“Whether you vote for the candidate directly, or vote for the official who appoints them, you have the power. You must use it,” Body writes.
Mississippi Gov. Tate Reeves signed an income-tax cut into law that will eliminate $524 million from state revenues.
Lawmakers in the Mississippi Legislature have mere hours left to reach a compromise on plans for a teacher-pay raise. In January, the Senate and House each passed bills that would raise pay for the state’s teachers by thousands, but with key differences.
The Mississippi Senate approved legislation to reduce the state income tax by hundreds of millions of dollars, despite caution from opponents who questioned the wisdom of doing so while education, roads and other public infrastructure remain critically underfunded.
Every Black member of the Mississippi Senate walked out today as their white colleagues voted to approve a bill that Republicans have described as legislation to prevent so-called “critical race theory” from being taught in schools.
The Mississippi Lottery Corporation raised $80 million for state highways and almost $59 million to support public education during its first full fiscal year. The education funds will go to the state’s Education Enhancement Fund, which supports the Early Childhood Learning Collaborative, which is a state-funded pre-K program, and the Classroom Supply Fund.
Mississippi’s K-12 public-school teachers may still get a $1,000 pay raise after lawmakers in the House and Senate reached a last-minute agreement. Some feared the raise could become a casualty amid a legislative impasse over a House tax-reform bill.
More than half of working Mississippians would no longer pay state income taxes starting next year under a bill Republican House Speaker Philip Gunn touted today as “probably the most extraordinary policy change that we’ve ever done—at least in my book.”
Mississippi’s public schools “would be miles ahead of where we are now” in responding to the COVID-19 pandemic “had schools not been dreadfully underfunded,” The Parents’ Campaign Executive Director Nancy Loome says, days after the Legislature overrode the governor’s funding veto.
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The Mississippi Free Press is a project of the Mississippi Journalism and Education Group, a 501(c)(3) nonprofit journalism organization (EIN 85-1403937).