Jackson Free Press

The office of Secretary of State Delbert Hosemann's office has responded to a request by the JFP to clarify the legal status of a campaign for municipal office being incorporated as a non-profit organization.

In response to the question "Can a campaign set up as a unincorporated nonprofit corporation?" the SOS office responded "A nonprofit corporation can be incorporated for any lawful activity."

In regards to the second question "Can an incorporated non-profit organization serve as the fundraising arm of a municipal election campaign?" the state office answered "A corporation may perform any lawful activity. A contribution made by a corporation to a candidate, political party or committee is limited to $1,000 per calendar year."

At hand is the campaign of Jackson mayoral candidate Regina Quinn, which is set up as an incorporated non-profit organization. It's important to note that Quinn's campaign is the only one in the mayoral race set up in this way. But running for public office certainly falls under the category of "any lawful activity," so it appears Quinn's campaign is on solid legal ground.

Sources from other campaigns raised questions as to the legal status of a campaign being organized as a non-profit, and Regina's husband John May, Jr., who filed the paperwork to incorporate "Jackson United to Elect Regina Quinn Mayor" admitted to the JFP he had received conflicting responses on separate dates from the secretary of state's office as to whether it would be considered legal.

It is a confusing situation to all but political gurus, but the answers we received to these questions seem to back up the claims from May, who is also an attorney, that everything the campaign is doing is legitimate.

In an e-mail to the JFP Thursday afternoon, Quinn explained the campaign's decision to form as a non-profit.

"We set up our political committee as a nonprofit in light of the fact that we wanted to make it clear to our contributors that we are not seeking to profit from my running for Mayor." Quinn wrote. "Win or lose, we will donate any excess funds to charity. Also, our organization is permissible under state statute and within the guidelines of the Secretary of State's Office for political campaigns."

The Mississippi Insurance Department has arranged for insurance companies to use the Mississippi State Fairgrounds as damage inspection stations.

The campaign to elect Regina Quinn mayor of Jackson has sent over a copy of the campaign finance report it plans to file for 2012. You can read it here.

Quinn's biggest supporter is her husband John May Jr., who gave $25,966 over a six month period.

The report does not have the seal of Mississippi Secretary of State Delbert Hosemann, meaning the copy we received had not been filed when it was scanned and sent to us, but this is the first glimpse into the finances of the Quinn campaign to date.

As we noted in Tuesday's story on campaign finance reform, mayoral candidate Regina Quinn did not file a campaign finance report by the Jan. 31, 2013 deadline. This means one of two things -- either she is either in violation of Mississippi sunshine laws regarding campaign finance transparency, or she didn't raise or spend over $200 in 2012 on her campaign.

This morning, another campaign told the JFP that a non-profit organization was founded under the name "Jackson United" to Elect Regina Quinn, Mayor. It was incorporated on June 18, 2012.

This afternoon, we discovered the incorporation document that shows that the non-profit was formed by Jackson attorney John Richard May, Jr. for the purposes of "Political Advocacy and Public Education."

Mississippi code prohibits incorporated committees and associations and incorporated companies and corporations from contributing more than $1,000 per year, directly or indirectly, to a candidate or the candidate's committee. They are also prohibited from contributing more than $1,000 annually to any political party.

The penalty for such action is a fine no less than $1,000 or more than $5,000 against the corporation.

It is unclear what, if any, contributions the non-profit organization has made at this time. May could not be reached for comment Tuesday afternoon.

A link to a copy of the filing for incorporation for "Jackson United" follows below.

Jackson United's incorporation documentation

Update: After a Tuesday afternoon request from the JFP for clarification on the law pertaining to incorporated entities and political campaigns, the office of Secretary of State Delbert Hosemann has attorneys looking into the legality of a campaign being set up as a non-profit organization. As of 3:45 p.m. Wednesday afternoon, there was still no consensus. Stay tuned for more updates.

Johnny Lee Butts went out for his regular morning walk on July 22, 2012 and never came home. That morning, a car struck and killed Butts; later police arrested a couple of teenagers for the crime.

