Friday, July 13, 2018

Mayor Closes Clinton Library

Clinton Mayor Phil Fisher announced at a press conference held at his office today that he closed the Clinton Library last night.

Nobody Home

Mayor Fisher said that the city and Jackson-Hinds Library System had never agreed to a lease for the building. The city built the library at a cost of $8 million in 2010. Mayor Fisher said the restrooms suffered from severe sewage problems. He said that the city was responsible for the maintenance of the building.  Mayor Fisher said JHLS Executive Director Patty Furr posted a note about the sewage problems on the front door of the library instead of contacting his office. The insurance company also said had concerns about providing coverage when a tenant without a lease occupied the building.

Public Works crews on the scene.
Mayor Fisher said the main issue over the failure to sign a lease agreement was the naming of the building.  He said:

The sticking point of that agreement was the naming of the facility, the naming of the rooms in the facility, the ownership of the FFE (Building, Furnishings, Equipment), and artwork. The Quisenberry family has a long history in Clinton and their generous donation of 20 acres made this facility a possibility. Part of that donation was the naming rights. The previous May r honored that, as will I. The $700,000 in FFE and artwork was p id for by Clinton taxpayers and must remain in the Quisenberry Library - FFE and Artwork Belong Here, in Clinton, at the Quisenberry Library.

The Mayor said that he will not reopen the library until JHLS signs a lease agreement.  The JHLS Board meets on July 25 although the Mayor pointed out it could call an earlier meeting.  The city will fix the sewer problems while the library is closed.  Several Public Works vehicles were at the library this afternoon.




Page 1: Note posted on door.
Page 2: Mayor Fisher's statement.






46 comments:

Anonymous said...

What a bully

Anonymous said...

How many libraries operate in JHLS? And Clinton wants its own rules. JHLS should pull out all the books. And the gigabit internet.

Anonymous said...

The video is on the Clinton Facebook page. Dude still wears a three piece suit like George Jefferson. Good Mayor though.

Anonymous said...

"An overload of the children's restroom facility..." What the hell, they got a special children's restroom facility? Does it have a 4 foot tall door to get in and out of?

Anonymous said...

What is the JHLS?

Alpha Storm said...

Jackson-Hinds Library System

Anonymous said...

I know the mayor of Clinton and he is a good man. If he feels the restrooms are dangerous because of the number of children there, then they probably are. Children nowadays can mean any size and any stage of maturity.

Anonymous said...

At least there is one elected Phil in MS that backs up words with action.

Anonymous said...


Let me guess, JHLC wanted to name it the "Obama" library, or some shit like that.


Anonymous said...

Since the City owns the Building, land and furnishings, they can tell the library Board to hit the road hoppy toad.........Clinton can run their own library.

Anonymous said...

Good move Mayor - too bad we can't expand our city limits west and pick up you for our Mayor; someone who will take action rather than try to build up a radical city.

The JHLS "leadership" has been a joke for several years; recently, supervisor Morgan made a good appointment that rankled the members that thought it was their private plaything. Glad to see people standing up to their incompetence and arrogance; would hate to see it for all the taxpayers in Hinds County, but if they don't want to learn how to play well with others in the sandbox and share the toys appropriately would support you in pulling out all together from the system. Probably plenty of places to get a new stock of books, which is the only thing JHLS provides to Clinton in this arrangement.

Anonymous said...

phil for governor! he’s actually doing what he was elected to do.

Anonymous said...

Phil Fisher is a good man that gets results and doesn’t tolerate BS. He’s a retired General Officer from the Army National Guard and commanded the fighting 184th ESC in Afghanistan. He’s playing hardball with JHLC because he has to.

Anonymous said...

Actually Morgan’s appointment is at odds with Clinton’s position but all three folks are doing a good job in a tough spot.

Anonymous said...

Hinds County has been very proactive with the library commission and they are working well together. The county even stepped in to help with Eudora Welty. Maybe there is a role the county can play in the Clinton stand off.

Anonymous said...

FIsher voted against the library when he was alderman. He’s always hated the fact that they built it and this is his revenge.

Anonymous said...

As someone who recently dealt with a ruptured sewer line, it is a BIG DEAL. As in, couldn't live in house for several weeks and made my plumber $7,000 richer, deal.

Yazoo clay expands 2 to 3 times it's size when wet, and contracts the same when dry. The heaving of the ground caused our sewer line to break, so that the broken ends were no longer matched up. The soil around the break was dense clay, which does not drain.

