Mississippi Today
Mississippi lawmakers to study tax cuts with committees, summit
The two presiding officers of the Mississippi Legislature have formed special committees to further their goals of providing additional tax cuts during the 2025 legislative session.
On Tuesday, House Speaker Jason White, who earlier this year formed a special tax cut study committee, announced a day-long policy summit on tax cuts for Sept. 24. Also on Tuesday, Lt. Gov. Delbert Hosemann, who presides over the Senate, announced he has formed a special committee to study the state’s fiscal policy.
The committee will be led by the chairs of the Senate’s two money committees, Senate Appropriations Chairman Briggs Hopson and Finance Chairman Josh Harkins.
“Our ultimate goal is always to lower the tax burden and ensure taxpayer dollars stay in taxpayer pockets,” Hosemann said in a news release. “This requires Appropriations and Finance leadership to be at the table looking at all income and expenses to ensure we are being as efficient as possible while fully funding necessary services.”
Both Gov. Tate Reeve and White have advocated eliminating the state’s income tax, which accounts for about 30% of the state general fund revenue, while White also has spoken of reducing the state’s grocery tax.
Hosemann has voiced support for at least reducing the 7% grocery tax, which is the highest statewide tax on food in the nation.
Hosemann has said that ensuring the fiscal integrity of the state should not be ignored when looking at tax cuts.
The income tax generates about $2 billion a year while it has been estimated, based on a 2019 study, that the grocery tax generates about $325 million a year. But the grocery tax would generate much more now than in 2019 because of the significant increase in grocery prices. Since the 7% sales tax is imposed on the cost of groceries, state Economist Corey Miller has said that inflation has provided significantly more revenue from the grocery tax in recent years for the state.
In 2022, the Legislature passed and Reeves signed into law a $525 million income tax cut that is currently being enacted. When fully enacted in 2026, income in Mississippi will be taxed at a rate of 4%.
In addition, a business tax cut enacted in 2016 is still being phased in — $42 million annually through 2029 before fully enacted.
The clamor for additional tax cuts has been intensified in large part because of the unprecedented growth in revenue collections in recent years. Most states have experienced similar growth thanks primarily to the large influx of federal funds provided to states primarily to deal with the COVID-19 pandemic. In addition, revenue growth has been aided by Mississippi being so heavily reliant on the sales tax for its revenue. As prices of retail items have increased during the inflationary period, that has resulted in the 7% sales tax being levied on more expensive items generating more revenue for the state.
Still, during the past year, revenue collections have been slowing. For the past fiscal year, which ended June 30, the state collected only $18.4 million or .24% more than was collected the previous year.
And if not for collecting $68.7 million or 84.4% more in interest earnings than the previous fiscal year, the state would have been in the rare situation of collecting less revenue than the previous year for only the sixth time since 1970. Higher interest rates have spurred the increased earnings on the unprecedented surplus funds the state currently has.
Multiple speakers are scheduled for White’s tax summit at the Sheraton Refuge in Flowood, including Gov. Reeves, legislative leaders, other state officials and legislators from Arkansas who have worked on tax cuts in the neighboring state. National tax cut proponent Grover Norquest also is scheduled to speak.
“It is exciting to be assembling this policy summit that will be free to the public to encourage engagement from all interested parties so lawmakers, tax experts, and any Mississippian can partake in robust conversation that will lead to a better, brighter Mississippi,” White said in a news release.
Other members of the Hosemann study group include Sens. Andy Berry, Bradford Blackmon, Rod Hickman, Chris Johnson, Dean Kirby, John Polk, Derrick Simmons and Daniel Sparks.
This article first appeared on Mississippi Today and is republished here under a Creative Commons license.
Mississippi Today
On this day in 1946
Dec. 23, 1946
University of Tennessee refused to play a basketball game with Duquesne University, because they had a Black player, Chuck Cooper. Despite their refusal, the all-American player and U.S. Navy veteran went on to become the first Black player to participate in a college basketball game south of the Mason-Dixon line. Cooper became the first Black player ever drafted in the NBA — drafted by the Boston Celtics. He went on to be admitted to the Basketball Hall of Fame.
This article first appeared on Mississippi Today and is republished here under a Creative Commons license.
Mississippi Today
Podcast: Ray Higgins: PERS needs both extra cash and benefit changes for future employees
Mississippi Today’s Bobby Harrison talks with Ray Higgins, executive director of the Mississippi Public Employees Retirement System, about proposed changes in pension benefits for future employees and what is needed to protect the system for current employees and retirees. Higgins also stresses the importance of the massive system to the Mississippi economy.
