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Solar company’s donations to Brandon Presley appear legal. But should he have accepted them?

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Public Service Commissioner Brandon Presley, the Democratic nominee for governor, has accepted thousands of dollars in donations from people whose companies have come before the commission to seek approval for certain projects.

There is no evidence that the political contributions violated any state law. But as he campaigns around the state and pitches campaign finance and ethics law reforms, the contributions beg the question: Should he have accepted them?

Republican Gov. Tate Reeves’ campaign plainly accused Presley this month of breaking state law in a pair of TV ads, alleging the governor’s Democratic opponent illegally accepted campaign donations from leaders of a Tennessee-based solar company called Silicon Ranch.

The basis for the attack is a state law that prohibits public service commissioners or candidates from accepting campaign donations from representatives of public utilities the commission is responsible for regulating.

An attorney for the Public Service Commission told Mississippi Today, though, that Silicon Ranch is not a public utility, which should allow commissioners to legally accept the contributions.

“Speaking through its orders, the commission has consistently found that Silicon Ranch, as well as other companies, are not public utilities,” Ross Hammons, general counsel for the Public Service Commission, said in a statement.

Hammons, who is employed by the three elected commissioners, said the commission’s process for determining what a public utility is goes back to the late 1990s and has remained consistent over the years.

A campaign finance database created by Mississippi Today shows that Presley has accepted at least $16,500 in contributions from Silicon Ranch employees. He previously called Reeves’ allegations untrue and maintains that all of his campaign donations are “completely legal.”

READ MORE: See who has donated to Brandon Presley

A Reeves campaign spokesperson did not substantively answer questions from Mississippi Today for this article but repeated the campaign’s assertion that the donations were illegal because the PSC has some jurisdiction over the solar company.

“Mississippi’s laws prohibit donations from ‘electric utilities…that come under the jurisdiction of the PSC,’” the spokesperson said. “They do not apply solely to ‘public utilities.’ That requires the most generous possible reading of the law.”

Republican Brent Bailey, who serves on the Public Service Commission with Presley and has also accepted money from Silicon Ranch employees as recently as this year, said Reeves’ attacks are “without substance.”

Bailey, in a statement to Mississippi Today, defended his acceptance of the Silicon Ranch donations and said he was proud to “lead the charge” for renewable energy.

“All my campaign donations have been vetted, are legal and appropriate,” Bailey said. “This is a typical election-season political attack with no substance, and it unfairly and incorrectly implicates the current members of the Mississippi Public Service Commission.”

The Reeves campaign did not respond to Bailey’s comments or to Mississippi Today’s questions asking if they believed Bailey had also violated state law by accepting the Silicon Ranch donations.

READ MORE: Solar energy company threatens to sue Tate Reeves campaign for airing ‘defamatory’ TV ad

Presley sat on commission when Silicon Ranch project was approved

Mississippi law defines a public utility as an organization or company that, in part, operates equipment for “the generation, manufacture, transmission, distribution, provision of electricity to the public” for compensation.

But Silicon Ranch does not provide electricity to the general public for profit, and the PSC does not set its rates. The company, instead, provides electricity to public utilities.

The company, according to its website, has completed two Mississippi-based solar projects: One in Meridian in conjunction with the Naval Air Station, and one in Hattiesburg, operated in partnership with Mississippi Power. Neither of these are offering electricity to the public.

State law still requires organizations such as Silicon Ranch to come before the Public Service Commission to obtain a “certificate of public convenience and necessity” before transferring electricity to another entity.

The company came before the commission in 2017 to obtain approval for its Meridian project, and the commission, in an order, unanimously approved the project. Presley, of course, served on the commission at that time.

The order states: “Petitioner Silicon Ranch is not a public utility and the project is not utility property under the laws of the state of Mississippi. It is further ordered that petitioner Silicon Ranch is not subject to the Commission’s jurisdiction except for the requirement of obtaining a certificate of public convenience and necessity.”

