Jackson Free Press

So, this morning we had a team of a reporter, an intern and photographer out at Mississippi's only abortion clinic. It's the morning after federal Judge Dan Jordan issued an injunction keeping the clinic open until at least July 11 because, in part, the folks who pushed it made it clear that their goal was to eliminate abortion in Mississippi -- which they focused on far more than on women's health and safety.

What was funny this morning, to us, is how Roy McMillan (the man who sits in front of the clinic every morning with big fetus posters and other signs) yelled at my folks to tell me that "shoes are optional!" along with various other criticisms of the JFP's coverage. He was clearly referring to this recent JFP editorial, which I wrote a few weeks ago criticizing McMillan and his wife, Dr. Beverly McMillan, for trying to make any form of hormonal birth control, including the pill and the morning-after pill, illegal.

I ended the editorial: "Dr. McMillan is as welcome to those views as her husband is to sit in front of a clinic when he could be out helping children that are already born, hungry and unwanted. But it is not her place to tell hard-working American women that their health insurance should not pay for their health-care needs because she'd prefer that they get pregnant. Whether Dr. McMillan also prefers them barefoot is still an open question."

It's good to know where they stand on that question.

What was funny is that I drove by not long afterward, not knowing about McMillan's messages for me, and snapped some photos from my iPhone. An anti-abortion couple sitting next to the gate told me that they appreciate the JFP's coverage of the controversy because we report all sides and include comments from everyone. So, I suppose, the anti-abortion movement isn't filled with people who all think alike, just like the pro-abortion rights movement isn't. And I rather suspect there are a good number of folks out there against abortion who know that easy access to birth control will actually lower the number of abortions in our state and America. Unlike the McMillins, who don't seem to care about that point.

Meantime, I encourage everyone to read former JFP assistant editor Casey Parks' indepth feature on the Pro-life movement in Mississippi. It includes very interesting reading about the McMillans (they liked this story then, they told us) and other people inside the movement, including lobbyist Terri Herring.

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Seriously, Mississippi, you can't quit you.

Ole Miss today confirmed rumors we've been hearing—that Gov. Phil Bryant, who is under fire in the state and nationally for signing SB 2681, is going to be the commencement speaker at the University of Mississippi, which is still trying to recover from the latest bigoted incident on campus.

I'm, frankly, astounded at the timing. I know many people at Ole Miss are working to move the university past its past, but how in the world does this choice help? Who makes these decisions?

Here's the verbatim release:

OXFORD, Miss. – Gov. Phil Bryant is set to visit the University of Mississippi on May 10 to deliver the main address at the university's 161st Commencement.

Mississippi's 64th governor, Bryant was sworn in on Jan. 10, 2012. Before becoming the state's chief executive, he was lieutenant governor from 2008 to 2011. He also served as state auditor and represented his legislative district in the Mississippi House of Representatives for five years.

The Moorhead native speaks to graduating students, their families and other guests at 9 a.m. in the Grove. This year's graduating class includes about 2,650 spring candidates for undergraduate and graduate degrees, plus some 1,000 August 2013 graduates.

"Over the years, we have had leaders from many fields come to campus for our commencement addresses, and Gov. Bryant has provided valuable leadership to our state in both the legislative and executive branches for nearly 25 years," Chancellor Dan Jones said. "By championing education and business reforms, he has helped drive economic development and provide a brighter future for all Mississippians. We look forward to the insights and challenges he will offer our graduates."

Recipients of doctor of philosophy degrees are to be hooded by their major professors in a 7:30 p.m. ceremony May 9 in the Gertrude C. Ford Center for the Performing Arts. The Sally McDonnell Barksdale Honors College ceremony begins at 4 p.m. at the same location.

A shuttle service for handicapped and elderly visitors is available Saturday before the main ceremony. Shuttles will pick up people needing assistance from various locations and take them to the seating area. (Wheelchairs, if needed, must be provided by families.) The headquarters for the shuttle service will be at the Department of Parking and Transportation tent, at the intersection of University Avenue and All American Drive. To request assistance, call 662-915-7235.

In case of rain, the ceremony will be moved to Tad Smith Coliseum. If the weather is threatening, a decision on moving the ceremony indoors will be made by 8 a.m. and announced through media outlets, text messaging and the Ole Miss website.

Following the main ceremony, individual schools and the College of Liberal Arts hold ceremonies at various times and locations to present baccalaureate, master's, doctor of pharmacy and juris doctor degrees and awards. The schedule is as follows:

• College of Liberal Arts master's degrees – 11 a.m., Fulton Chapel

• Patterson School of Accountancy – 11 a.m., …

Join the JFP, the Center for Violence Prevention and the Chick Ball Committee for a free JFP Chick Ball happy hour Thursday, May 31, at Hal & Mal's downtown (200 S. Commerce St.).