READ MORE: As lawmakers look to cut taxes, Mississippi mayors and county leaders outline infrastructure needs
This article first appeared on Mississippi Today and is republished here under a Creative Commons license.
Mississippi Today
‘Bringing mental health into the spaces where moms already are’: UMMC program takes off
A program aimed at increasing access to mental health services for mothers has taken off at the University of Mississippi Medical Center.
The program, called CHAMP4Moms, is an extension of an existing program called CHAMP – which stands for Child Access to Mental Health and Psychiatry. The goal is to make it easier for moms to reach mental health resources during a phase when some may need it the most and have the least time.
CHAMP4Moms offers a direct phone line that health providers can call if they are caring for a pregnant woman or new mother they believe may have unaddressed mental health issues. On the line, health providers can speak directly to a reproductive psychiatrist who can guide them on how to screen, diagnose and treat mothers. That means that moms don’t have to go out of their way to find a psychiatrist, and health care providers who don’t have extensive training in psychiatry can still help these women.
“Basically, we’re trying to bring mental health into the spaces where moms already are,” explained Calandrea Taylor, the program manager. “Because of the low workforce that we have in the state, it’s a lot to try to fill the state with mental health providers. But what we do is bring the mental health practice to you and where mothers are. And we’re hoping that that reduces stigma.”
Launched in 2023, the program has had a slow lift off, Taylor said. But the phone line is up and running, as the team continues to make additions to the program – including a website with resources that Taylor expects will go live next year.
To fill the role of medical director, UMMC brought in a California-based reproductive psychiatrist, Dr. Emily Dossett. Dossett, who grew up in Mississippi and still has family in the state, says it has been rewarding to come full circle and serve her home state – which suffers a dearth of mental health providers and has no reproductive psychiatrists.
“I love it. It’s really satisfying to take the experience I’ve been able to pull together over the past 20 years practicing medicine and then apply it to a place I love,” Dossett said. “I feel like I understand the people I work with, I relate to them, I like hearing where they’re from and being able to picture it … That piece of it has really been very much a joy.”
As medical director, Dossett is able to educate maternal health providers on mental health issues. But she’s also an affiliate professor at UMMC, which she says allows her to train up the next generation of psychiatrists on the importance of maternal and reproductive psychiatry – an often-overlooked aspect in the field.
If people think of reproductive mental health at all, they likely think of postpartum depression, Dossett said. But reproductive psychiatry is far more encompassing than just the postpartum time period – and includes many more conditions than just depression.
“Most reproductive psychiatrists work with pregnant and postpartum people, but there’s also work to be done around people who have issues connected to their menstrual cycle or perimenopause,” she explained. “… There’s depression, certainly. But we actually see more anxiety, which comes in lots of different forms – it can be panic disorder, general anxiety, OCD.”
Tackling mental health in this population doesn’t just improve people’s quality of life. It can be lifesaving – and has the potential to mitigate some of the state’s worst health metrics.
Mental health disorders are the leading cause of pregnancy-related death, which is defined by the Centers for Disease Control as any death up to a year postpartum that is caused by or worsened by pregnancy.
In Mississippi, 80% of pregnancy-related deaths between 2016 and 2020 were deemed preventable, according to the latest Mississippi Maternal Mortality Report.
Mississippi is not alone in this, Dossett said. Historically, mental health has not been taken seriously in the western world, for a number of reasons – including stigma and a somewhat arbitrary division between mind and body, Dossett explained.
“You see commercials on TV of happy pregnant ladies. You see magazines of celebrities and their baby bumps, and everybody is super happy. And so, if you don’t feel that way, there’s this tremendous amount of shame … But another part of it is medicine and the way that our health system is set up, it’s just classically divided between physical and mental health.”
Dossett encourages women to tell their doctor about any challenges they’re facing – even if they seem normal.
“There are a lot of people who have significant symptoms, but they think it’s normal,” Dossett said. “They don’t know that there’s a difference between the sort of normal adjustment that people have after having a baby – and it is a huge adjustment – and symptoms that get in the way of their ability to connect or bond with the baby, or their ability to eat or sleep, or take care of their other children or eventually go to work.”
She also encourages health care providers to develop a basic understanding of mental health issues and to ask patients questions about their mood, thoughts and feelings.
CHAMP4Moms is a resource Dossett hopes providers will take advantage of – but she also hopes they will shape and inform the program in its inaugural year.
“We’re available, we’re open for calls, we’re open for feedback and suggestions, we’re open for collaboration,” she said. “We want this to be something that can hopefully really move the needle on perinatal mental health and substance use in the state – and I think it can.”
Providers can call the CHAMP main line at 601-984-2080 for resources and referral options throughout the state.
This article first appeared on Mississippi Today and is republished here under a Creative Commons license.
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