all the people working for corrections are supposed to be able to deliver services for 19,197 people incarcerated… they’re supposed to deliver (services) with honor and integrity and courage. And we’ve not taken care of them. We expect them to perform like eagles with people who society has said they’ve given up on them… they expect the department of corrections to be able to correct everything that has fallen by the wayside.”
The direct plea to lawmakers was one of several that corrections officials and criminal justice advocates made over a period of several years. Almost every time, lawmakers ignored those pleas.
The new year began with crisis in Mississippi correctional institutions. To date, at least five prisoners have been killed in what the state has called disturbances at three facilities. Local sheriffs’ offices sent more than 100 officers to Mississippi State Penitentiary in Sunflower County to combat an outbreak of violence.
Family members of inmates at Parchman haven’t heard from their loved ones in several days as graphic videos of conditions inside the prison circulate social media. The department of corrections issued a statewide lockdown of all its prisons to reduce injuries and fatalities.
In the same January 2019 hearing, Manisa Ragsdale, a lieutenant with the corrections department, told the committee that employees’ working conditions were outright dangerous.
“One of the main concerns that I see happening every day is low staffing,” Ragsdale said. “If we were to have a major incident to happen, there is no one there to respond to the incidents.”
Ragsdale continued: “People are having to come in early just so they can have adequate staff to run the shift for one day. It’s kind of dangerous. If you have something to happen you don’t have anyone to respond. If I’m in a major crisis, who is going to come and see about me?”
The department of corrections has remained tight-lipped the past several days, though prison officials now say the facilities are under control. Social media videos and photos, purportedly posted by inmates, have alluded to lack of staff response during such incidents as fires and prisoner-on-prisoner violence.
To address these shortages, Hall, the commissioner, asked lawmakers for $22.3 million to repair Unit 29 at Parchman – the maximum security unit at Mississippi State Penitentiary where at least three men were killed and dozens more were injured this month. In his most recent budget recommendation, Gov. Phil Bryant called for $6 million for the first phase of that building project.
This spring, lawmakers ultimately approved a total budget of $36 million for Parchman, 2.6 percent less than the prison received the previous year — and $22.8 million short of the total sum Hall requested.
The Legislature did not grant the prison department’s request for the money to repair Unit 29.
Today, the department still needs $22.3 million to renovate Unit 29 alone, MDOC communications director Grace Fisher said in August 2019. She did not have a figure for the prison’s total renovation.
That same month Mississippi Today outlined the findings of a state inspection of the prison which found Unit 29 had the most health violations and the prison itself had more than 400 cells with flooding, leaks, lack of lights, power and water and other health issues like black mold and raw sewage.
An analysis shows lawmakers cut the department’s budget three times in the past eight years. In years the department received funding increases, the upticks were marginal and considerably less than what the department requested.
Corrections budgets were cut in fiscal years 2017, 2016 and 2012 compared to previous years.
The past two years, the department received increases of 2 percent and 1 percent, respectively, but those increases were about $40 million less than the department requested each year.
Lawmakers did dole out 3 percent raises in 2019 for some state employees, including corrections officers. About 900 officers, whose previous salaries ranged from $24,903 per year for trainees to $32,205 for sergeants, were granted the full 3 percent raise.
But even after Hall asked lawmakers to provide the pay increase for corrections officers, the raise did little to move the needle.
“I shudder to think if I had to run a household” on the salary officers make, Hall said in 2018.
In January 2019, Hall said she was losing employees to Mississippi factories such as Continental Tire and Nissan because they offered better wages and working conditions.
“We’re losing our workforce,” Hall said. “I’m sitting here as the commissioner saying that, and I don’t like to say it but that’s the situation that we have.”
Civil rights organizations have made their case to lawmakers that understaffing is just one problem that has led to the department’s woes. One solution they’ve pitched to lawmakers is legal reform about what constitutes prison time in the state.
“Mississippi politicians talk about how tough they are when it comes to fighting crime, but we need to ask whether they are being smart,” Cliff Johnson, director of the MacArthur Justice Center at the University of Mississippi School of Law, said in July 2019. “You can’t throw people in prison for years on end for every offense under the sun and then act shocked when the prison population swells to 20,000 and you can’t afford the astronomical price tag that goes along with having one of the highest incarceration rates in the world.”
