Mississippi

City and county officials need to get issues resolved quickly – Mississippi's Best Community Newspaper

Published

4 weeks ago

May 13, 2024

Press Room

City and county officials need to get issues resolved quickly

Published 11:57 pm Sunday, May 12, 2024

The leaders of government in the city and the county have a lot of work to do, and constituents are ready for them to get to work and get it done.

Lives hang in the balance.

For many years, Adams County has contracted with the City of Natchez for fire protection services. For several years, the late Dan Dillard, who sat on the city’s board of aldermen until his death in March 2023, advocated for the city to ask for more money for those fire services. Dillard was a numbers guy, and he said the city was subsidizing fire protection for those who live in the county.

Some county supervisors think some fires should be rated differently than others, and the city should not receive as much money for responding to them. For instance, those supervisors say a grass fire or a car fire should not be rated differently in terms of cost to the county than a structure fire.

However, the city is still obligated to respond to and man those fires in the county. And we all know how quickly a car fire and a house fire could turn into something more.

At the same time, the original contract between the city and county called for the city to work side by side with the county’s volunteer firefighters. Fire Chief Robert Arrington said volunteers responding to fires in the county have fallen in number through the years.

Regardless, the voters of Natchez and Adams County have elected our mayor and aldermen and supervisors to do this work, and they need to come together and get a new contract agreed upon post haste.

At the same time, E-911 dispatchers have been stuck in a moldy, damp basement of the Adams County Jail while the county and city have been unable to come to agreement going forward about where dispatchers should be located and how much each should pay toward those services. That battle has been going on for at least two years.

And, that community swimming pool … we need not say more.

Enough!

Fire protection for the county and dispatch services for the city are areas the city and county have cooperated for a number of years and have worked well. It would behoove the county to continue fire service contracting with the city. Same for the city with dispatch. It would cost Adams County much more money annually to build county fire stations, hire full-time firefighters and install water towers and hydrant systems than to simply continue working with the city.

The city would need to purchase duplicate equipment and hire as many as 10 new employees to set up its own dispatch operation. And no doubt that would deteriorate the communication thus cooperation we enjoy right now between the sheriff’s office and the city’s police department.

This kind of prolonged stalemate adds much legitimacy to the call for combined city and county government. County and city leaders should be looking for more ways to work together and save taxpayers money, rather than protecting fiefdoms and costing taxpayers even more for duplicated services.

Perhaps all of the talk about how well the city and county is working together is just that — talk.

City and county officials, sit down at a table soon and get this resolved, please, for the sake of the people you were elected to serve.

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Mississippi

Miss Mississippi 2024: Two take awards during first night of preliminary competition

Published

6 hours ago

June 6, 2024

Press Room

Miss Mississippi 2024: Two take awards during first night of preliminary competition

The Miss Mississippi competition officially kicked off its 91-year anniversary Wednesday night, with two competitors taking home preliminary awards.

Contestants are split into three groups, with each group competing in one contest every night in preliminaries beginning at 7 p.m. Wednesday saw two preliminary awards handed out, one in talent and one in evening wear.

Preliminary rounds for the 2024 competition will continue through Friday, and Saturday night will be the finale with the crowning of a new Miss Mississippi at the Vicksburg Convention Center.

Miss Mississippi Wednesday night preliminary winners:

Evening wear: Miss Mississippi State — Morgan Nelson.
Talent: Miss Madison County — Gracie Bassett.

Miss Mississippi 2024 judges:

The Miss Mississippi Scholarship Organization also announced the judges for this year’s competition on Tuesday.

Katie Robertson — Miss Mississippi winner 1996.
Christopher Schram —Michigan
Patricia Cole — Virginia
Jonathan Black — Maryland
Brenda Baudo — Wisconsin

More on Miss Mississippi 2024 Miss Mississippi 2024: how to watch, preliminary competitions and events to attend

Grant McLaughlin covers state government for the Clarion Ledger. He can be reached at gmclaughlin@gannett.com or 972-571-2335.

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Mississippi

Mississippi Judge Affirms Settlement After 62-year-old Died in Police Encounter

Published

13 hours ago

June 6, 2024

Press Room

Mississippi Judge Affirms Settlement After 62-year-old Died in Police Encounter

JACKSON, Miss. (AP) — A judge has ordered the enforcement of a lawsuit settlement between Mississippi’s capital city and the family of a man who died after police officers pulled him from a car while searching for a murder suspect.

George Robinson, 62, died in January 2019, days after the encounter with three Jackson police officers. His relatives sued the city in October 2019, saying Robinson was not the subject of any warrant and alleging the officers “brutally, viciously and mercilessly beat Mr. Robinson by striking and kicking him.”

The Jackson City Council on April 23 unanimously approved the payment of $17,786 to settle the lawsuit with Robinson’s relatives, including his sister Bettersten Wade. City documents said the settlement was not an admission of liability by the city or the three officers named in the suit. Robinson was Black, as are the three officers.

But Wade’s attorney, Dennis Sweet III, released a letter April 24 saying the city violated a confidentiality agreement that was part of the settlement. Sweet said that because of the public disclosure and because the city “appears to claim or infer some sort of perceived victory,” Wade would continue suing the city.

In a ruling Friday, Circuit Judge Faye Peterson wrote that she found “no merit” in arguments made by Sweet. Peterson wrote that the plaintiffs and the city had entered a legally binding settlement.

“Moreover, the City of Jackson cannot legally choose to keep settlements confidential, and this fact does not amount to some abstract form of fraudulent misrepresentation,” Peterson wrote.

Robinson had been hospitalized for a stroke days before the police encounter and was on medication, Wade has said. He had a seizure hours after he was beaten, and he died two days later from bleeding on his brain.

Second-degree murder charges against two of the officers were dropped in the case. In August 2022, a Hinds County jury convicted former detective Anthony Fox of culpable negligence manslaughter. In January of this year, the Mississippi Court of Appeals overturned Fox’s conviction. A majority of the appeals court wrote that prosecutors failed to prove Fox “acted in a grossly negligent manner” or that Robinson’s death “was reasonably foreseeable under the circumstances.”

Wade is the mother of Dexter Wade, who was run over by an off-duty Jackson Police Department officer in March 2023.

Dexter Wade was buried at the Hinds County Pauper’s Cemetery. But it was October before his mother was told about the burial. His body was exhumed Nov. 13, and an independent autopsy was conducted. A wallet found in the pocket of his jeans contained his state identification card with his home address, credit card and a health insurance card, said civil rights attorney Ben Crump, who is representing Wade’s family.

On Nov. 20, Dexter Wade’s family held a funeral for him, and he was buried in another cemetery.

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