The only way someone could shed more clarity on the public utility status is if the Legislature chooses to change the definition or if a judge interprets the statute differently than a commission. But a judge would only address the issues if someone appeals a Public Service Commission order to the court system.

Mississippi Today was unable to identify an instance when a similar company appealed a commission’s order to the court system, meaning there is no Mississippi judicial ruling or legal analysis of a public utility definition outside of the PSC’s rulings.

While there is no available evidence to suggest Presley or other commissioners who have accepted similar donations have committed a crime, a prosecutor could, in theory, bring charges against the Democratic nominee.

Reeves’ campaign did not answer questions about whether they had referred the matter to the Mississippi Attorney General’s office for investigation. The attorney general would be most equipped to handle such a prosecution or launch an investigation, but the agency declined to answer questions about the issue.

Debbee Hancock, a spokesperson for Attorney General Lynn Fitch’s office, did not answer a question from Mississippi Today asking if anyone had filed a complaint with the agency about the donations or if the agency was investigating the donations.

Instead, Hancock issued a terse statement saying the agency does not comment on open investigations. She did not respond to a follow-up question seeking to clarify if her statement meant the agency was conducting an ongoing investigation of the donations, nor did she respond when Mississippi Today pointed out that the agency has commented on investigations in the past.

READ MORE: Fitch says she’s investigating PAC run by Chris McDaniel treasurer

Absence of ethics laws in Mississippi

For many years, many elected officials in Mississippi have benefitted from the general absence of “pay-to-play” prohibitions.

Candidates for the Public Service Commission, because of past corruption scandals, face stricter campaign finance laws than most other elected officials. PSC candidates are prohibited from taking contributions from officers of public utilities whose rates the commission sets.

But across state politics, it’s common for owners or executives of companies that reap millions of dollars a year from Mississippi taxpayers or receive favorable policy decisions to be among the largest donors to the state’s top public officials.

Mississippi Today published an investigation this week that showed Reeves’ top political donors were awarded $1.4 billion in state contracts or grants from agencies he’s overseen since he became governor in 2020.

READ MORE: Gov. Tate Reeves’ top political donors received $1.4 billion in state contracts from his agencies

Though there is no evidence that the Silicon Ranch donations to Presley violate state law, he has accepted thousands of dollars in donations from people who have come before the commission to seek approval for certain projects — though the projects are limited in scope and do not draw down taxpayer funding.

The Democratic candidate did not substantively answer questions from Mississippi Today on Oct. 15 asking if he thought accepting the donations was ethical or if he thought it was hypocritical of him to take the contributions while pitching campaign finance reforms.

Instead, he reiterated that the solar company donations were legal and suggested the press ask Reeves if it’s ethical for him to accept donations from people who receive state contracts.

“That’s a great question to ask him about Centene health care,” Presley said of Reeves. “It’s a great question for him to be asked about millions of dollars that he has taken in from folks that do business with the state. I can tell you, for me, every contribution we’ve had come in is legal.”

As he’s being attacked by Reeves for violating state ethics laws, Presley has made ethics reform a major plank of his 2023 campaign. Specific ideas Presley pitched this year include:

  • Limiting the gifts that politicians could receive from lobbyists.
  • More timely reporting of lobbyists’ expenditures on politicians.
  • Preventing politicians from receiving campaign contributions while the Legislature is in session.
  • Requiring a politician to wait one year after leaving office before becoming a lobbyist.
  • Prohibiting corporations from making campaign contributions and limiting the size of contributions from others.
  • Ensuring the Legislature is covered by open meetings laws.
  • Increasing penalties for violations of lobbying and campaign finance laws.

But in the meantime, the state’s relevant laws are loose. The secretary of state’s office and Ethics Commission have for years said they lack enforcement or investigative authority. The secretary of state’s office is responsible for receiving campaign finance reports but serves mainly as a repository, with no real investigative or enforcement authority. The Ethics Commission, after some changes to laws in recent years, appears to have some authority, but it’s unclear.

