Jackson Free Press

Voting 2-1 this morning, the Mississippi Public Service Commission agreed to let Mississippi Power Co. continue building a lignite coal plant in Kemper County -- at least for the time being

The Hinds County Republican Party said it will also hold a primary election for two seats on the Board of Supervisors.

The county GOP primary will take place Sept. 24 with a runoff on Oct. 8 if necessary. Candidates must qualify by submitting a qualifying form and $15 fee by Friday, July 26 in either the Jackson or Raymond courthouses. The general election is Nov. 5 to replace Doug Anderson, who died earlier this year, and Phil Fisher, who stepped dow to be mayor of Clinton. Anderson represented District 2 and Fisher represented District 4.

Republicans decided to hold a primary only after county Democrats announced plans for primary yesterday, said Hinds County Republican Party Chairman Pete Perry in a statement. Perry said special elections are typically nonpartisan.

On July 1, supervisors temporarily filled the open seats. Al Hunter, owner of contracting firm First Construction Inc., who lives in Edwards, took over for Anderson. Dr. Robert Walker, Vicksburg's first black mayor and now a Byram resident, replaced Fisher.

Walker's appointment also gives all five board seats to African Americans, which has drawn criticism from whites and Republicans because Hinds County's white minority is currently with representation on the board.

The District 4 seat is considered safe for Republicans.

(Yes, I'm going to get all the mileage I can out of this Public Enemy-esque headline.)

A group called Mississippians for Affordable Energy picketed Tuesday night in Meridian to protest Mississippi Power Co.'s Kemper County coal-fired power plant.

Local TV station, WTOK reported: "The picketers say they were there in protest of the financial burdens on ratepayers as Mississippi Power constructs the lignite plant, as well as a fundraising dinner that was in progress tonight for Central District Public Service Commissioner Lynn Posey."

The news station noted that the protestors set up outside of Weidmann's, a fancy joint in downtown Meridian.

Posey, a Republican, has consistently voted in favor of Mississippi Power and Kemper. And even though Posey won't be up for re-election again for another couple years, it's possible that he is banking that the growing unpopularity and price tag of Kemper -- almost $5 billion -- won't sit well with central-district voters in 2015.

Meridian is approximately 30 miles south of where Kemper construction is taking place.

Francis P. Smith Jr., pastor of Total Praise and Worship on Cedar Lane in south Jackson, has qualified for the race to be the next mayor of Jackson, information from the city clerk's office shows.

Smith competed as an Independent in the June 2013 general election for mayor, which late Mayor Chokwe Lumumba won in a landslide.

In an interview leading up to that contest, Smith told the Jackson Free Press: "I'm running for mayor, simply, to bring Jackson out of the slum, out of the abyss, out of the pits of hell."

Smith served as the Housing and Rehabilitation Manager for the city from 2002 through 2011 under Harvey Johnson Jr.'s administration and, later, the Frank Melton administration.

The JFP reported last year:

In that position, Smith supervised the Housing and Rehabilitation staff as they enforced city codes, executed community improvement projects, assured recipients spent Community Development Block Grants funds properly, and assisted elderly and disabled citizens with housing needs, such as roofing, electrical, plumbing and foundational repairs.

Smith is just the third candidate to officially qualify for the April 8 nonpartisan contest to replace Lumumba, who died late last month.

Bennie Thompson, the only African American and only Democrat representing Mississippi in Congress, is locking horns with Gov. Phil Bryant over the guv's staunch objection to Medicaid expansion.

Buzzfeed reported yesterday that Thompson called into a telecast of the New Nation of Islam to discuss a number of topics, and made several eyebrow-raising remarks.

Thompson never says Bryant's name on the tape, but points out that in turning down Medicaid expansion under the Affordable Care Act, "he also turned down $426 million in federal funds."

"It's not just that this man (Bryant) turned it down, he also turned resources down that could go to help his citizens who are already documented as having some of the worst health conditions known to man," Thompson said, adding "just because a black man created it."

In what Buzzfeed characterized as "shocking" comments, Thompson called U.S. Supreme Court Justice Clarence Thomas an "Uncle Tom" and Senate GOP Leader Mitch McConnell is a "racist."

Mississippi may be in the midst of the nation's slimiest political contest, the Republican primary for U.S. Senate.

Now, a new study purports that Mississippi is indeed the crookedest state in the union. Researchers at Indiana University and University of Hong Kong "studied more than 25,000 convictions of public officials for violation of federal corruption laws between 1976 and 2008 as well as patterns in state spending to develop a corruption index that estimates the most and least corrupt states in the union."

