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A USM student spoke out about a candidate for provost. Then they got an email from one of the school’s biggest donors.

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A USM student spoke out about a candidate for provost. Then they got an email from one of the school’s biggest donors.

by Molly Minta, Mississippi Today
April 18, 2023

The unsolicited email arrived in Emily Goldsmith’s inbox shortly before 6 p.m. on April 12 with a subject line that was short and to-the-point: “provost protest.” 

Goldsmith, a graduate student at the University of Southern Mississippi, had recently been critical in the student newspaper about a growing controversy on campus: One of the finalists for provost — an administrator and finance professor named Lance Nail — had a checkered past at a former employer, Texas Tech University. A Title IX investigation found Nail reportedly mishandled a report of sexual misconduct and “failed in his responsibility as the Dean of the College.”

The news touched a nerve on campus where students had called on the university to adopt a zero-tolerance policy toward sexual assault a year and a half ago. More than 750 students, faculty and alumni signed a petition protesting Nail’s possible hiring. Goldsmith, whose pronouns are they/them, just so happened to be the only student quoted in the student newspaper. Still, they knew they were speaking for many when they said that hiring Nail “would communicate that all the university’s claims about diversity, inclusion, and equity were meaningless platitudes.” And, they began helping to plan a protest.

Days later, the email came through.

“You do not know me but my name is Chuck Scianna and I am the guy that Scianna Hall is named after,” it began.

Chuck Scianna, a USM alumnus and founder of an oil drilling equipment company, addresses the Institutions of Higher Learning Board of Trustees on Oct. 3, 2022.

Goldsmith knew of Scianna. The 93,000-foot building that bears his name in gleaming gold font faces U.S. Highway 49, a major thoroughfare in Hattiesburg. Scianna, an alumnus and co-founder of a major distributor of oil pipeline products, also happens to be one of USM’s largest individual donors along with his wife, Rita, having given more than $10 million. He is also “lifelong friends” with USM’s new president, Joe Paul.

But Goldsmith didn’t know why Scianna cared about their protest.

In the email obtained by Mississippi Today, Scianna wrote that he knew Goldsmith was planning to protest but asked them to consider that USM had hired a search firm, created a search committee and instituted a “process” to vet the candidates for provost and still, Nail had become a finalist.

“If you are going to protest the interviewing of Dr. Nail, should you not protest Dr. Paul and the search committee, the search firm and everyone else involved in the selection process,” Scianna wrote. “Should we just turn the university over to you and your group to hire the provost and run the university?”

In his 48 years of business, Scianna wrote, he had been accused of “many things that were not even close to the truth.” He suggested there was more behind the news articles about Nail, who he noted he had worked with “in the past.”

“I am not advocating that you should not have a voice, but it should be peaceful and armed with the facts, not just a google search,” he wrote, adding “I believe that if you have a conversation with him before you rely only on a google search you might have a different opinion.”

“You are completing a PhD,” he concluded. “Don’t you have to have an open mind to get the best out of an education? Does your program allow you to get all of your research facts from one source? I am only asking that you go into this with an unbiased opinion of Dr. Nail and let the process pick the best candidate.”

USM did not return a comment by press time, but Scianna’s email offers a look at how university donors in Mississippi, who have extraordinary access to powerful administrators, view the role of community feedback in the largely confidential search-and-selection process of key university hires. It also speaks to whose voices get results from university administration.

Goldsmith felt shaken and intimidated by Scianna’s email. 

“I do think it’s troublesome to discount the students who are saying they have feelings about this,” Goldsmith said. “This is their campus. Even if we’re going to say ‘majority rules,’ nobody has made a petition to say that we should hire Lance Nail, so it’s not like there’s this loud opposite voice.”

Goldsmith didn’t reply to Scianna and forwarded the email to their dissertation advisor — their immediate superior — who then sent it up the chain. Scianna’s email soon started circulating among faculty before it ultimately made its way to Chris Winstead, the dean of the College of Arts and Sciences.

Troubled by the message, Winstead texted and called Paul about it, according to another email shared with Mississippi Today.

“I do think that there is a power dynamic at play,” Goldsmith said. “Perhaps it would not have been unusual if I had had prior overlap (with Scianna) or conversations or a personal connection or even perhaps if I was in the College of Business.”

Scianna told Mississippi Today that he was just trying to offer Goldsmith some advice — not telling them not to protest. “Read the email. It’s very clear. There’s no threat,” he said.