Johnson continued: “It seems to me that the only way Mississippi can afford the cost of prisons that actually keep people safe is to reduce the number of people we lock up and to impose shorter sentences for many crimes. There is a way to do that thoughtfully and safely.”
Still, lawmakers and other state leaders have talked about their commitment to the corrections department.
On Sunday, after days of violence within the statewide prison system, outgoing Gov. Bryant stressed Mississippi’s need to “invest in its prison system and the men and women who work there.” However, during his eight years in office, Bryant implemented several annual and mid-year agency cuts to balance the state’s budget. All of those mid-year cuts affected the corrections department, though Bryant exempted the Mississippi Highway Patrol once, citing safety concerns.
Gov.-elect Tate Reeves, who will be inaugurated on Jan. 14, echoed that sentiment, tweeting that he was briefed by the department on the recent violence and “grateful to those working to restore order and safety.”
“There is much work to be done in our correctional system,” Reeves said.
As the 2020 legislative session gavels in this week, the department of corrections does not have a permanent leader. Hall announced in late December that she would resign her post in mid-January for a job in the private sector. Reeves, the incoming governor, has not yet announced who he will appoint as her replacement.
“We’ve always fought for you, we’ve always fought for the department of corrections,” Rep. Angela Cockerham, I-Magnolia, told Hall in the January 2019 meeting. “Don’t ever think that you don’t have support because you do.”
Michelle Liu contributed to this report.
This article first appeared on Mississippi Today and is republished here under a Creative Commons license.
Good morning Tupelo! Today is Monday, January 6, 2020. It is the 6th day of the year. There are 360 days left in the year (don’t forget this is Leap Year!) and 72 days left of winter! Valentine’s Day is in 39 days, and Spring starts in 73 days.
If you’d like to become a sponsor of our daily Rundown, please contact joshua.ballard@ourtupelo.com or call 662-260-1498
HAPPENING TODAY
Today in Tupelo, here are the things going on around town:
The Bancorpsouth Arena will be open for Public Ice Skating today from 1:00 p.m. this afternoon until 6:00 p.m. tonight. Ice Rink Admission price is $12 per person and this includes skate rental.
Miranda Lambert’s Little Red Wagon Tour is partnering with the Tupelo-Lee Humane Society to help them get what they need to take care of all those sweet animals! From now until January 10, 2020, you can bring donations to Steele’s Dive to be entered into a drawing for two free tickets. There will be two drawings held on January 10 for the January 16th concert, meaning that there will be two lucky winners who will receive a free pair of tickets EACH.
We have a free family four-pack of tickets to see the Harlem Globetrotters at the Bancorpsouth Arena on January 13 to give away to our followers here at OurTupelo! As a bonus, these four tickets also come with Magic Passes! We’ll be running this promotion though January 11, and announcing the winner at noon-ish on that day. Make sure to check out the pinned post on our Facebook page for details on how to win!
Tupelo-Lee Humane Society invites you to Kitten Yoga! Kitten Yoga is held every Monday evening from 6:00 p.m. to 7:00 p.m.. Classes are $10 per person and will be taught by professional yoga instructors in an environment filled with kitten happiness!
FOOD TRUCKS
Tupelo’s Food Trucks can be found today at the following locations:
Local Mobile will be at Ballard Park on West Main Street from 11:00 a.m. to 1:30 p.m.
If we missed listing an event you know of, let us know!
Want us to know about something coming up? Just tag our Facebook page, or you can even mark us co-host on an event you are having on your Facebook event listing. You can also send us a message on our Facebook page, or shoot us an email at submit@ourtupelo.com and we will help you share it.
Be sure to check out our extended calendar of events as well, for upcoming happenings in the area!
Have a great day and get out there and enjoy Our Tupelo!
* We update all listings periodically as new information becomes available.
Local Blood Bank Calls on Donors to Help Patients Now
TUPELO, MS— From Vitalant:
Vitalant, formerly United Blood Services, the nonprofit blood bank serving the local community in Northeast Mississippi, has declared a critical shortage of blood, as blood providers nationwide have less than a two days’ supply of necessary blood types.