The full article is not publicly available, but based on the study's methods, Mississippi tops of the corruption list—surpassing even Illinois where two of the last three governors served time in federal prison on corruption charges—whose Top 10 is full of other southern state:

1. Mississippi
2. Louisiana
3. Tennessee
4. Illinois
5. Pennsylvania
6. Alabama
7. Alaska
8. South Dakota
9. Kentucky
10. Florida

It should be noted that by some other measures, Mississippi has one of the nation's lowest "corruption risks," thanks to a strong state auditor and insurance commissioner, both of whom are elected in Mississippi, unlike in some other states.

Bidding on 360 parcels of tax-forfeited property will begin tomorrow, city and state officials said today.

The Mississippi Secretary of State holds properties when owners fail to pay ad valorem property taxes, which provides funding to city and county governments as well as local schools. Of the approximately $75 million in forfeited land the SOS holds, almost $15 million of it lies with in Hinds County, according to a Jackson city press release.

“Our goal is to get this property back on the tax rolls to benefit the capital city and the State of Mississippi,” said Secretary of State Delbert Hosemann through a news release. “By partnering with the City of Jackson, we are taking an aggressive step to return these dilapidated and abandoned properties to productive use.”

The available properties will be advertised for public bidding beginning, Thursday, Aug. 27 on the Secretary of State's website: http://www.sos.ms.gov/PublicLands/Jackson.

Shortly after taking office last year, Mayor Tony Yarber's administration tackled problem properties.

"Our Community Improvement Division has made great strides over the past year ridding areas of dilapidated structures that mar our neighborhoods. Now, this auction will give citizens the opportunity to purchase property and play a vital role in Jackson's revitalization," Yarber said in the press release.

Romenesko got a hold of an undated screenshot of a Gulf Coast-based news anchor's Facebook status that advises same-sex-loving folks to take a "gaycation" because the anchor thinks they've been in the news too much.

"I'm all for the LGBT community's ongoing fight for equality. I support their fight in every way," wrote Dave Elliot, an anchor for WLOX-TV. "But it seems like they've been in the news too much lately. Maybe they should take a short break. Go on gaycation, just for the weekend."

Indeed LGBT issues have been in a lot of headlines recently, especially here in Mississippi. This week, a number of LGBT groups rallied to demand human rights. Earlier this year, a handful of conservative lawmakers tried to sneak through a so-called religious freedom bill that would have turned the clock on civil rights back to Jim Crow times.

When LGBT advocates got wind of the bill, reaction was swift enough to slow the bill down. The House removed the most worrisome language, but the Senate wants to negotiate more, which means by Monday, the discriminatory language could end up back in the proposal and send it to the governor.

If that happens, it could put Elliot in the awkward position of having to read even more gay news, assuming he still has his job. Romesko reported that WLOX wrote on its Facebook page that “we are not happy at all with the post" or any "free publicity" that the station may be getting from the post.

Interestingly, Dave Elliot's Facebook page indicates that a couple hours ago shows that he was visiting Little River Canyon National Preserve's Eberhart Point Overlook in Alabama. So it is unclear whether WLOX— an ABC- and CBS-affiliated station—will send Elliot on a permanent vacation.

U.S. Attorney General Eric Holder is stepping down, National Public Radio is reporting.

Holder is the nation's first African American AG and one of the longest-tenured members of first-black-President Barack Obama's cabinet.

According to NPR: "Two sources familiar with the decision tell NPR that Holder, 63, intends to leave the Justice Department as soon as his successor is confirmed, a process that could run through 2014 and even into next year. A former U.S. government official says Holder has been increasingly "adamant" about his desire to leave soon for fear he otherwise could be locked in to stay for much of the rest of President Obama's second term."

Holder shepherded the USDOJ through rocky times and made civil-rights enforcement a hallmark of his tenure.

Under Holder, several issues and cases out of Mississippi garnered national prominence.

In March 2012, Deryl Dedmon and two co-conspirators from Rankin County became the first individuals charged under a 2009 federal hate-crime law for the murder of James Craig Anderson, a black man from Jackson.

The case of Shelby County, Ala. v. Holder challenged the federal Voting Rights Act, which required a number of states that had histories with racial discrimination in voting. The U.S. Supreme Court decision in Shelby cleared the way for several states, including Mississippi, to implement voter-ID laws.

Civil-rights groups had argued, and Holder agreed, that voter ID represented an unconstitutional barrier to exercising voting rights. Mississippi's voter ID law, designed to stop election fraud, was first used in the June 2014 U.S. Senate primary, which resulted in multiple allegations of vote fraud that have yet to be resolved.

Some Mississippians are incensed at North Carolina Gov. Bev Perdue for comparing her state's recent successful ballot initiative defining marriage as between a man and a woman to Mississippi -- whose Constitution also defines marriage as between a man and a woman.

A campaign has several parts. First, especially, if you're an unknown candidate, you have to tell your story. Then, you have to talk about your big ideas. After that, you have to convince people that you're the best person to put those ideas into action.