“The higher up you get in any organization, you’re more susceptible to people finding fault with what you do, finding fault with your decisions and then the narrative gets misconstrued — a lot of times by the media, to be honest, because they don’t go out and get all the facts or look at both sides,” he said.

The controversy started earlier this month after USM announced that Nail was one of four finalists for provost, the university’s chief academic officer. Students at USM promptly dug into his history — and had concerns about what they found.

Nail became dean of Texas Tech’s business college in 2012, after spending four years at USM’s College of Business. In 2015, Nail let go of a business school professor, reportedly a friend of his, who had been accused of sexual misconduct, according to KCBD. But the Title IX investigation, which Nail said had “inaccuracies,” found that he still invited the former business professor to a university trip to Chile, where the professor harassed a female student.

Later that year, Nail resigned from Texas Tech after the university determined he had broken its grading policies.

Nail, who was visiting the USM Gulf Park campus on Monday, didn’t return an inquiry from Mississippi Today before press time. In a comment to SM2, the student newspaper, Nail wrote that “the many Southern Miss colleagues I worked with” could attest to his character, particularly his former students and “those who served on the Business Advisory Council who supported my mission to graduate ethical business leaders from Southern Miss.”

Scianna told Mississippi Today that he is one of those colleagues who served on USM’s Business Advisory Council, which advises the dean of the business college. He said he worked closely with Nail, reviewing the college’s curriculum to see how it “would be beneficial to my company” and recruiting students for internships or non-profit projects that he declined to share more details about.

But perhaps the biggest project Scianna and Nail collaborated on was the construction of Scianna Hall, a more than $30-million project. At the time, Scianna’s $6-million donation was the USM Foundation’s largest one-time gift from an alumnus.

As dean, Nail had a key hand in stewarding the campaign to build the business school. He lists the project as one of his significant professional accomplishments on the first page of his resume.

“He didn’t just walk in one day and say ‘Will you write a check?’” Scianna said.

After Nail left USM, Scianna said the two stayed “acquaintances.” He said he didn’t recommend Nail for the position or express a preference for Nail to anyone on the search committee.

“I’m not impartial,” he said. “I want the very best candidate, but I want the process to work out. My email to Emily has nothing to do with Lance Nail. It’s with the way that it’s being approached. … Don’t make your decision based on Google searches.”

Scianna has served on search committees for key hirings at USM before, most recently last year when he was on the committee convened by the Institutions of Higher Learning Board of Trustees to select the university’s next president. When it comes to the hiring process, he said that unlike the majority of students, faculty and alumni, the search committee has access “to all the facts.”

“Shouldn’t their decision weigh more?” he said. “I mean, we don’t like chocolate ice cream. Let’s have a protest. Should we ban chocolate ice cream? Should we have the facts? And that’s all I’m saying.”

He said he wasn’t sure what a protest — no matter how large — could accomplish when the university ultimately makes a hiring decision based on the help of the search committee and the headhunting firm.

“What if a thousand people got together and said your newspaper was dishonest, didn’t report the truth?” he said. “Should there be an investigation? You know, I don’t know. That’s, that’s, I’m just not smart enough, I guess, to figure that out.”

USM’s provost 13-person search committee does include two student voices — the SGA presidents of the Hattiesburg and Gulf Park campuses — but Goldsmith said the process should be more transparent so that all students can be heard. They suggested the university share the steps that were taken to vet Nail before he became a finalist.

And while they don’t plan to ask Nail any questions when he visits campus Tuesday, they will attend the protest they helped organize in USM’s designated free speech zone in the middle of campus.

“I do think generally that undergrad and graduate students should be made more aware of administrative hiring,” they said. “There isn’t always a ton of transparency in higher education. Sometimes students don’t even know to look at this stuff … but I have learned through this process that many undergrad students do care. They’re not thoughtless, they’re not uninvolved. They are thinking, they are thoughtful, they are involved.”

Scianna, who is back in his office in Waller, Texas, after visiting Hattiesburg this weekend, doesn’t plan to see the protest for himself because his philanthropy shows his dedication to USM.

“I don’t have to be part of this,” he said. “They can do what they want to do. I mean, talk, beat your drum, do whatever. But let your actions speak for yourself.” 

This article first appeared on Mississippi Today and is republished here under a Creative Commons license.

