Jackson Free Press

When it comes to Jackson, there's not much that still surprises city attorney Pieter Teeuwissen after nine years total representing the city, four of them as city attorney.

He's served two different mayors, working as head of litigation under former mayor Frank Melton and, since 2009, for Harvey Johnson, Jr.

This morning, Teeuwissen spoke at Friday Forum at Koinonia Coffee House on a range of topics pertinent to Jacksonians, including the Environmental Protection Agency's consent decree, much-needed water and sewer improvements and school millage rates, among other subjects.

Teeuwissen, 47, has a unique perspective on the capitol city, having graduated magna cum laude from Tougaloo College in 1986. This morning, he sounded as much like a history professor as an attorney as he shared some of that perspective with the crowd of 25-30 interested coffee-drinkers.

"The problems with the infrastructure go back to 1988, when some of us still had hair," Teeuwissen said, rubbing his bald head to laughs from the audience. "Former Mayor Dale Danks had a fee tacked onto the citizens' water bills, and part of Kane Ditto's platform was to remove that fee, which he said was unnecessary. He really beat Danks up with that issue, then after he got elected, he realized, 'Uh, oh, I need that fee to keep up the sewer and wastewater system,' so he didn't remove it until he was running for re-election in 1997.

"So when Harvey Johnson came into office, it was like 'Hey! You're Jackson's first black mayor. Congratulations! Now, I'm cutting off your crucial infrastructure funding.' Then they wanted to say he couldn't handle balancing the budget."

One audience member asked about the legal proceedings surrounding the problem with Jackson's blighted homes, and suggested a program where the city somehow would repossess some property from the state and sell it to citizens for $1, so they could bring the house up to code. Teeuwissen did his best to explain the legalese of a problem that has stumped many a city-council member.

"We don't have the authority to start any kind of creative homesteading program," Teeuwissen said. "The state legislature would have to give us the authority to do that. What happens right now is someone doesn't pay their taxes for a few years, and when nobody buys their house at a tax sale, that house is struck off and put in the custody of the state. (The state isn't) going to cut the grass, and they aren't going to keep them up, they just sit on them. ... We need cooperation of the state legislature to do anything like (a homestead program)."

Teeuwissen added that to get that help, the city council must make the issue part of their resolutions for the next legislative session. Citizens can help by contacting their state legislators to express how much it is needed.

With the recent election of Mayor Chokwe Lumumba, Teeuwissen could be out of a city job soon. Traditionally, incoming mayors choose their own city attorney. Although Lumumba hasn't made his intentions public one way or the other, he could decide to keep Teeuwissen. The men know each other based on their familiarity from Lumumba's four years serving on the Jackson City Council.

"I do not know which direction the administration is going to go in, whether they will retain me or not," Teeuwissen said. "But whatever they decide to do, I'll support that decision and this administration. I'll do it because I love Jackson and I want to see it prosper."