Despite submitting paperwork to run in the city of Jackson's special election for mayor, two individuals have been removed for not meeting requirements to seek the office.

They are:

Tonya Brooks of Valley North Boulevard

Tammie Patterson of Carleton Street.

That shaves the number of people seeking the office down to 13.

The election is April 8.

A runoff, which is expected, between the top votegetters would be on April 22.

Mississippi Democrats are basking in the post-electoral bliss of having held on to or picked up a number of mayor's seats yesterday.

A shock to no one, Democrat Chokwe Lumumba coasted to a W in Jackson (lesson here for future secret campaign engineers: being on the down-low never helped anyone).

Other incumbent Dems who also won reelection include Parker Wiseman of Starkville, Connie Moran of Ocean Springs and Patt Patterson of Oxford. Two sitting Democratic lawmakers, George Flaggs Jr. and Billy Broomfield, will also become mayors of Vicksburg and Moss Point, respectively. Each man defeated fellow Democrats and incumbents in those cities in primaries this spring.

What Democrats are beaming most about are the cities they took away from Republicans. In Tupelo, it was young Jason Shelton, in Meridian it was Percy Bland and in Booneville, it was Derrick Blythe. Tupelo was particularly sweet for Democrats, who haven't had the mayor's chair for three decades.

State Rep. Steve Holland, a Tupelo-area Democrat, credits Democrats' strong messaging and investment of "sweat equity" for yesterday's victories. Holland called Shelton a super guy with lots of energy and spunk.

"He had a cooler campaign that I would have had," Holland said of Shelton. "He tried to out conservative the other guy, and apparently it worked."

Two other Democrats--Glen Cook of Stonewall and James Young of Philadelphia -- also won election.

If after working out in the sweltering sun all day today, and you turned on your faucet for a cool drink only to get a glass full of brown of liquid, don't worry.

It's just a little "discoloration."

The city sent out a discolored water alert today after "experiencing a temporary widespread discolored water occurrence in our distribution system."

The water's perfectly imbibable, according to the release: "The discolored water being experienced during this discolored water episode is SAFE TO DRINK" and " Your water continues to meet all State and federal drinking water standards for public health and safety. NO BOIL WATER ALERT IS IN EFFECT."

City crews are "aggressively flushing lines" to make the water the right color again. In the meantime, you probably shouldn't wash your clothes or run your dishwasher, the city cautions. The city is handing out bottles of Red-B-Gone, a rust-stain remover, to citizens who request it.

Here are some helpful numbers:

Action Line 311
Hours: Monday - Friday 7:30 AM to 5:30 PM

Water Maintenance
601-960-1777 / 601-960-1778
Hours: Monday - Friday 8:00 AM to 5:00 PM

Water Lab
601-960-2723
Hours: Monday - Friday 7:00 AM to 4:00 PM

After 5:00 PM Monday through Friday and on weekends, please call 601-960-1875.

Jarvis Dortch, a health-policy expert and advocate, said today that he will run for the Mississippi House of Representatives.

"There are a number of policy concerns that I hope to address during this campaign. Our state's failures in healthcare, education, and wages are all issues that keep too many Mississippians in poverty," Dortch, who is running as a Democrat, wrote in the announcement.

"To be completely honest, many of our local legislators are not doing the job of engaging the public and truly representing our needs. Our problem isn't that we have poor people that aren't working hard, but we have poor leadership working against them."

Dortch is competing in District 66, which Democratic Rep. Cecil Brown now serves. In the last round of redistricting, however, Brown's district was combined with that of Republican Rep. Bill Denny. Brown is running for Public Service Commissioner from the Central District. The new District 66 serves south Jackson, Byram, Terry, Raymond and Utica.

"Unless you have your own personal lobbyist, the game is rigged against you. And there are way too many legislators willing to play the game. I'm not naive but I'm also not so cynical that I don't believe it's worth fighting for change," Dortch wrote.

A previous version of this story misstated that Jarvis Dortch is running against Rep. Bill Denny, R-Jackson.

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The Clarion-Ledger is reporting that president and publisher Jason P. Taylor is leaving the company.

On Wednesday, three employees--two sales people and one circulation staffer--also departed in the latest round of cuts at the C-L.

Taylor's announcement came less than one year after the announcement that he would take over operations at the Jackson daily as well as the Hattiesburg (Miss.) American and Montgomery (Ala.) Advertiser, succeeding Publisher Leslie Hurst.

One month later, Brian Tolley, then executive editor, said he was leaving the company; Tolley was eventually replaced by Sam Hall.

According to a story on the C-L's website, Taylor will go to work for Fairport, NY-based GateHouse Media as president and publisher of the Las Vegas Review-Journal and serve as chief-executive officer of GateHouse Media Live and Virtual Events. In addition, he will oversee GateHouse Media's Western U.S. Publishing Operations as president.

