A group of Mississippi midwives is again advocating for regulations around their profession – a move they say will actually make it easier for midwives to practice in the state in the long run. 

Under proposed legislation, midwives who want to practice in Mississippi would need to attain licensure from a board, and in turn would gain multiple privileges. As it stands, Mississippi is one of 13 states that has no regulations around professional midwifery – a freedom that hasn’t benefited midwives or mothers, advocates say. 

“Tattoo artists have to apply for a license within our state, but yet someone who’s actually delivering a life and taking care of a mom, prenatal and postnatal – there’s no oversight,” said Rep. Dana McLean, R-Columbus, author of the bill. McLean has proposed similar legislation over the past few years. 

This is the first year the legislation made it to a full floor vote. The bill specifically addresses professional midwifery – not nurse midwifery, which requires more extensive medical training. 

House Medicaid Chair Missy McGee, R-Hattiesburg, proposed an amendment that would make it unlawful for licensed midwives to do homebirths for breech babies, but withdrew her amendment after other committee members voiced opposition to it. McLean said part of the purpose of the bill is to give women the opportunity to choose to give birth how they feel safest, and it would be the board’s responsibility to determine scope of practice. 

Proponents of House Bill 927 say it builds value around midwives, protects mothers and babies, and strengthens the respect and collaboration between midwives and physicians. 

“Consumers should be able to birth wherever they want and with whom they want – but they should know who is a midwife and who isn’t,” explained Tanya Smith-Johnson, president of the National College of Midwifery. “… Right now the way the law is, technically my husband could say ‘I’m a midwife,’ and there’s no one to say that you’re not.”

The lack of licensure, despite seeming inclusive, has rendered midwifery services inaccessible to poor women – and has also run some midwives out of business, Smith-Johnson explained. 

Without licensure, insurance companies won’t cover midwifery services. Mississippi mothers have to pay out of pocket for the services and midwives end up undervaluing themselves to stay competitive in a market that doesn’t recognize them as licensed professionals. 

“It’s hard for a midwife to be sustainable here,” Smith-Johnson said. “ … What is the standard of how much midwifery can cost if anyone and everyone can say they’re a midwife?”

The absence of licensure has also meant that midwives don’t get access to things like labor medication that those certified in states with licensure can access. 

“It means that you’re kind of working just rogue … not being able to fully take care of a client, where you can order labs, carry oxygen, have medications a midwife would use for someone who is in labor – all of those things,” she said.

Smith-Johnson is part of Better Birth, a group that has been pushing for this legislation for five years. The group formed in response to an infant death that involved a midwife making questionable choices. The mother involved didn’t want to press charges – she just wanted reform. 

“We formed because the mom had two options,” explained Erin Raftery, president of Better Birth. “She could either sue the midwife … but if she did that then it’s almost a guarantee that the profession would either be heavily restricted or outlawed, which is not what that mama wanted … So the other option her attorney gave her was to push for licensure.”

Anyone who practiced midwifery without a license under the bill would be fined $1,000.

In a state riddled with maternity care deserts, the last thing mothers want to see is birth workers leaving the state. But with no clear pathway to becoming a professional midwife, some birth workers are doing just that. 

When Amanda Smith, originally from Jackson, was looking for a midwife to attend the births of her last three children, she and her husband couldn’t find a midwife with whom they felt comfortable working. Smith later discovered her calling for birth work while she was supporting her sister through labor, and she ended up getting her professional midwifery license in Colorado. 

She returned to Mississippi in 2022 to serve her home state and now practices in Hattiesburg. However, she imagines there are midwives like her who leave the state and don’t come back – in no small part because of the liability risk that lack of licensure poses. While Smith has a Colorado midwifery license, she can’t become licensed in Mississippi because it doesn’t exist. 

“It was one thing that really worried me about moving back,” Smith said. “I hired a lawyer to do a consultation and help me look over my paperwork and talk me through any scenario where I could potentially go to jail for being a midwife in Mississippi … I really look at this (bill) as a protection for midwives.”

If the bill becomes law, the board – comprised of nine members, including six midwives and the state health officer – will get to choose the kind of training midwives must undergo in order to attain a license. 

In Texas, licensed midwives must complete a minimum of 1,350 hours of supervised clinical experience and pass an examination with NARM, the North American Registry of Midwives. 

The bill seems to have more traction this year than it has in years past. Midwives say that in part, that’s due to a growing realization that they have the opportunity to regulate their profession as they see fit – before one too many risky situations causes physicians to impose regulations that don’t have midwives’ best interests in mind. 

“I think there’s just been more iffy situations happening in the state, and it’s caused the midwives to realize that if we don’t do something now, it’s going to get done for us,” said Raftery.

The bill now advances to a full floor vote in the House. 

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

Mississippi Stories: James Storey

by Marshall Ramsey, Mississippi Today
February 4, 2025

People still remember where they were on that hot, muggy Mississippi afternoon when Ole Miss fullback James Storey caught two touchdown passes to defeat Notre Dame 20-13 at Mississippi Veterans Memorial Stadium. Nearly 50 years later, people also remember all the ways that Coach Storey has changed their lives for the better.  Moving back to his hometown of Ripley, Storey left the gridiron for the classroom. Dedicating his life to a mindset of humility, generosity, and selflessness that involves serving others without expecting anything in return, he truly has a servant’s heart.  I traveled to north Mississippi to meet up with him to discuss his football days and his long career as an educator, principal and coach.  He also shared his passion of helping the Boys & Girls Club of North Mississippi as well. Storey is a hero on and off the gridiron.  And while the 1977 Notre Dame team may not agree, he’s also a heck of a nice guy.