“It’s a mess,” state Ethics Commission Director Tom Hood said recently of Mississippi’s campaign finance laws. “Changes (to the law) have been made multiple times over multiple years, and it’s like trying to put together a jigsaw puzzle that doesn’t fit.”

Fitch, as the state’s top law officer, runs the only state agency with clear authority to investigate and prosecute campaign finance violations. But Fitch, like her recent predecessors, has shown little interest in investigating or prosecuting complaints and enforcing campaign finance laws. Mississippi attorney general actions on campaign finances or lobbying over the years have been so rare that, when they do happen, they bring outcry of selective enforcement.

Most often, campaign finance violations go unchecked, leaving the state political system open to the corrosive influence of special interest money.

Hood said he would like for laws and responsibilities to be clearer, particularly with campaign finance issues.

“Somebody needs to have clear authority and responsibility to enforce the law — that would be a good first step,” Hood said.

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

Mississippi Today

On this day in 1961

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mississippitoday.org – Jerry Mitchell – 2024-11-22 07:00:00

Nov. 22, 1961

Credit: Courtesy: Georgia Tourism & Travel

Five Black students, made up of NAACP Youth Council members and two SNCC volunteers from Albany State College, were arrested after entering the white waiting room of the Trailways station in Albany, Georgia. 

The council members bonded out of jail, but the SNCC volunteers, Bertha Gober and Blanton Hall declined bail and “chose to remain in jail over the holidays to dramatize their demand for justice,” according to SNCC Digital Gateway. The president of Albany State College expelled them. 

Gober became one of SNCC’s Freedom Singers and wrote the song, “We’ll Never Turn Back,” after the 1961 killing of Herbert Lee in Mississippi. The tune became SNCC’s anthem. 

After her release from jail, Gober joined other students, and police arrested her and other demonstrators. Back in the same jail, she sang to the police chief and mayor to open the cells, “I hear God’s children praying in jail, ‘Freedom, freedom, freedom.’” 

Albany State suspended another student, Bernice Reagon, after she joined SNCC. She poured herself into the civil rights movement and later formed the Grammy-nominated a cappella group Sweet Honey in the Rock to educate and empower the audience and community. 

“When I opened my mouth and began to sing, there was a force and power within myself I had never heard before,” a power she said she did not know she had. 

Other members of the Freedom Singers included Cordell Reagon, Bernice Johnson, Dorothy Vallis, Rutha Harris, Bernard Lafayette and Charles Neblett. On the third anniversary of the sit-in movement in 1963, they performed at Carnegie Hall. 

“This is a singing movement,” SNCC leader James Forman told a reporter. “The songs help. Without them, it would be ugly.” 

Today, the Albany Civil Rights Institute houses exhibits on these protesters, Martin Luther King Jr. and others who joined the Albany Movement.

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

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IHL deletes the word ‘diversity’ from its policies

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mississippitoday.org – Molly Minta – 2024-11-21 14:32:00

The governing board of Mississippi’s public universities voted Thursday to delete the word “diversity” from several policies, including a requirement that the board evaluate university presidents on campus diversity outcomes.

Though the Legislature has not passed a bill targeting diversity, equity and inclusion initiatives in higher education, the Institutions of Higher Learning Board of Trustees approved the changes “in order to ensure continued compliance with state and federal law,” according to the board book

The move comes on the heels of the re-election of former President Donald Trump and after several universities in Mississippi have renamed their diversity offices. Earlier this year, the IHL board approved changes to the University of Southern Mississippi’s mission and vision statements that removed the words “diverse” and “inclusiveness.”

In an email, John Sewell, IHL’s communications director, did not respond to several questions about the policy changes but wrote that the board’s goal was to “reinforce our commitment to ensuring students have access to the best education possible, supported by world-class faculty and staff.”