For Vitalant, the busy holiday season resulted in over 21,000 fewer donations than expected.
Due to the critical shortage, donors are strongly encouraged to give blood as soon as possible by calling 877-258-4825 (877-25-VITAL) or by going online to vitalant.org.
“We strive to maintain a 4-day supply of blood just to provide what patients need, and currently we’re at less than half that for certain blood types,” said Dr. Ralph Vassallo, Chief Medical Officer at Vitalant. “Blood on the shelf helps patients every day—for traumas, cancer treatments and critical transfusions—and enables us to be ready if disaster strikes.”
Currently, all blood types and components are in short supply, with a special need for platelets and type O blood donations. Platelets have a very short shelf life—only five days. Type O-negative blood is the universal blood type that can help stabilize all patients. Nationally, Vitalant needs to collect more than 35,000 blood products per week to meet patient needs. In Northeast Mississippi, we need to collect 250 blood products per day to meet local patient needs.
Every two seconds, someone needs blood.
And even with new donations coming in daily, the demand can quickly outpace supply. Patients depend on the ongoing generosity of volunteer blood donors for the blood transfusions they need.
Who’sat risk? Everyone from accident victims to newborns to seniors who may need:
Red blood cells for trauma, surgery, emergencies
Platelets and red blood cells to fight chronic disease – patients with cancer, hemophilia and sickle cell disease
Plasma to stop the bleeding – burn patients and those with clotting disorders
It is crucial for Vitalant to maintain a safe and ready supply at all times. It takes up to 2.5 days to process, test, and distribute each blood donation before it is delivered to hospitals.
“To all the blood donors out there—you have gone above and beyond to save my son’s life. Without blood transfusions I would have lost my little boy,” said Nathan’s mom, April.
Nathan was born with a rare blood disorder, Gardos channel mutation, that causes his red blood cells to rapidly break apart. Every month, he relies on the generosity of strangers to donate lifesaving blood—a need that will most likely continue the rest of his life.
In fact, Nathan will receive his 79th blood transfusion on January 9.
Nathan and countless other children and adults with rare blood disorders and chronic disease need donated blood regularly.
To find a Vitalant donation center, please visit vitalant.org or call 877-25VITAL.
Blood donation takes about an hour from check-in to refreshments. Donors can save about 20 minutes by completing their Fast Track Health History the day they donate. It’s at vitalant.org.
Volunteer blood donors must be at least 16 years old, weigh at least 110 pounds, and be in good health. Additional height/weight requirements apply to donors 22 and younger, and donors who are 16 and 17 must have signed permission from a parent or guardian.
About Vitalant: Vitalant is the nation’s second largest community blood service provider, supplying comprehensive transfusion medicine services for nearly 1,000 hospitals and health care partners for patients in need across 40 states. Vitalant inspires local communities to serve the needs of others and transform lives through the selfless act of donating blood. Every day, almost 5,000 blood donations are needed to meet the needs of people throughout the country, and Vitalant’s 780,000 donors supply 1.8 million donations a year. In addition to blood products, Vitalant offers customers transfusion services, medical consulting, quality guidance, ongoing education, research and more. For more information and to schedule a donation, visit vitalant.org or call 877-258-4825 (877-25VITAL). Join the conversation about impacting the lives of others on Facebook, Twitter and Instagram.
*United Blood Services and Lifeblood are now Vitalant*
Good morning Tupelo! Today is Sunday, January 5, 2020. It is the 5th day of the year. There are 361 days left in the year (don’t forget this is Leap Year!) and 73 days left of winter! Valentine’s Day is in 40 days, and Spring starts in 74 days.
If you’d like to become a sponsor of our daily Rundown, please contact joshua.ballard@ourtupelo.com or call 662-260-1498
HAPPENING TODAY
Today in Tupelo, here are the things going on around town:
The Bancorpsouth Arena will be open for Public Ice Skating today from 1:00 p.m. this afternoon until 6:00 p.m. tonight. Ice Rink Admission price is $12 per person and this includes skate rental.
Miranda Lambert’s Little Red Wagon Tour is partnering with the Tupelo-Lee Humane Society to help them get what they need to take care of all those sweet animals! From now until January 10, 2020, you can bring donations to Steele’s Dive to be entered into a drawing for two free tickets. There will be two drawings held on January 10 for the January 16th concert, meaning that there will be two lucky winners who will receive a free pair of tickets EACH.