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Mississippi Stories: Michael May of Lazy Acres

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11 hours ago

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January 21, 2025

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mississippitoday.org – rlake – 2025-01-21 14:51:00

In this episode of Mississippi Stories, Mississippi Today Editor-at-Large Marshall Ramsey takes a trip to Lazy Acres. In 1980, Lazy Acres Christmas tree farm was founded in Chunky, Mississippi by Raburn and Shirley May. Twenty-one years later, Michael and Cathy May purchased Lazy Acres. Today, the farm has grown into a multi seasonal business offering a Bunny Patch at Easter, Pumpkin Patch in the fall, Christmas trees and an spectacular Christmas light show.  It’s also a masterclass in family business entrepreneurship and agricultural tourism.

For more videos, subscribe to Mississippi Today’s YouTube channel.

This article first appeared on Mississippi Today and is republished here under a Creative Commons license.

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Mississippi Today

On this day in 1921

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19 hours ago

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January 21, 2025

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mississippitoday.org – Jerry Mitchell – 2025-01-21 07:00:00

Jan. 21, 1921

George Washington Carver Credit: Wikipedia

George Washington Carver became one of the first Black experts to testify before Congress. 

His unlikely road to Washington began after his birth in Missouri, just before the Civil War ended. When he was a week old, he and his mother and his sister were kidnapped by night raiders. The slaveholder hired a man to track them down, but the only one the man could locate was George, and the slaveholder exchanged a race horse for George’s safe return. George and his brother were raised by the slaveholder and his wife. 

The couple taught them to read and write. George wound up attending a school for Black children 10 miles away and later tried to attend Highland University in Kansas, only to get turned away because of the color of his skin. Then he attended Simpson College in Indianola, Iowa, before becoming the first Black student at what is now Iowa State University, where he received a Master’s of Science degree and became the first Black faculty member. 

Booker T. Washington then invited Carver to head the Tuskegee Institute’s Agriculture Department, where he found new uses for peanuts, sweet potatoes, soybeans and other crops. 

In the past, segregation would have barred Carver’s testimony before Congress, but white peanut farmers, desperate to convince lawmakers about the need for a tariff on peanuts because of cheap Chinese imports, believed Carver could captivate them — and captivate he did, detailing how the nut could be transformed into candy, milk, livestock feed, even ink. 

“I have just begun with the peanut,” he told lawmakers. 

Impressed, they passed the Fordney-McCumber Tariff of 1922. 

In addition to this work, Carver promoted racial harmony. From 1923 to 1933, he traveled to white Southern colleges for the Commission on Interracial Cooperation. Time magazine referred to him as a “Black Leonardo,” and he died in 1943. 

That same year, the George Washington Carver Monument complex, the first national park honoring a Black American, was founded in Joplin, Missouri.

This article first appeared on Mississippi Today and is republished here under a Creative Commons license.

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Legislative recap: 2025 tax cut battle has been joined

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2 days ago

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January 20, 2025

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mississippitoday.org – Geoff Pender – 2025-01-20 12:00:00

After relatively brief debate and questioning given its magnitude, the state House passed the first meaningful legislation of the new session: House Bill 1, a measure that would eliminate the state income tax, trim taxes on non-prepared food and raise sales and gasoline taxes.

It would mark a sea change in state tax structure, a shift from income to consumption taxation.

“We are at a place where we can finally tell the hard-working people of Mississippi we can eliminate the tax on work,” House Ways and Means Chairman Trey Lamar, HB1’s author, told his colleagues.

The measure passed the House 88-24. It gained some Democratic support in the supermajority Republican House, with nine Democrats voting in favor, 24 against and 12 voting present.

The proposal garnered some bipartisan support because it includes at least a couple of items Democratic lawmakers have championed in the past: A gasoline tax to help fix crumbling roadways, and a reduction in the “grocery” tax, or the sales tax levied on unprepared food, of which Mississippi has the highest overall rate in the nation.

It still met with some Democratic opposition in part because it is a sea change toward more “regressive” taxation. Proponents say this is just, people should pay more for state services they use, such as roadways, and for things they buy as opposed to taxing income. Opponents say this places a proportionately higher tax burden on people of modest means.

“I would say the people hurt the most with this would be working people who have to put gas in their car to go to work or those who have to purchase materials to do a job,” House Democratic Leader Robert Johnson said.

Beyond that concern, opponents or skeptics worry that the foundation of the proposed tax overhaul would be built on shifting sands — a state economy that has been so rosy primarily from the federal government dumping billions of dollars in pandemic spending into Mississippi. With the federal spigot being cut off, some worry, the state economy could slump, and the massive tax cuts in this new plan could provide a state budget crisis, of which Mississippi has much experience, and underfunding of crucial services such as schools, roads, health care and law enforcement.