The end result is that you can't use any water because the drain line stays backed up. If you try, you will have an overflowing sink or toilet.

Sewer lines often run through, or under, the concrete foundation. If the sinks and toilets are somewhere other than an exterior wall, you'll have to empty out your room, remove the flooring, and jackhammer through your foundation before digging up the old line and replacing it with new. Then concrete patching, replacement flooring, and refurnishing.

Yes, it's a very big deal. I hate yazoo clay.

Anonymous said...

City of Clinton VS JHLS? I bet we (City of Clinton) win. I have an opinion. We could join the Madison, or Rankin, or Warren County Library System and be a lot better treated that we are with the ongoing political joke that is the JHLS. The Quisenberry family were great people who generously gave the land for the building. the city built the facility. we could fairly easily stock it with books. I see nothing worthwhile that JHLS might offer to this partnership.

The City of Clinton has been willing to repair the plumbing from day one, but our insurance carrier will not honor the claim, since JHLS seems to be too wrapped in politics to sign the agreement with Clinton. As far as I am concerned, JHLS can go pound salt.


Not related to this latest problem, but a question for the lawyers out there. Can Clinton leave Hinds county and become a part of Madison County? Clinton does touch Madison County up close to Pocahontas. What a good thing it would be to pull out of the crap that is Hinds County! If not a plan to join Madison County, then could we leave and become the county of Clinton? Free State of Clinton?

Anonymous said...

This ain’t got nothing to do with insurance claims and sewers. The Mayor is taking a hard line on who owns the furniture and artwork the city bought. And the naming rights. He is right, but the city should have just said as much in the first place rather than all this insurance bs. He’s a good mayor and a terrible PR specialist.

Anonymous said...

That’s the best library in the system. Period.

Anonymous said...

Libraries are the next Blockbuster. Just cut taxpayer losses. They are just hang out spots for people checking social media who don’t have internet’s at home.

Anonymous said...

Where the hell is the grand piano? I call bull on that. Source?

Wasn't us the Legos said...

The grand piano is missing? Perhaps a gang of 5 year olds managed to flush it down the toilet in the Children's Restroom??

Anonymous said...

There has never been a grand piano in the clinton library. Somebody better call that child prodigy they just made auditor.

Let them eat cake said...

Who goes to the library in 2018 anyway. Close then all

Meanwhile - In The Arena.. said...

Cindy and the other Phil will be making a PR stop at the Clinton library next week. They're already floating the notion that McDaniel favors burning books. Never let a crisis go to waste.

Anonymous said...

Libraries are taxpayer funded internet cafes and places for stinky vagrants to hang out and "shower" in the restrooms. Yes, "shower," as they use the sinks.

Anonymous said...

What the hell do you think sinks are for if not for 'washing up'? Why use the sink after you urinate? You don't piss on your hands do you. Do you prefer that they stink? Quit bitching about nothing!

Anonymous said...

There was a very good regional system made up of 7 counties but Jackson and Hinds pulled out to do their own thing. The only hope for Jackson and Hinds to for all services to become regional but the only way that will happen is for Jackson to die first.

Anonymous said...

Kingfish there was never a baby grand piano in the Quisenberry library. The piano that is in the meeting room was donated by the Clinton Lions club. And as for the art work....there was no money in the budget for art so local artists donated all the work in the building, which Is valued at $68,000 to $70,000. And there are no chandeliers. Light fixtures, yes. If you’re going to put out statements for the public the least you could do is make sure there’s some modicum of truth to them.

Anonymous said...

So JHLS wants the artwork and is against Clinton naming the building? Did I read that right?

Anonymous said...

If the City of Clinton owns the building and has bo contractual obligations regarding the building, they can vote to demolish the building. As far as naming goes, how about “The Clinton Library “.

Anonymous said...

8:51 AM Bless your bleeding heart.

Kingfish said...

Spoke to the Mayor and here's the deal. City spent $30k on artwork. $20k worth was donated. Mayor jokingly calls those light fixtures chandeliers and took him literally as I haven't been in that library but one time. There is a piano but not a grand. Still a lot of $$$ to spend on artwork for the library not to $8 million for building.

Anonymous said...

I beg your pardon! Yes, the insurance company DOES care about a lease agreement. It’s the only way to properly assign responsibilities for upkeep and repair of the facility. The insurance company does not expect to have to pay for damage caused by that tenant, whether through its negligence or deliberate action. And it shouldn’t have to. Or, at least the very least, it should know of this expectation up front so the appropriate premium can be charged for that increased risk.