In a recent report, CNN shed new light on what happened that morning . According to statements by two of the passengers-- a teenager and a man named Tony Hopper Jr.-- the passengers and unnamed driver of the car spotted a man walking. Here's an exchange from the grand jury indictment, according to CNN:

We see a walker on the side of the road. The complete left side of the road while we are on the complete right side of the road," the unidentified teen told a police lieutenant. "And I pointed out to say, 'watch out there is a walker there...'" The unnamed teen continued his story: "Whit slightly turns the steering wheel and I saw him. 'Watch out, don't do nothing stupid' and then he just keep turning the steering wheel and eventually before we knew it he ran him straight over." "He didn't slow down," Hopper said in a statement to a deputy sheriff. The deputy asked: "He never hit his brakes?" Hopper replied: "No sir." "Do you think he hit him on purpose?" asked the deputy. "Yes, sir, I do," said Hopper.

The driver is white; Butts was African American. However, the Panola County District Attorney John Champion (he is also the DA for DeSoto County) opted to not seek hate crime charges in the case.

Donny Butts, the victims brother wants to know why. He told CNN "That's the only reason they ran him over because he was black. Point blank."

The Butts family is considering filing a wrongful death suit, which may be the only way for the full truth to come out.

Several stories about Mississippi's former forensic pathologist Dr. Steven Hayne have cropped up lately in the national media.

Attorney General Jim Hood reminds Mississippians that all claims applications covered by the National Mortgage Settlement are due January 18, 2013.

For our Question o' the Week this week, we asked a simple question in social media. We got an amazing line-up of answers in 24 hours. Please feel free to log in and post your answers below as well.

Lindsey Lee My kids. So cheesy, but true...

Jason Stanfield Great music.

Stephanie Fondren Bracey My beautiful 8-year-old daughter who has the happiest most innocent spirit and a heart of gold!

Iam ScrapDirty Perfection.

Charles Walter Jett Other people's artwork. Makes me step up my game when I see really good work.

H Charles Johnson Failure.

Marc Rolph H Charles Johnson.

Narada Thijs Snyder Not being told to hurry.

John Agwazim The way ants live.

Shuntina Johnson Sunsets, right before the rain.

Nicki Findley Nichols The feeling of freedom, whether its being silly with my 4-year-old or country road riding with the windows down and the music cranked.

Jarrod Parker Conquistadors.

Jessica Erin Eubanks The positive energy of others expressing themselves!

Terena Watkins Bell Being able to be an awesome single mom to my girls & showing them how to be strong, independent Christians.

Micah Smith Posters with animals that say motivational statements. Thank you, tiny cocker spaniel. I will "go for it."

Lisa Parenteau My mother. The strongest person I know.

Yasmeen Banu Sincere kindness.

Pam Greer What inspires me? I'm inspired each day that I am allowed to wake up in good health and right mind by God to tackle life. Most people do not live to see another day; however, I did today.

Gregory Smith Frank Zappa.

Tony Davenport People who celebrate unity.

Brandon Ainsworth Life, and the endless possibilities that it has to offer. So much to do, so little time.

Brittany Hammons Simmons Nature's beauty! I breathe it in and it is so serene.

Tom Head Finding human dignity in unexpected places.

Laurel Isbister Irby People who rescue animals and help them live new lives.

Andrew Forbes ·The cancer patients I work with at Batson Children's hospital.

Jarrod Parker · Curious people.

Jill Conner Browne People doing good for goodness' sake—for people (and/or animals!) who can't "repay" the kindness.

Kass Welchlin When my elders live a life full of conviction, follow their dreams and not give up on life.

Nola Kay Pearson Gibson All of the above and lifelong learning.

Karole Sessums The Courage of Others.

Melissa Kelly Deadlines.

Ginger Williams-Cook Teachers.

Sabir Abdul-Haqq Dedication

Olga Lynette Henderson Hanson Seeing, listening, existing--all inspire me to continue trying, caring, doing.

Edward Peter Cole II To witness ... random acts of kindness!

Jehrod Alain What inspires me is the spiritual, that which is beyond our physical limitations. My dreams inspire me. Love inspires me.