We have a free family four-pack of tickets to see the Harlem Globetrotters at the Bancorpsouth Arena on January 13 to give away to our followers here at OurTupelo! As a bonus, these four tickets also come with Magic Passes! We’ll be running this promotion though January 11, and announcing the winner at noon-ish on that day. Make sure to check out the pinned post on our Facebook page for details on how to win!
CrossWalk Free Will Baptist Church invites you to join them for a seminar on Toxic People. Most likely, all of us have encountered those we would consider to be toxic. How do we recognize them? How do we respond to them? How do we help reform them? Session one of “How Do I Manage Toxic People In My Life” begins this morning at 10:30 a.m..
St. Paul Orthodox Church invites you to join them at Ballard Park for a blessing of the waters at 1:00 p.m..
Showdown Esports invites you to join them at the Link Centre at 12:30 p.m. for their Sunday Showdown Tupelo area weekly FGC event! Come out and compete, spectate, or play casual games on the side and hang out!
If we missed listing an event you know of, let us know!
Want us to know about something coming up? Just tag our Facebook page, or you can even mark us co-host on an event you are having on your Facebook event listing. You can also send us a message on our Facebook page, or shoot us an email at submit@ourtupelo.com and we will help you share it.
Be sure to check out our extended calendar of events as well, for upcoming happenings in the area!
Have a great day and get out there and enjoy Our Tupelo!
* We update all listings periodically as new information becomes available.
Friends, it’s warm and going to rain — this weather is gonna make everybody sick! Granny used to say that the weather changing back and forth is just bound to make everybody sick!
And how many of y’all remember that old homemade cough medicine! Whew! That stuff was rough!
I don’t remember my Mom and Dad ever making it, but PawPaw and Granny sure did! And if they ever heard you cough, you were gonna get some!
Granny would have to dig around in the cabinets to get it, because she kept it hidden! I didn’t know why back then; we sure weren’t gonna drink it up! Then after she found it, she would pour you some in a big spoon and you had to swallow it down!
Good Lord, that stuff burned! It’d burn the hide off your throat all the way down! But it stopped your cough!
Years later, we found her recipe for what we called her fire water. It had whiskey in it, and honey, lemon, and peppermint. It was mostly whiskey I think now, but it did the trick! But whew, it tasted awful. I mean make your eyes water awful! We got to where we wouldn’t go around Granny if we had a cough! But you know how hard it is to not cough, when you really have to!
I asked John Barry if he had something similar, but he said they used to give him mineral oil when he had a bad cough! I asked him if it worked. He said “Yes! If they give you a bunch of mineral oil, you wouldn’t cough because you were afraid to!”
Good morning Tupelo! Today is Saturday, January 4, 2020. It is the 4th day of the year. There are 362 days left in the year (don’t forget this is Leap Year!) and 74 days left of winter! Valentine’s Day is in 41 days, and Spring starts in 75 days.
If you’d like to become a sponsor of our daily Rundown, please contact joshua.ballard@ourtupelo.com or call 662-260-1498
HAPPENING TODAY
Today in Tupelo, here are the things going on around town:
The Bancorpsouth Arena will be open for Public Ice Skating today from 1:00 p.m. this afternoon until 9:00 p.m. tonight. Ice Rink Admission price is $12 per person and this includes skate rental.
Miranda Lambert’s Little Red Wagon Tour is partnering with the Tupelo-Lee Humane Society to help them get what they need to take care of all those sweet animals! From now until January 10, 2020, you can bring donations to Steele’s Dive to be entered into a drawing for two free tickets. There will be two drawings held on January 10 for the January 16th concert, meaning that there will be two lucky winners who will receive a free pair of tickets EACH.
We have a free family four-pack of tickets to see the Harlem Globetrotters at the Bancorpsouth Arena on January 13 to give away to our followers here at OurTupelo! As a bonus, these four tickets also come with Magic Passes! We’ll be running this promotion though January 11, and announcing the winner at noon-ish on that day. Make sure to check out the pinned post on our Facebook page for details on how to win!