"Hold up, Wait a minute, Put a Little Love In It"

That's the message the Central Mississippi Planning and Development District sent the Jackson Redevelopment Authority yesterday over JRA's decision to terminate its lease with the Farish Street Group.

In a three-page letter to JRA Executive Director Willie Mott, CMPDD CEO F. Clarke Holmes said JRA's purported termination notice was sent in clear contravention of the FSG/JRA lease, because the CMPDD, who is acting on behalf of MDA (and protecting it's $4.7 million investment in Farish Street) wasn't given prior notice.

"CMPDD request that JRA immediately withdraw the Termination Notice as to the Subject Properties until CMPDD is provided reasonable notice and opportunity to cure any defaults under the JRA-FSG Lease, or JRA is allowed to exercise its rights under the Leasehold Deeds of Trust and the Consent Agreement to protect its security for the CMPDD Loans," the letter read.

It might not be a pardon, but the letter could serve as a temporary reprieve for Farish Street Group and its embattled manager David Watkins. The better news here for Watkins is he seems to have CMPDD on his side in the negotiations going forward, because JRA isn't likely to pick a fight with the wing of MDA it has to deal with on a regular basis.

The letter concludes with this message: "In the meantime, we believe the best course of action for all of the parties is to move forward with transparent discussions aimed at getting the Farish Street project completed in a manner that achieves everyone's goals."

This week's new releases...

Duling Hall and new releases...

Gov. Phil Bryant has filled both Mississippi Supreme Court vacancies, following the departure of Justices Randy Pierce and David Chandler. Former District 1 Court of Appeals Judge James Maxwell and tenth district chancellor Dawn Beam will join the state's highest court in the new year.

Chief Justice Bill Waller Jr. said in statement that Judge Maxwell's "energy and experience will serve the court and the citizens of the state well.” Waller expressed enthusiasm at Beam's arrival to the court. In a statement, he said Judge Beam has continued to go above standards in helping her court's district convert to an all electronic filing system. Beyond clerical duties, Waller said Beam "has tirelessly worked to resolve issues regarding placement and supervision of abused and neglected children.”

Judge Beam has been involved with her district's work to guarantee safe homes for all children and recently spoke at a community meeting in December praising the local Department of Human Services workers in Marion County for the changes they've made in their office--including upping personnel numbers. The increased personnel led to 160 children being removed from their homes due to court orders that cited deplorable living conditions or drug abuse at home.

Judge Maxwell was appointed to the district court by former Gov. Haley Barbour in 2009 and re-elected in 2014. He practiced civil law in Jackson and worked as an assistant U.S. attorney in the northern district of Mississippi.

Gov. Phil Bryant announced his fourth budget cut to the current fiscal-year budget this afternoon. He will cut over $20 million from the state's budget, meaning a less than half percent cut for each state agency. He also pulled $39 million from the state's rainy day fund to plug budget holes, a letter to the state's fiscal officer Laura Jackson shows.

Gov. Bryant announced the news on his Facebook page today, shortly after the Joint Legislative Budget Committee met to adjust their revenue estimates, decreasing anticipated revenue projections for the upcoming budget year, which must be finalized by Saturday night and starts July 1.

Lt. Gov. Tate Reeves told reporters after the meeting that revenue estimate change will make the budgeting process "even more challenging." Lawmakers will have to cut $174.6 million from the already reduced legislative budget office's proposed budget for fiscal-year 2018.

The state now has $240 million in its rainy day fund, which the governor has drawn from three times already this year as well as cutting agency budgets to keep the state's budget balanced in spite of lagging revenues.

Ask questions, voice concerns, and share your opinions directly with the Mayor.

Hal White, half of the creative team behind Jackson institution Hal and Mal's, has died.

He was a staple of this city. Along with his brother, Malcolm, Hal opened Hal and Mal's on Congress Street 28 years ago. For all 28 of those years, he plugged away, turning the family-friendly restaurant into a Jackson landmark. It's a venue that has billed everything from B.B. King to Snoop Dogg, and served as a gathering place for Jacksonians of at least three generations.

Hal suffered a brain aneurysm over the weekend and endured three surgeries since at St. Dominic's. He spent his final days surrounded by loving friends and family.

He is survived by his wife Ann and their three wonderful children Brandi, Taylor and Erica.

The Jackson Free Press sends love and condolences to the White family and joins them in mourning.

Thank you for everything you've done for this city, Hal.

The city has made its picks to the 1-percent sales-tax commission.

City officials had requested an opinion from the Mississippi attorney general's office on whether members of the city council could sit on the commission. It's unclear whether than opinion has come back.

In any case, the city's picks include Yarber along with James Anderson, an attorney for the city of Jackson, and Dr. Charles Williams, interim director of the city's public works department. Jackson is advertising for a permanent public works director.