Rachel Jarman Myers The Sonic Boom!

Don Allan Mitchell Mississippi.

Jan Michaels · My almost 83-year-old father who still runs his own business and is caretaker of his wife …

The website Remapping Debate has posted a story titled "Brother, Can you Spare $829 Billion?" On it, your can see just how much the top public corporations are hoarding ... er, holding.

So how much pump-priming could America’s largest corporations achieve if they were to dig into their cash and cash equivalents as well as their short-term investments? Remapping Debate examined the relevant quarterly Securities and Exchange Commission filings of the 100 largest corporations by revenue as ranked by the Fortune 500 in 2012 (looking only at publicly-held corporations, and excluding those in the financial sector). We looked at filing data for the period closest to June 30th in 2012, 2006, and 2000.

...each of three numbers calculated as a percentage of total assets for each of the three years: cash and cash equivalents (CCE) separately, short-term investments separately, and CCE and short-term investments combined (for 10 companies in 2000, comparable data were not available).

It turns out that more than 70 percent of the corporations listed in both 2012 and 2000 showed an increase over time in CCE and short-term investments combined as a percentage of total assets, including 15 corporations where the percentage point increase was 10 points or more.

Kind of makes me wonder how much faster the economy could recover if some of those companies would put some of their resources into hiring -- and creating additional consumers for their goods. Hmmm... What do you think?

File this under the finally, about time file.

Augusta National Golf Club announced today that the club will welcome its first two female members when the club opens for its new season in October. For years, the home of The Masters has resisted allowing women to join the private all-male golf club.

Former Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice and South Carolina financier Darla Moore have accepted to join the club and will be the first female members to don a green jacket in the club’s history. This move has been coming since 2002.

Martha Burk of the National Council of Women's Organizations wanted the club to add women members in 2002 and lead a small boycott of the 2003 Masters tournament. Former club chairman Hootie Johnson, chairman during Burk’s protest, dug his heels in once saying Augusta National might one day have a woman in a green jacket, "but not at the point of a bayonet."

The Masters lost television sponsorship for two years and the club paid CBS to broadcast the tournament commercial free for those two years. Johnson retired in 2006 and Billy Payne has been more open to allowing women than his predecessor.

"These accomplished women share our passion for the game of golf and both are well known and respected by our membership," Payne said in a statement. "It will be a proud moment when we present Condoleezza and Darla their green jackets when the club opens this fall. This is a significant and positive time in our club's history and, on behalf of our membership, I wanted to take this opportunity to welcome them and all of our new members into the Augusta National family."

In the ESPN article linked above, it states from private sources that women have been considered for membership five years ago. It is about time, Augusta National added women members and hopefully these two women will not be the only female members added.

So tonight I got a text that WAPT had done my story from a couple weeks ago about Robert Henderson, the pardoned felon who is now working for Council President (and mayoral candidate) Frank Bluntson. But when I watched the report, I realized that WAPT actually completely cribbed my enterprise reporting, including the pardon and other details, with no attribution to me or anyone else. Not to mention, they talked about "some taxpayers" supposedly being upset about it without actually talking to any of them.

Then, they have District Attorney Robert S. Smith on camera at the end saying that everyone deserves a second chance, including Henderson. Let's just say this is a very different story than the DA told me a few years back when speaking about Mr. Henderson.

But back to WAPT: This piece was shoddy journalism at its worst. I expect better out of y'all and, at the least, credit where it's due.

The JFP got more great news Friday night when we learned that we are winning two first-place and one second-place award from the Society of Professional Journalists' southeastern division. Valerie Wells takes first place for feature writing, the Personhood team (this time, including R.L. Nave and Adam Lynch) takes second place for public service, and I won first place for serious commentary. Here is the full press release. Cheers to the team, congratulations to all the winners. We're honored to be in your company:

At a noon press conference at Mississippi Republican headquarters, the state party took the sheet off its newest additions: Seven county-level officials who were elected as Democrats officially joined the Republican Party. According to the Mississippi GOP, those officials include:

Yesterday was a very good day for the JFP staff, and especially our writers and designers.