If you have little ones, don’t miss Storytime at Barnes & Noble at 11 a.m. and then again at 3 p.m. for an exciting story, crafts, and snacks in the children’s department! This event is focused on children under 6, and is free to the public.
A special program of dulcimer music will be provided by the North Mississippi Dulcimer Association from 10:00 am until noon at the Parkway Visitor Center located at milepost 266 near Tupelo, Mississippi. The North Mississippi Dulcimer Association teaches dulcimer history, tradition, craftsmanship, and music by sharing its knowledge and talents. The Appalachian mountain dulcimer is the first instrument developed in the United States. Dating back to the early 1800s, the dulcimer is an instrument whose very name means “sweet sound.” The National Park Service and the North Mississippi Dulcimer Association invite everyone to listen to the soft sweet sounds of the dulcimer and learn about its extensive history. This program is free. For additional information, call 1-800-305-7417.
At 1 p.m., you can join a park ranger at the Natchez Trace Parkway, in living history attire, to discover what it was like for Tennessee Militia men traveling the Natchez Trace during the War of 1812. Ranger Andy will share his knowledge of the time period with visitors of all ages through displays of reproduction equipment carried by the soldiers in the early 1800s.
Lane Bryant invites you to join them today at 10 a.m. with Chasi Jernigan: Sweat In Mascara for a celebration of all things LIVI. Forget resolutions. It’s time to unwind, refresh your closet and revive your style! Plus enter for a chance to win prizes from 2–4PM and score BOGO free on all new LIVI styles!
Children ages 6-12 are invited to Nerf Night at 6 p.m. at Extreme Athletics! Bring your own Nerf gun that takes traditional nerf bullets and they will provide the bullets and the eyewear, as well as provide pizza, chips, and a drink with every registration! (A waiver will be required for each participant.)
In Aberdeen, visit the Historic Elkin Theatre tonight for a viewing of “A Beautiful Day in the Neighborhood.” Admission is $5.00 each, and all concession items are $1.00 each. Doors open at 6:30 p.m. and the movie starts at 7 p.m..
MUSIC AND ENTERTAINMENT
As for music in Tupelo tonight, we have the following:
If we missed listing an event you know of, let us know!
Want us to know about something coming up? Just tag our Facebook page, or you can even mark us co-host on an event you are having on your Facebook event listing. You can also send us a message on our Facebook page, or shoot us an email at submit@ourtupelo.com and we will help you share it.
Be sure to check out our extended calendar of events as well, for upcoming happenings in the area!
Have a great day and get out there and enjoy Our Tupelo!
* We update all listings periodically as new information becomes available.
Address: 216 A Main Street, Tupelo, Mississippi (under the kangaroo sign, downstairs)
NOW OPEN! * Adults 21 years and older.
Although Downunder is listed on its Facebook page as a Cocktail Bar, once you descend down the stairs to basement level, it’s more reminiscent of a speakeasy found in old photos and movies from the golden years. It could also be described as a retro bar with its video games, dart board, and pinball to one side, with retro funky furniture scattered throughout the rest. Talking with the owner, Kris (a native Australian), this is more like a home away from home. A relaxing space to grab a drink, some Australian inspired grub, and chill for a spell.
To start, I ordered a Fosters beer ($7). It’s founded in Australia but made in the USA. It’s a full pint, so one can should do ya. It’s super smooth and complimented my meal well.
For my meal, I went with the Aussie Rissoles ($10). This is an Australian staple and gluten free to boot! It’s two seared beef patties, creamy mashed potatoes, drizzled with savory gravy, and topped with Parmesan roasted edamame.
The Aussie Rissoles is a very good meat-and-potatoes meal with the Parmesan roasted edamame providing a surprising yet savory little pop with each bite!
They offer many Australian-inspired dishes, including a charcuterie board that changes every couple weeks!
Downunder has several retro games that can be fun for one and all including a dart board arcade game. They also have a pinball game with an AC/DC theme, which is one of my most favorite Australian exports!
I’m writing this while watching folks talking, playing games, laughing, eating, and having a blast at Tupelo’s newest hot spot! Although Australia is almost 10,000 miles away, Downunder offers a taste of the the country’s cuisine and free spirit.