The largest hurdle Republican House leaders face in seeing their tax plan through to law is not in garnering bipartisan support. It’s internecine disagreement with the Senate Republican leadership, which still appears to harbor abovementioned concerns about overhauling tax structure in uncertain economic times and betting on growth to cover massive tax cuts.

Senate leaders have said they want to enact more tax cuts, but their plan has not yet been released. Lt. Gov. Delbert Hosemann has provided some details of what he wants to see, but it would appear he wants a more cautious approach on cuts. He has not publicly opined on the tax increases in the House plan.

Quote of the Week

“Have you ever worn a belt and suspenders, lady? It’s a belt and suspenders approach.” — Rep. Trey Lamar, R-Senatobia, to Rep. Omeria Scott, D-Laurel, during floor debate on Lamar’s bill to eliminate the state income tax and raise other taxes.

“No. I have not worn a belt and suspenders. I don’t know anyone who has worn a belt and suspenders,” Scott replied.

In Brief

House will renew push to legalize mobile sports betting

House Gaming Committee Chairman Casey Eure, R-Saucier, told Mississippi Today he plans on taking another crack at legalizing mobile sports betting in the state. In 2024, the House and Senate passed versions of legislation to permit online sports betting, but never agreed on a final proposal. Some lawmakers raised concerns that gambling platforms would have no incentive to partner with smaller casinos, and most of the money would instead flow to the Mississippi Gulf Coast’s already bustling casinos. Proponents say legalization would undercut the influence of illicit offshore sports betting platforms.

“I’ve been working on this bill for many years and I’m just trying to satisfy any concerns that the Senate may have so we can pass this and start collecting the tax dollars that the state deserves and not allowing everyone to place bets with these offshore accounts,” Eure said. “I feel like the state is losing between $40-$80 million a year in tax revenue.”

Sports wagering has been permitted in the state for years, but online betting has remained illegal amid fears the move could harm the bottom line of the state’s brick-and-mortar casinos. Mobile sports betting is legal in 30 states and Washington, D.C.,  according to the American Gaming Association. — Michael Goldberg

Hosemann makes Senate committee chair changes

Republican Lt. Gov. Delbert Hosemann last week named new chairmen of committees, after former state Sen. Jenifer Branning was sworn into office as a new justice on the Mississippi Supreme Court. 

Sen. Chuck Younger, a Republican from Columbus, previously led the Senate Agriculture Committee and will replace Branning as chairman of the Transportation Committee. Sen. Neil Whaley, a Republican from Potts Camp, previously led the Senate Wildlife, Fisheries and Parks Committee, but will now lead the Senate Agriculture Committee. 

Here are the other changes to Senate committees: 

Sen. Ben Suber, a Republican from Bruce, will be the new chairman of the Senate Wildlife, Fisheries and Parks Committee 

Sen. Bart Williams, a Republican from Starkville, is the new chairman of the Senate Public Property Committee

Sen. Scott DeLano, a Republican from Gulfport, will lead the Senate Technology Committee 

Sen. Robin Robinson, a Republican from Laurel, will chair the Senate Labor Committee 

Sen. Angela Turner Ford, a Democrat from West Point, will lead the Senate Drug Policy Committee.  — Taylor Vance

What’s in a name? Democratic Rep. Scott hopes GOP majority will pass ‘Donald J. Trump Act’ bills

Perhaps tired of seeing many measures she authors ignored or shot down in flames by the Republican supermajority in the Mississippi Legislature, Democratic Rep. Omeria Scott of Laurel is trying a new strategy: naming bills after Republican President-elect Trump.

For this session, Scott has authored: House Bill 61, the “Donald J. Trump Voting Rights Restoration Act;” House Bill 62, the “Donald J. Trump Ban-The-Box Act … to prohibit public employers from using criminal history as a bar to employment;” and House Bill 249, the “Donald J. Trump Early Voting Act.” — Geoff Pender

More bills filed to criminalize abortion

Since the 2022 Dobbs Supreme Court decision overturned the constitutional right to an abortion, Mississippi lawmakers have proposed bills to criminalize workarounds to the state’s strict abortion ban – including criminalizing the abortion pill and out-of-state abortions. The 2025 legislative session is no exception. 

Rep. William Tracy Arnold, R-Booneville, filed House Bill 616 that would make it a felony to manufacture or make accessible medication abortion. Anyone convicted of the crime would be subject to a fine between $1,000 and $5,000, as well as imprisonment between two and five years. Last year, about 250 Mississippians each month requested medication abortion from Aid Access, the only online telemedicine service supplying medication abortion via mail in the U.S. 