“Ninety percent of Jackson citizens decided on Jan. 14 they wanted better streets and an improved water and sewer system,” Yarber said in a press release. “We’re excited to put forth these appointments to the commission so citizens will finally have the opportunity to see their 1 percent sales tax go to work for them.”

The tax was expected to generate about $15 million a year for infrastructure upgrades, but a recent change in state law is likely to reduce that sum.

Update: According to Jackson Director of Communications Chris Mims, Babe's was seeking $300,000 in damages. He added that the actual payout is likely to be around $105,000, give or take a few thousand dollars.

A lawsuit City Attorney Pieter Teeuwissen called "the last lawsuit against the city from the Melton administration" has been decided in favor of Babes Showclub vs. the city of Jackson.

The adult entertainment venue is seeking damages for loss of revenue "in the hundreds of thousands." On Tuesday, the city council voted 5-2 to settle with the club, closing the door on the final civil lawsuit against the former administration.

The history:

The Jackson Police Department shut down Babe's Showclub, an adult entertainment venue in the 1100 block of West Street back in March of 2006 on the grounds the city had no record of Babe's adult entertainment renewal application.

Attorneys for Babes called the closure illegal, and local attorney Chris Ganner and Tampa, Fla., attorney Luke Lirot argued that the city had also squelched the owner's rights to appeal the closure.

Babes General Manager Bo Powell argued that his club had applied for its 2006 license in October 2005 and complained that the city's application process was "confusing." He also claimed that city officials, whether accidentally or intentionally, had misdirected his application efforts.

Powell re-applied for a temporary license, but the city said it couldn't legally give out temporary licenses, despite Babes' attorneys' protestations that a temporary license is the only kind Babes could get if the city didn't follow through with the licensing process on its end.

Powell testified that an employee filed an application with the city's sign and license division because no one was available in JPD to take the application. Two city employees in the sign and license division testified that they'd accepted a $200 license renewal fee and stamped the document as a receipt. City employee Yolanda Shaw said she told JPD that Babes had made the payment, though JPD license and permit officer Samuel Gardner claimed at the time he had no record of the application.

Gardner also said he'd told Babes two months later that they had no license registered, but Powell said he had no hint of the problem until police showed up to close his club down in March.

Live music and new releases...

According to NewsMax (ugh) our esteemed former lobbyist/former governor/current lobbyist Haley Barbour was on Fox News this weekend complaining that President Obama isn't paying enough attention to the debt.

The news exploded today that a Republican senatorial candidate in Missouri, Rep. Todd Akin, has declared that women can't get pregnant from "legitimate rapes." This idiot was defending his anti-abortion stance (including rape and incest, of course):

“It seems to me, first of all, what I understand from doctors is that’s really where—if it’s a legitimate rape, the female body has ways to try to shut that whole thing down.”

and:

“Let’s assume that maybe that didn’t work, or something,” Akin said. “I think there should be some punishment, but the punishment ought to be on the rapist and not attacking the child.”

Clearly, every woman who has ever gotten pregnant from a rape is lying about it being rape, according to this fool's logic.

Much has been made so far this year about the "war on women"—from Rush Limbaugh's horrendous attacks on Sandra Fluke to many Republicans supporting all sorts of anti-women regulation including outlawing in vitro and birth-control pills.

This latest affront to women—1 in 6 are sexually assaulted before age 18 as I was—is where we must say "ENOUGH"! We must demand that all of our elected officials disavow Akin's remarks. More importantly, we must demand pro-women and actual pro-family legislation from our elected officials, including right here in Mississippi. Women have the power to stop these attacks on us and our rights, if we only will.

This is too much, and it's time we decide what kind of nation we're going to be in the future. Speak up, women and men. An attack on one woman's rights and self-respect is an attack on us all.

In a unanimous and completely unsurprising move, the Mississippi Republican Central Committee rejected the federal Affordable Care Act, which Congress passed three years ago.

The state GOP said it was supporting the positions of the state's Three Tops--Gov. Phil Bryant, Lt. Gov. Tate Reeves and Speaker Philip Gunn--in resisting the implementation of the ACA as well as the expansion of Medicaid.

“Our party is unified and supports the prudent and careful approach advocated by the Governor, Lieutenant Governor and Speaker. At a time when we learn more every day about improper government intrusion into the lives of ordinary citizens, it defies logic to embrace an expansion of that intrusion,” MSGOP Chairman Joe Nosef said through a press release.

Of course, Obamacare is being implemented anyway. Last summer's U.S. Supreme Court decision assured that the ACA, including its controversial individual mandate provision, would be the law of the land even if it lets states opt out Medicaid expansions, which the architects of the law hoped would pay for a big chunk.

Nosef is right on one point, though: Mississippi Republicans have been unified in saying they reject Obamacare.

Emphasis on saying.

