Jackson Free Press

Show Me the Tummy
Dennis Grant, Probation Services Company Offender Services Coordinator said in a letter to Mayor Melton that he has not received proof of Melton's recent surgery in Texas. Melton's bond for his felony indictments requires him to report any departures from the state. A delay in the mayor's heart surgery required he file details with Grant.

By Jan. 29, however, Melton was still holding out on the information, according to Grant.

"This (delay), I have been informed, was due to further complications of medical procedures in Texas. However, I still have not received documentation verifying his surgery, performing physicians, and scheduled release and return to Jackson," wrote Grant in a letter filed Feb. 7 in the Circuit Clerk's office. "I will be making out a violation report if I have not received this information by the end of the week."

Neither Melton nor Grant returned calls to the JFP for comment.

This Time, It's Personal
State Health Officer Dr. Brian Amy announced in a House Health Committee meeting Tuesday that the Senate's recent call for him to step down as department head is the result of a witch hunt because he would not kowtow to demands from Sen. Alan Nunnelee, R-Tupelo, back in 2004.

"The first call I got in 2004 from Sen. Alan Nunnelee was to talk to me about a certificate of need, and I told him I couldn't talk to him about that," Amy told the committee. "(Nunnelee) said, 'By God, I'm the chairman of public health, you can talk to me anytime you want to,' and I said 'I'm not going to because this is not appropriate.' He said, 'If that's the way you want it, it's going to be a rocky four years for you.' It's been personal since day one."

Amy gave this response to a question from Rep. Jamie Franks, D-Mooreville, who asked why the improvement plan Amy submitted to the committee included a request for protection from "political intervention."

Amy has come under fire since last June when The Clarion-Ledger published reports on problems with the state's health agency. The paper says the agency has been failing to properly inform the public about disease outbreaks such as West Nile, even though Amy claimed today that the health department reported every case of the disease.

Nunnelee argues that the department also failed to enforce restaurant inspections, allowing eateries with persistent health violations to stay open, and also complained that the department has overseen the deterioration of its low-level ranks—including nurses and restaurant inspectors—while top-paid administrators got raises.

The Senate recently passed a bill that would replace both Amy and the board by June 30, and reduced his $213,315 a year salary to $1.

Barbour's Boy and Bad Stats
Senate Finance Chairman Tommy Robertson, R-Moss Point, said at the Mississippi State University's John C. Stennis Institute of Government luncheon that he does not support SB 3098, a bill that would cut the state's grocery tax while increasing the state's tax on cigarettes.

Robertson argued that the tax swap would hurt the middle class and damage small municipalities that draw revenue from the grocery tax—which is one of the highest in the nation.

"Before we start going in and cutting out the grocery tax, we need to look at what's going on down the road to our municipalities, and what it'll do to the middle-class people of this state who are having to pay, because people on food stamps don't pay the sales tax on groceries. …" Robertson said.

Walter Howell of the Mississippi branch of the AARP told Robertson that his pro-municipality argument was full of holes. "Cities would make money from the current Senate bill, based on recent research from the Stennis Institute," Howell said, referring to a Stennis Center study that said the tax swap would actually generate millions of extra dollars in revenue for Mississippi towns.

Robertson, who frequently votes in line with Gov. Haley Barbour, denied that Barbour is putting pressure on him to kill the bill in his committee, even though he said he may not allow the bill to live if the Senate does not stand solidly behind it. Robertson told the lunch crowd that phone calls to his office do not seem to be in support of the tax swap.

"People called my office, and they seem to not support the bill by a 60-40 margin," Robertson said.

Howell said he contested Robertson on the popularity of the bill. "I challenge you on this matter of people not supporting this tax. Every survey contradicts what you say," Howell said.

Previous Comments

ID

67439

Comment

"I am the Committee process" said Robertson at the luncheon. He is full of it. He supported the bill last year, but after an ethics committee - which reports to governor- cleared him of an ethics complaint, he is solidly behind the governor. Nice deal he made! And there is no way those calls were 60-40. They were overwhelmingly in favor of the tax swap.

Author

jd

Date

2007-02-15T11:41:37-06:00