Helping a minor receive an abortion would also be criminalized under House Bill 148 filed by Rep. Mark Tullos, R-Raleigh. That would include transporting a minor out of state to undergo an abortion, as well as helping a minor procure a medication abortion – both of which would be punishable by not less than 20 years in prison or a fine of not less than $50,000. — Sophia Paffenroth

By the Numbers

$1.1 billion

The estimated net annual cost of the House plan to eliminate the state income tax and raise sales taxes, once fully phased in. Proponents say economic growth would allow the state budget, currently about $7 billion a year, to absorb the cut. Eliminating the income tax would cost the state $2.2 billion in revenue, but the House plan would raise about $1.1 billion in other taxes in offset.

0

The amount of income tax Mississippians would pay after a 10-year phased in elimination of the state income tax. With previous cuts being phased in, state income taxes next year will already be reduced to 4%, among the lowest rates in the nation.

8.5 %

The new Mississippi sales tax, up from current 7%, under the House tax plan assuming most local governments would not opt out of adding a new 1.5% local sales tax.

13 cents more a gallon

The cost of the House’s proposed new 5% gasoline tax, based on last week’s average cost of gasoline in Mississippi of $2.62. The new 5% tax would be on top of the flat 18.4 cents a gallon current state excise on gasoline.

4%

The tax on unprepared food once a reduction of the current 7% would be phased in over a decade under the House plan. The state would over time reduce its sales tax on such groceries to 2.5%, but local governments would add a 1.5% sales tax to such items unless they opt out.

Full Legislative Coverage

Lawmakers must pass new legislation to improve access to prenatal care

Lawmakers will file another bill this session to help low-income pregnant women get into the doctor earlier – after the federal government rejected the program set up under last year’s law, because of discrepancies between what was written into state law and federal regulations for presumptive Medicaid eligibility. Read the story.

Proposal: eliminate income tax, add 5% tax on gas, allow cities, counties to levy local sales tax

House leaders last week unveiled a sweeping tax cut proposal that would eventually abolish the state income tax, slash taxes on groceries, increase local sales taxes and shore up funds for state and local road work. Read the story.

A new Mississippi law aims to limit jailing people awaiting mental health treatment. Is it working?

Officials say a new law to decrease the number of people being jailed solely because they need mental health treatment has led to fewer people with serious mental illness detained in jails – but the data is contradictory and incomplete. Lawmakers plan legislation to make more counties report the data. Read the story.

How soon we forget: Mississippi House push for record tax cuts revives fear of repeat budget crises

Eight years ago, from a combination of dozens of tax cuts the Legislature approved and a slumping economy, the state saw a budget crisis that resulted in severely underfunded schools, government layoffs, a near halt to building new roads and highways and problems maintaining the ones we have, too few state troopers on the highways and cuts to most major state services. Read the story.

NAACP legislative redistricting proposal pits two pairs of senators against each other

The Mississippi chapter of the ACLU has submitted a proposal to the courts to redraw the state’s legislative districts that creates two new majority-Black Senate districts and pits two pairs of incumbent senators against one another. Read the story.

Legislation to send more public money to private schools appears stalled as lawmakers consider other changes

Some top lawmakers in Mississippi’s Republican-controlled Legislature are prepared to make it easier for students to transfer between public schools but remain skeptical of sending more public money to private schools. Read the story.

House passes $1.1 billion income tax elimination-gas and sales tax increase plan in bipartisan vote

A bill that phases out the state income tax, cuts the state grocery tax and raises sales taxes and gasoline taxes passed the House of Representatives with a bipartisan vote on Thursday. Read the story.

Tate Reeves and other top Mississippi Republicans owe thanks to President Joe Biden

The tremendous cash surpluses that some state Republicans cite when defending their plan to eliminate the state’s income tax would not exist if not for the billions of dollars in federal funds that have been pumped into the state during Biden’s presidential tenure. Read the story.

Podcast: Mississippi transportation director discusses proposed new gasoline tax

Mississippi Department of Transportation Director Brad White tells Mississippi Today’s Geoff Pender and Taylor Vance he’s staying “in his lane” and out of the politics of a House tax overhaul that would eliminate the income tax and raise sales and gasoline taxes, but that he’s pleased lawmakers are trying to address the long running need for a steady new stream of money to help cover highway maintenance needs. Listen to the podcast.

This article first appeared on Mississippi Today and is republished here under a Creative Commons license.

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