Anonymous said...

At this point the work of the General Contractor needs to be looked at. He is located in Brookhaven. What I do know about him and have done work for him only once is he wants a very cheap price. I held my feet to the fire and said no on a different project. The civil plans need to be addressed as well and the mechanical and plumbing. Someone needs to ask the question as to where the limits of where the soil had to be undercut, refer back to geo tech report, and see if the plumber backfilled as required where he dug for the tie in. If the geo tech report stated how much and where the soil had to be undercut and refilled with proper fill dirt and it wasn’t, then there is a claim that should be filed. This crap goes on day after day and that’s why inspections are needed. Ask yourself this because I hear it from residential builders and dirt contractors putting in pads all the time. Do you want your house built on substandard fill to save a few dollars so you can have a pond in the front or back of your house? I think you’re getting the picture

Anonymous said...

Nobody holds their own feet to the fire. You got your sayings mixed up.

Anonymous said...

1:15 is clearly a Mayor apologist or an City employee. The supposed claim arose from something that happened when here was no lease. Doing a lease now has no effect on that claim.

Anonymous said...

Libraries are about as obsolete as condom machines in Texaco service stations. Move on please..........

PittPanther said...

Bad construction in Mississippi is always blamed on Yazoo Clay. Did they not see the clay when they built the building? Why wasn't anything done at that time, prior to construction? This was built only 8 years ago - hardly the dark ages of building construction. I'm really sick of construction firms putting up shoddy buildings that don't last, and then blaming the dirt when it inevitable fails.

Anonymous said...

951, the c9ntractor only builds what the architrct/engineer designs and specifies. And the A/E is paid to provide continual inspections throughout the construction to insure it is built as specified. An $8 million public building would have required a complete set of plans - general, mechanical, electrical, site work - defining the requirements. If it was not proper planned and specified, don't blame the contractor. Again, he only puts in what was speced, which was what the owner paid for. When you go to What-a-Burger and order a single, but the cashier looks at you and just 'knows' you want a double with cheese and bacon, he still only gives you a single because that's what you ordered and paid for.

If the building is having problems, start first by defining the cause of the problem, then seeing if it was built as designed. Your jumping on the contractor here and across the board statewide shows a gross ignorance of the process.

Anonymous said...

That HIDEOUS building is less than a decade old? It looks like something from 1955. Was there any period, in Mississippi, when public buildings ceased to be built in that grim style? From what I can tell, the local architects bought a style book, back in 1949, and have been cranking-out ugly "modern" public buildings, using that one style book, without interruption, up to the present day.

That grotesque library was NOT cheap to build. It just LOOKS cheap. Why do Mississippians tolerate buildings which cost so much to build, but which look so awful?

Anonymous said...

11:37, why do we have government buildings that HAVE to be designed so elaborate?!! Take for instance Mississippi Employment Security Commion on I-220. Yep, look at that building and if you don’t know what it is it looks like a research center and looks nothing like a building that doles out unemployment funds. Did we really need that much of a building to show off? Same here on the library. Did you need such a grand design? Keep it simple! Save us some money....8 million dollars and you can’t even flush the toilets.

8:47, say what you want but when we start accepting the most qualified bid instead of the lowest bid then we will see changes. But we know that’s not going to happen.

Anonymous said...

Libraries are not obsolete. They do provide internet to a portion of the population who either can't afford it, or aren't able to have it in their homes. I visit two regional libraries weekly. I am never not in one where a librarian isn't assisting with a job application or schoolwork. Ours has weekly programs for children that are packed. They have ongoing reading programs for children and host local meetings. Of course they also check out books and media materials. Just because you don't read doesn't mean that others don't.

Anonymous said...

That director is not worried about county libraries all she is about is the city. She cut the county library hours to punish the county. Never did she discuss cutting the city branches. She cut the employees pay as well. She is the culprit. Investigate her and see where she came from and what she did at her last job.

Anonymous said...

4:11PM : You are so right about that director. But the city branches unless located in good areas get nothing. Most of the branches in both the city and county are in poor condition,and instead of doing something about them, she wastes tons of money on unnecessary things. Investigate her. Heck there are paintings "missing" that are valued at $6,000 and if they aren't returned she was told that she would have to write a check. Come on now,that alone along with all the other mess is enough for someone to look into things.



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