The Jackson water crisis requires action. The state government needs to create a special Jackson utility district that is independent from the City of Jackson.
There are dozens of existing utility districts throughout the state, often created to supply water. The statute already exists. It just needs some tweaking to be responsive to Jackson’s needs.
The board needs to be appointed in a manner that will create harmony with the funding sources necessary to solve Jackson’s long-term water crisis, which will require a large sum of money to fix.
One board seat should be appointed by the governor, another by the lieutenant governor, another by the House speaker, one by the City of Jackson and one by Congressman Bennie Thompson. Board members should get a reasonable stipend to ensure quality board members.
One of the causes of the water crisis has been using the Jackson Water Department as a political football. An independent board would fix that.
In 2017, Jackson water department billings were $61 million. This year’s billings are estimated to be $40 million — a 34 percent drop in revenue. Meanwhile, profit dropped from $35 million in 2016 to negative $16 million in 2019. This is a financial disaster related directly to the incompetence of the City of Jackson to manage.
The city quit sending out bills, then quit cutting off slackers who wouldn’t pay their bills, then allowed huge billing errors to go unfixed. Straight piping became rampant with little prosecution. The result was predictable — total and utter disaster.
The problem with socialism is that sooner or later you run out of other people’s money. Jackson has run out of other people’s money so there’s now no water to drink.
A scathing, comprehensive EPA investigation was sent to the mayor in 2020. Yet he kept it a secret, jeopardizing the health of the city. Only after he was re-elected did the report become public. Meanwhile, free water surely helped Lumumba gain votes. This is how politics screws up our water. An independent water district would not be subjected to these kinds of political pressures.
An independent water district could create its own hiring and purchasing policies better suited for managing a water system. The City of Jackson hiring process is a bureaucratic nightmare that lacks the flexibility and speed to deal with an emergency. Requiring water engineers to live in Jackson is a classic example. When you are desperate for qualified personnel, such requirements are absurd.
Same with purchasing. The City of Jackson has a bureaucratic, encumbered system of approving purchases, requiring numerous forms and stamps of approval. When there is an emergency at the water plant and you need replacement pumps in 24 hours, this just doesn’t work. An independent water district could set its own policies to fit its unique mission.
But most importantly, an independent water district would be far more likely to secure appropriate funding if those doing the funding have appointed the board. It’s clear there has been division between the state and the city regarding funding. Lumumba refused to jump through the state hoops. This is one of his great failings. Instead of kissing the rings of those who hold the purse strings, he’s been gallivanting around the country talking nonsense about making Jackson the most radical city in America. Being the only city in the nation without potable water is indeed radical, but I don’t think Jackson voters are too pleased about this kind of radicalism.
The mayor also raised state suspicions with his weird antics over the city’s garbage contract. The bidding process was rigged and when the city council said “whoa,” the mayor accused city councilors of taking bribes. Talk about winning friends and influencing people! There was just no way the state was going to give Lumumba a big blank check in the wake of that fiasco.
Lumumba did make one good hire as mayor — Robert Miller as public works director. Miller had the requisite skills and background to do the job. But Miller couldn’t stomach Lumumba’s suppression of the EPA report and rightly jumped ship. That was the turning point, for without Miller there was no one left who knew anything about the complexities of running a city.
The state is not without blame. The whole crisis started with the corrupt Siemens contract. The corruption came in the way of unqualified minority contractors with whom Siemens was required to engage. They installed the meters wrong. The meters failed. People lost faith in the billing process so the city quit cutting off users and a free fall began.
The minority set aside law is a creation of the state legislature. It’s a horrible piece of legislation that needs to be repealed. It does nothing but create corruption.
But the state culpability doesn’t end there. Our state bidding laws are also a disaster, the worst in the nation, allowing the “lowest and best bid” to prevail. In most states the language is the “lowest responsive bidder” meaning that you respond to the bid specifications and you have the lowest bid. Performance bonds are used to ensure compliance.
But our state’s “lowest and best” language has given rise to RFPs, which stand for Request For Proposals but really should stand for Related Friends and Pals. RFPs have pushed aside the time-proven sealed bidding process, allowing officials to pick their cronies behind closed doors. It was this RFP process that allowed Lumumba to choose Richard’s Disposal over Waste Management, which led state officials to distrust Lumumba.
Of course, the national left-wing media portrayed the sob story of stingy right-wing Republican state leaders depriving the poor Democrats of Jackson basic necessities of life, all driven by white flight, which starved Jackson of revenue.
Except the city audits tell a different story. City revenues are increasing, not decreasing, going from $180 million in 2002 to $240 million in 2019. What nonsense.
It’s almost as though Lumumba has deliberately let this crisis occur so that the national Democrats will give him billions which he can dole out to crony contracts. When Vice President Kamala Harris said this week on Meet the Press that billions is on its way to Jackson, you can only shake your head in disbelief. This is not the proper way to run a city or a nation.
Lumumba defended himself at a recent press conference by waving three reports and saying he has always had a plan. I have seen all these reports. One was a report from former city engineer Charles Williams seeking to raise salaries 30 percent at the water plant to facilitate recruiting. Only problem was that Williams refused to go along with the Richard’s Disposal deal and was pushed out by Lumumba. No doubt his plan was shelved.
A second report was mainly a list of city streets to pave and water mains to repair. It was unrelated to the O. B. Curtis emergency. The third report, “Plan to Hinds Co Delegates Oct-Dec '21,” provides a detailed list of 20 capital expenditures items for the O. B. Curtis plant totaling $20.5 million. This was indeed a plan. The problem was the mayor and his staff did not follow the grant application protocol required by the state and the feds. The devil is in the details and Lumumba just didn’t get ‘er done.
State leaders in charge of matching American Rescue Plan (ARPA) dollars say Jackson is behind the curve in applying. This could add another $40 million to the $42 million the city has already received. That’s four times more than is needed to fund the $20.5 million capital expenditures for O. B. Curtis.
Congressman Bennie Thompson, who represents much of Jackson, complained that he has yet to see a plan from the city to fix O. B. Curtis. Obviously, there is a failure to communicate. This is on the Lumumba administration for not stroking the right bellies and following the proper funding procedures. It lies at the root of competence.
When diehard Democrat Thompson throws up his hands, you know it’s bad. Thompson told Mississippi Today, “I would not support the city being given back the authority to run it because it doesn’t make sense.”
No, it doesn’t make sense, so for goodness sake, let’s not do it. State leaders should create the independent utility district ASAP.
