Mississippi Today

The exodus continues: Three major health systems leave state hospital association

Published

2 years ago

May 23, 2023

The Mississippi Hospital Association shrinks again as several hospitals dropped out of the state trade organization this week.

Ochsner Health System and North Mississippi Medical Center recently left the association. Merit Health also severed ties, according to multiple media reports.

The exodus began in late April, when the state’s largest public hospital, the University of Mississippi Medical Center, left the MHA. Memorial Hospital System in Gulfport, Singing River on the coast, George Health System and Forrest General Hospital followed soon after.

Almost none of the hospital’s letters announcing their departure cited a reason beyond doubts with the organization’s “leadership.” All of the hospitals’ leaders have declined to publicly expand on their decisions.

The separations, however, come on the heels of a major donation from the MHA’s political action committee.

The PAC contributed $250,000, its largest donation in history, to Democratic gubernatorial candidate Brandon Presley’s campaign just days before UMMC dropped out of the organization, MHA executive director Tim Moore previously confirmed to Mississippi Today.

Presley is an outspoken proponent of Medicaid expansion. Republican Gov. Tate Reeves, the incumbent candidate, has adamantly opposed the measure, though a recent poll shows most Mississippians support it.

Research shows Medicaid expansion would bring millions into Mississippi’s struggling hospitals. Moore previously told Mississippi Today that’s why the hospitals’ departures have bewildered him.

He said the donation to Presley’s campaign was made after the MHA board recommended the move. Though the PAC operates separately from the MHA, it’s also headed up by Moore, who serves on the MHA board.

Ochsner’s termination letter to the MHA, attributed to Chief Operating Officer and President Mike Hulefeld, reiterated previous hospitals’ concerns about the organization’s leadership.

“There is tremendous value in having a hospital association that serves as a strategic and thoughtful advocate on issues of importance to Mississippi’s hospitals and the patients we serve,” Hulefeld said in the letter, dated May 19. “Unfortunately, MHA’s current leadership and approach is preventing the association from accomplishing this goal.”

All of the hospitals that Ochsner operates in Mississippi will no longer be part of the MHA, the letter confirmed.

North Mississippi Medical Center declined to provide their termination letter to Mississippi Today, but a spokesperson confirmed that four of their facilities — in Tupelo, Eupora, Iuka and Pontotoc — would be leaving the organization.

Merit Health, which operates nine hospitals across Mississippi, confirmed to Magnolia Tribune that they, too, would be ending their relationship with the MHA. Spokespeople for the hospital system could not be reached by time of publication.

The state trade organization lobbies on behalf of Mississippi’s hospitals. As they continue to lose members, Moore said it would impact their finances and ability to successfully advocate.

The MHA is largely funded through member dues, and Moore in a previous interview said the departures would have to be accounted for when calculating funding for the next fiscal year, which starts in July.

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 1906

Published

3 hours ago

January 22, 2025

Staff Editor

mississippitoday.org – Jerry Mitchell – 2025-01-22 07:00:00

Jan. 22, 1906

Willa Beatrice Brown served as a lieutenant in the U.S. Civil Air Patrol. Credit: Wikipedia

Pioneer aviator and civil rights activist Willa Beatrice Brown was born in Glasgow, Kentucky.

While working in Chicago, she learned how to fly and became the first Black female to earn a commercial pilot’s license. A journalist said that when she entered the newsroom, “she made such a stunning appearance that all the typewriters suddenly went silent. … She had a confident bearing and there was an undercurrent of determination in her husky voice as she announced, not asked, that she wanted to see me.”

In 1939, she married her former flight instructor, Cornelius Coffey, and they co-founded the Cornelius Coffey School of Aeronautics, the first Black-owned private flight training academy in the U.S.

She succeeded in convincing the U.S. Army Air Corps to let them train Black pilots. Hundreds of men and women trained under them, including nearly 200 future Tuskegee Airmen.

In 1942, she became the first Black officer in the U.S. Civil Air Patrol. After World War II ended, she became the first Black woman to run for Congress. Although she lost, she remained politically active and worked in Chicago, teaching business and aeronautics.

After she retired, she served on an advisory board to the Federal Aviation Administration. She died in 1992. A historical marker in her hometown now recognizes her as the first Black woman to earn a pilot’s license in the U.S., and Women in Aviation International named her one of the 100 most influential women in aviation and space.

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

Mississippi Stories Videos

Mississippi Stories: Michael May of Lazy Acres

Published

19 hours ago

January 21, 2025

Staff Editor

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.

Mississippi Today

On this day in 1921

Published

1 day ago

January 21, 2025

Staff Editor

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.