Most Mississippi state Republicans have stated their opposition to the federal health law, but there is evidence that the party's armor is starting to chink, most notably Sen. Billy Hudson, R-Hattiesburg's recent coming out in favor of expanding Medicaid.

Meanwhile, Republican congressmen are quietly soliciting Obamacare funds for a Rankin County health clinic.

There'll be more about that in tomorrow's paper.

Forget about making Mississippi healthier. Forget about the cost to taxpayers. The fight over Medicaid in Mississippi is turning into an all-out partisan turf war.

The latest salvo came yesterday, when Democratic Mississippi Attorney General Jim Hood issued an opinion stating that the governor cannot lawfully run the Medicaid program if the Legislature fails to reauthorize the program.

At odds over whether the state should expand Medicaid, lawmakers couldn't come to a consensus on renewing Medicaid before the legislative session ended this spring, leaving the future of the program up in the air.

Republican Gov. Phil Bryant, who opposes Medicaid expansion, has said that if Democrats, who support the expansion and have asked for legislative debate on the subject, continue standing in the way of Medicaid's reauthorization that he would run the program himself.

In recent weeks, legislative Republicans and the Mississippi Republican Party have blitzed the Internet and social media with anti-Obamacare messages ahead of the July 1 Medicaid deadline. The MS GOP has started an online petition against Obamacare while Speaker Philip Gunn, a Clinton Republican, has written op-eds for several local newspapers and blogs.

Hood's opinion this week relies on a similar opinion Hood issued in 2009, which states that "a governor cannot create or re-create a state agency that has been repealed by operation of law, nor can a governor divert funds which may be appropriated to a statutorily repealed agency to some other agency."

The response from Bryant's office was terse. Bryant's spokesman, Mick Bullock, responded to Hood in an email to the Associated Press: "That's all it is, his opinion."

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Two special concerts and new releases...

If there's something I feel like I've learned after years of watching the New Orleans Saints play football, it's that there really is such a thing as scoring their last points too soon.

The classic instance in their modern incarnation is the Saints-49ners NFC Championship game in 2012. In that game, quarterback Drew Brees threw a 66-yard touchdown to tight end Jimmy Graham that put the Saints into the lead with 1:37 left on the clock. The point after put the score at 32-29.

The ensuing 49er drive took 1:28, as Alex Smith moved the team methodically down the field against a porous Saints defense, with the final touchdown just seconds before the end of the game.

It was a painful loss for Saints fans who watched a second Super Bowl berth slip away in a scenario that's happened just a little too often in the Sean Payton era—the Saints scored too soon on their final drive.

I don't think you can fault Payton and his quarterbacks, whether Brees or now Luke McCown, for seeing a potential matchup and going for the jugular late in the game. That's how football is played.

But what I do feel like you can fault Payton for—and I hate to say this—is trusting that his awful defenses will be able to hold off the other team's final drive if you give the opponent any time at all.

This past Sunday, for instance, I submit that a little conservative play-calling might have won the day.

The Saints were poised to beat the Carolina Panthers late in the fourth quarter, after marching down the field in an unhurried three-minute offense led by the surprisingly unflappable McCown.

Faced with dropped passes by the usually reliable veteran receiver Marques Colston and a couple of hot grabs by slot receiver Brandin Cooks, that final 24-yard pass into the end zone to Cooks looked too good to pass up; and it was, for Carolina cornerback Josh Norman, who made a fantastic interception on a pretty good pass by McCown.

It's hindsight, yes. But clearly the pass shouldn't have been thrown.

With over a minute on the clock and with timeouts still available, the Saints had two downs to get 6 yards and at least three backs to think about using to get them. On the play that they ran for the interception, Mark Ingram was wide-open in the flat for at least 5 of those 6 yards—a quick throw to the back would might have netted a first down and, critically, an opportunity to bleed more clock. (Colston, as it turns out, was also wide-open over the middle and might have scored if thrown to.)

Crazy talk? Sure. And, of course, there's no guarantee that you score from the 15 or so yards out.

But I can't avoid asking the question... is it too much to ask an NFL coach to at least temper the desire to toss it into the end zone for the quick …

I was just at the Hinds County Circuit Clerk's doing research for a story , and a couple of employees were talking about a mini-plague of serpents in the basement office.

This week, employees have stumbled across five earth snakes in the file room, Circuit Clerk Barbara Dunn said. Earth snakes are nonvenomous and grow up to around 8 inches. Employees said they have been unable to ascertain how the asps are getting in the building.

The thing that really made my skin crawl, though, was being charged $1 per page to make copies. Mississippi has some of the nation's worst open-records laws, which makes a lot of documents public but lets government agencies charge whatever they want. What stung the most was that I had to make the copies myself, and still had to fork out $84 for a pretty skimpy stack of paper (pictured).

Where's Nick Fury when you need him?

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