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

by Ray Mabus, Mississippi Today
February 4, 2025

This essay is part of an ongoing Mississippi Today Ideas series showcasing first-person perspectives of former Mississippi governors. We asked them to write about their successes while in office and perhaps what they wished had gone a little differently during their tenure.

When I ran for governor in 1987, my slogan was “Mississippi Will Never Be Last Again.” For so long Mississippi had been last in the things you want to be first in and first in the things you want to be last in. A common statement from other states was “Thank God for Mississippi.” That had to end. Mississippi needed to lead.

As governor, I, and the folks with me, began working to make that promise a reality, and, in the four years that followed, we got an amazing amount of things done and Mississippi moved out of last place in virtually every category.

We began with education because it is the only sure, long-term way to success. Here are a few of the things that were accomplished:

• Passed the largest teacher pay raise in the U.S.
• Enacted the largest percentage funding increase for higher education in the country for two years.
• Increased the high school graduation rate by 5.7% while the national rate declined.
• Developed the Office for Literacy, which Atlantic Monthly called “the most ambitious initiative in the nation to combat adult illiteracy.”
• In days before computers were everywhere, put a computer lab in every elementary school in the state, teaching a very successful “Writing to Read” program.
• Led the nation in percentage of students taking upper level science courses.
• Used fiber optics to allow students to participate remotely in courses through interactive audiovisual communications long before the ubiquitous internet.
• Passed the most comprehensive education reform act in America.

In jobs and economic development:

• 90,000 net new jobs in four years.
• First in U.S. in new manufacturing plants by population.
• $4 billion in new investments.
• Complete rewrite of economic development laws including tax credits for child care and educational benefits.
• Fifth largest drop in unemployment in country.
• 11th fastest per capita income gain in America.
• 25th in creation of new jobs.
• Unemployment lowest in more than a decade.
• Tourism increased by 41% and exports by 51%.
• Growth in welfare cut by 87%.
• Successful Jobs for Mississippi’s Graduates for highly at-risk youth started.

In health care:

• Largest expansion of health care coverage in state’s history by increasing Medicaid covering more than 100,000 additional Mississippians and keeping the state’s hospitals open and vital.
• The lowest infant mortality rate in state’s history.
• An intense focus on early childhood and child care. 

In government:

• Changed form of county government to reduce cost and corruption, which was part of my legacy as state auditor.
• Largest restructuring of state government in history.
• First governor to propose a budget.
• Appointed first woman to head a Highway Patrol in the U.S.
• Most Black Mississippians appointed to senior roles in state’s history.
• Enacted first capital budget.
• No tax increases.
• Budget always balanced.

But all this is just a far-from-complete list of nearly four-decade old statistics. What this doesn’t capture at all was our goal. It wasn’t just to move Mississippi out of last place and up the list in these categories, it was to try to make lives better and futures brighter for ALL Mississippians. 

All this was done to make Mississippi more competitive and to provide opportunities so that young Mississippians would stay and build their lives here. All this was done to make sure babies were born healthy and had the best educational opportunities starting in early childhood so that they could make the most of their lives. All this was done so that all Mississippians had the right to good health care so that the state didn’t lead the country in preventable diseases and so many other bad categories and so that EVERYONE could fulfill their potential. 

But for all that we — the people of Mississippi — did at that time to make our state the positive exception and example, looking at today and to the future, so many of those gains are gone. Mississippi is one of only three states which lost population between 2010-2020. People are voting with their feet and moving out, and others are not moving in. The needs in Mississippi are the same as they were in the late 1980s. We know what we need to do to address those needs, and we know it will work.

A much better job has to be done in public education. Education for everyone is the only way to a better future and a better state. Public education has to be better supported both financially and culturally. Tax money should go to public education and none to private schools, which is just a way to help the well-to-do and a cruel hoax on everyone else.

Health care has to be a right and not a privilege. Do whatever is necessary to cover every Mississippian, starting with expanding Medicaid to the maximum extent possible. This will also keep rural hospitals open so that people can get care close to where they live. And women must have full autonomy on all their health care decisions.

There is a saying that “the only way to keep a person down in a ditch is to get down in the ditch with them.” Because of our history, Mississippi bears a special burden on race. As I said in my 1988 inaugural address: “… a new day depends fundamentally on our resolve to banish racism forever from the state of Mississippi. We know in our hearts that the chains of prejudice have bound more than one group; they have held all of us back. A society divided against itself cannot prosper. And we know from history and our own lives the anguish and frustration of racial injustice — and we can be proud that so many among us have given so much in the belief that we shall overcome. We share the faith that we are each God’s children. After all the years, let us hear anew His truth that we are all brothers and sisters. That idea is written into our laws; now it must be woven into the fabric of our lives.”

Ray Mabus served as Mississippi governor from 1988 until 1992. He had previously served as state auditor. On the federal level, he served as U.S. ambassador to Saudi Arabia in the 1990s and as U.S. Secretary of the Navy from 2009 until 2017. Mabus, an Ackerman native, resides in West Virginia with his wife Lynne. He has three children.

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