"Over the past year, Mississippi Media has emerged and set a path to elevate The Clarion-Ledger, clarionledger.com and our suite of products and services. This team has come together to accomplish a true resurgence of a brand in motion," according to a quote attributed to Taylor.

Gannett East Group President Michael Kane said the Virginia-based company is working on a transition plan.

Taylor was the sixth C-L publisher since 2004.

WLBT is reporting that that a Jackson State University bus carrying the school's baseball team caught fire near Birmingham, Alabama.

The fired occurred at I-20/59 Northbound at Allison-Bonnett Memorial Drive, about 15 minutes west of Birmingham; JSU is scheduled to play Savannah State Tuesday, the news station reports.

WLBT said School officials say that everyone got off the bus okay, and no one was injured.

Pictures on news site's homepage show a completely charred charter bus.

According to City Hall, Jackson public-works crews will be doing the following today:

• Patching potholes on areas of S. Charleston Place, Jefferson Street, Dewey Street, Ellis Avenue, Castle Hill Drive, Monterey Street, Claiborne Avenue and First Avenue, River Park Dr., Springridge Drive, Lake Trace Drive, Kristen Drive and Lynn Lane, Riverside Drive and Highland Drive, Woodward Avenue, Ridgewood Road and Briarwood Road, Bailey Avenue, Brinkley Drive and Winchester Drive.

Here at the Jackson Free Press, we get a lot of mail.

Much of it is legitimate correspondence in the form of helpful news tips and provocative letters to the editors. Some of it is comprised of the off-the-wall brain leakings of people who clearly have more free time on their hands than other human beings to interact with.

But it's all good. We take the good with the crazy.

Every now and then we get a piece of mail that even sends a shudder through us grizzled newspaper veterans. Such was the case this afternoon with a manila envelope showed up addressed to Central Mississippi Tea Party c/o Jackson Free Press with a return address of Chicopee, Mass.

Donna, Todd and me all had the same initial reaction to the shady-looking epistle: Where the hell is Chicopee and is there a hummus factory there? Then we wondered why a Tea Party chapter on the East Coast would be sending us -- us! -- mail.

Maybe they saw our recent interview with three members of the local Tea Party during which the group's female president said the country might have been better off if women had never been given the right to vote and thought 'This is our kinda paper.'

When very, very cautiously opened the package, we were a bit surprised what was in it.

Can you guess?

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After thousands upon millions of requests -- okay, more like nine -- we're ready to reveal the contents of the letter that arrived at the JFP offices yesterday.

Drum roll......

It was just a couple photos and a rather bizarre letter denouncing Democratic Party ideals and complaining about how hard how tough it is to be a Tea Partier in the "liberal bastion" that produced the current Republican presidential nominee.

The letter also highlighted such weirdly out of context maxims as "'DEMOCRAT'" IS COMMUNISM WITH AN INVITING TAPIOCA FLAVOR" and "America--enchained and slowly eaten alive by the sofa."

If you're disappointed, so are we. We've come to expect so much lunacy from the Tea Party that we were dismayed that the envelope didn't contain Level III biohazards, effigies of progressive politicians, a Ted Nugent promotional CD or actual tapioca.

It's still early, though.

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Roy McMillan has died after a long illness, the Clarion-Ledger reported.

Frequent visitors to Fondren know McMillan as the brash, fedora-wearing, fetus-sign waving anti-abortion protester near the Jackson Women's Health Organization.

A bit of history on McMillan:

In 1995, a federal court ordered McMillan to stay 50 feet away from the clinic for violating the Freedom of Access to Clinic Entrances Act, enacted in 1994 after Dr. (David) Gunn's murder in Pensacola. According to court records, on May 3, 1995, McMillan made his hand into the shape of a gun and told clinic employees: "Y'all look like a bunch of birds on a telephone wire waiting to be shot off by a man with a shotgun...Pow, pow, pow, pow."

McMillan pickets the clinic each day they see patients by displaying signs that carry pictures of fetuses and messages equating abortion to genocide. He and his wife, Beverly, an OB/GYN and former abortion doctor, also oppose all hormonal birth control including the pill and the morning-after pill.

He told the Jackson Free Press that meeting Beverly in 1982 is how he became involved in the pro-life movement.

JFP reporter Casey Parks wrote of McMillan: "He was reluctant to even join the mission. He thought Beverly was cute and smart when he saw her speak, though, so he asked her on a date. She thought he was charming, and they quickly married.

The pro-life movement inundated the husband's life as the wife spent most of her weekends speaking around the state. He joined the pro-life movement rather halfheartedly—he agreed to oversee one of the pro-life publications. His master's in journalism from Columbia University would come in handy, he thought, and besides, he wanted nothing to do with sidewalk counseling or protesting. When a colleague suggested that Roy go out to the clinic to take some action photos, Roy got a little nervous."

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