“The end goal is to support all students, and to make sure they graduate fully prepared to enter the workforce, hopefully in Mississippi,” Sewell added.

On Thursday, trustees approved the changes without discussion after a first reading by Harold Pizzetta, the associate commissioner for legal affairs and risk management. But Sewell wrote in an email that the board discussed the policy amendments in open session two months ago during its retreat in Meridian, more than an hour away from the board’s normal meeting location in Jackson.

IHL often uses these retreats, which unlike its regular board meetings aren’t livestreamed and are rarely attended by members of the public outside of the occasional reporter, to discuss potentially controversial policy changes.

Last year, the board had a spirited discussion about a policy change that would have increased its oversight of off-campus programs during its retreat at the White House Hotel in Biloxi. In 2022, during a retreat that also took place in Meridian, trustees discussed changing the board’s tenure policies. At both retreats, a Mississippi Today reporter was the only member of the public to witness the discussions.

The changes to IHL’s diversity policy echo a shift, particularly at colleges and universities in conservative states, from concepts like diversity in favor of “access” and “opportunity.” In higher education, the term “diversity, equity and inclusion” has traditionally referred to a range of efforts to comply with civil rights laws and foster a sense of on-campus belonging among minority populations.

But in recent years, conservative politicians have contended that DEI programs are wasteful spending and racist. A bill to ban state funding for DEI in Mississippi died earlier this year, but at least 10 other states have passed laws seeking to end or restrict such initiatives at state agencies, including publicly funded universities, according to ABC News.

In Mississippi, the word “diversity” first appeared in IHL’s policies in 1998. The diversity statement was adopted in 2005 and amended in 2013. 

The board’s vote on Thursday turned the diversity statement, which was deleted in its entirety, into a “statement on higher education access and success” according to the board book. 

“One of the strengths of Mississippi is the diversity of its people,” the diversity statement read. “This diversity enriches higher education and contributes to the capacity that our students develop for living in a multicultural and interdependent world.”

Significantly, the diversity statement required the IHL board to evaluate the university presidents and the higher learning commissioner on diversity outcomes. 

The statement also included system-wide goals — some of which it is unclear if the board has achieved — to increase the enrollment and graduation rates of minority students, employ more underrepresented faculty, staff and administrators, and increase the use of minority-owned contractors and vendors. 

Sewell did not respond to questions about if IHL has met those goals or if the board will continue to evaluate presidents on diversity outcomes.

In the new policy, those requirements were replaced with two paragraphs about the importance of respectful dialogue on campus and access to higher education for all Mississippians. 

“We encourage all members of the academic community to engage in respectful, meaningful discourse with the aim of promoting critical thinking in the pursuit of knowledge, a deeper understanding of the human condition, and the development of character,” the new policy reads. “All students should be supported in their educational journey through programming and services designed to have a positive effect on their individual academic performance, retention, and graduation.” 

Also excised was a policy that listed common characteristics of universities in Mississippi, including “a commitment to ethnic and gender diversity,” among others. Another policy on institutional scholarships was also edited to remove a clause that required such programs to “promote diversity.” 

“IHL is committed to higher education access and success among all populations to assist the state of Mississippi in meeting its enrollment and degree completion goals, as well as building a highly-skilled workforce,” the institutional scholarship policy now reads. 

The board also approved a change that requires the universities to review their institutional mission statements on an annual basis.

A policy on “planning principles” will continue to include the word “diverse,” and a policy that states the presidential search advisory committees will “be representative in terms of diversity” was left unchanged.

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

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Closed St. Dominic’s mental health beds to reopen in December under new management

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mississippitoday.org – Gwen Dilworth – 2024-11-21 13:54:00

The shuttered St. Dominic’s mental health unit will reopen under the management of a for-profit, Texas-based company next month. 

Oceans Behavioral Hospital Jackson, a 77-bed facility, will provide inpatient behavioral health services to adults and seniors and add intensive outpatient treatment services next year. 

“Jackson continuously ranks as one of the cities for our company that shows one of the greatest needs in terms of behavioral health,” Oceans Healthcare CEO Stuart Archer told Mississippi Today at a ribbon cutting ceremony at its location on St. Dominic’s campus Thursday. “…There’s been an outcry for high quality care.” 

St. Dominic’s 83-bed mental health unit closed suddenly in June 2023, citing “substantial financial challenges.”

Merit Health Central, which operates a 71-bed psychiatric health hospital unit in Jackson, sued Oceans in March, arguing that the new hospital violated the law by using a workaround to avoid a State Health Department requirement that the hospital spend at least 17% of its gross patient revenue on indigent and charity care.

Without a required threshold for this care, Merit Health Central will shoulder the burden of treating more non-paying patients, the hospital in South Jackson argued. 

The suit, which also names St. Dominic’s Hospital and the Mississippi Department of Health as defendants, awaits a ruling from Hinds County Chancery Court Judge Tametrice Hodges-Linzey next year. 

The complaint does not bar Oceans from moving forward with its plans to reopen, said Archer.

A hallway inside Oceans Behavioral Hospital in Jackson, Miss., is seen on Thursday, Nov. 21, 2024, during the facility’s grand opening. Credit: Eric Shelton/Mississippi Today

Oceans operates two other mental health facilities in Mississippi and over 30 other locations in Louisiana, Oklahoma and Texas. 

“Oceans is very important to the Coast, to Tupelo, and it’s important right here in this building. It’s part of the state of Mississippi’s response to making sure people receive adequate mental health care in Mississippi,” said Lt. Governor Delbert Hosemann at the Nov. 21 ribbon cutting.

Some community leaders have been critical of the facility. 

“Oceans plans to duplicate existing services available to insured patients while ignoring the underserved and indigent population in need,” wrote Hinds County Sheriff Tyree Jones in an Oct. 1 letter provided to Mississippi Today by Merit Health. 

Massachusetts-based Webster Equity Partners, a private-equity firm with a number of investments in health care, bought Oceans in 2022. St. Dominic’s is owned by Louisiana-based Catholic nonprofit Franciscan Missionaries of Our Lady Health System.

Oceans first filed a “certificate of need” application to reopen the St. Dominic’s mental health unit in October 2023. 

Mississippi’s certificate of need law requires medical facilities to receive approval from the state before opening a new health care center to demonstrate there is a need for its services. 

The Department of Health approved the application under the condition that the hospital spend at least 17% of its patient revenue on free or low-cost medical care for low-income individuals – far more than the two percent it proposed. 

Stuart Archer, CEO of Oceans Healthcare, speaks during the grand opening of Oceans Behavioral Hospital in Jackson, Miss., on Thursday, Nov. 21, 2024. Credit: Eric Shelton/Mississippi Today

Oceans projected in its application that the hospital’s profit would equal $2.6 million in its third year, and it would spend $341,103 on charity care.

Merit Health contested the conditional approval, arguing that because its mental health unit provides 22% charity care, Oceans providing less would have a “significant adverse effect” on Merit by diverting more patients without insurance or unable to pay for care to its beds. 

Oceans and St. Dominic’s also opposed the state’s charity care condition, arguing that 17% was an unreasonable figure. 

But before a public hearing could be held on the matter, Oceans and St. Dominic’s filed for a “change of ownership,” bypassing the certificate of need process entirely. The state approved the application 11 days later

Merit Health Central then sued Oceans, St. Dominic and the State Department of Health, seeking to nullify the change of ownership. 

“The (change of ownership) filing and DOH approval … are nothing more than an ‘end run’ around CON law,” wrote Merit Health in the complaint. 

Oceans, St. Dominic’s and the Mississippi Department of Health have filed motions to dismiss the case. 

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

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