Jackson Jambalaya

Well Mayor Jokeway, the Zoo doesn't have the green. You won't be able to make this problem go away with dogma and rhetoric spewed during some out-of-town stump speech.

You OWN it now Pardner.

Bottom line, a cash flow problem that Jackson mayoral administrations have only made worse going on a decade. The Zoo is obviously insolvent.

Not sure how they are going to pay that

JPS just got scratch. they could buy the zoo. they have more than enough administrators

No worries in paying it back. JPS has money to give away.

The city will have no problem paying this. All they will have to do is "borrow" it from the newly approved School Bond. Everybody is happy and everybody wins.

I assume this is the first step towards demanding the $ from the management and board. Know what you’re being asked to do when you serve on a board people. There’s a reason financials are presented at every meeting.

Jackson is a prime example of how ineffective/destructive democratic policies and practices are. Spend other people’s money, expecting them to keep paying and you are never held accountable.

Since he thinks he can train ex-cons to run the city's 100GB fiber network maybe BabyChok can train ex-cons to run the Zoo too! Problem solved.

According to the CL:

Mayor Chokwe Antar Lumumba released the following statement on Poff’s resignation: “We thank Beth Poff for her service. We remain focused on the goal of providing a quality zoo and have already started the process of selecting new management."

My first quote would be: "I want to thank Beth Poff and the Zoo Board for agreeing to repay all the money. They have spared us from having to sue them for this gross mismanagement. Now we can go about repairing streets and fixing our infrastructure."

Then again, maybe the legislature will seek to take over the zoo board like they did with the airport and this will all go away. The Pelahatchie Zoo has a nice ring to it.

What time does the zoo open on Saturday?

Sell off the assets (including the animals I guess), pay the money back and shut this disaster down.

The Zoo better pay....you don't wanna mess with Shadrock!

Once again, the solution to this is to put Tater on the board. He can easily get the funds allocated by the state and his staff can verbally tell DFA to back off.

I want to feel sympathy for Ms. Poff because she was in a bad situation. I want to think she just wanted to provide for those animals. But when you read paragraph 2 about the Zoo "knowingly and willfully" and you see that the "zoo withheld information regarding the misappropriation form the DFA while reporting to the DFA as required by the MOUs", then I see know reason why Ms. Poff shouldn't serve some jail time.

Honest mistakes are one thing. Willfully and knowingly doing something is another. Then withholding the misappropriation is even worse.

Seen the RFP yet KF?

How much was that little street from Potato's neighborhood to the shopping center? $2.5 Million?

Imagine what that could do for the zoo...

Saw WLBT footage of the Rhino at the Jackson Zoo and you could barely see it because the damn weeds were so high. Can you not mow grass in Jackson anymore? Can you not at least try to make the Zoo more presentable with something as easy as keeping the grass mowed?

10:54 you hit the nail on the head. Put Tate on the board. Then DOT will coincidentally build a dedicated road to I-220 just for zoo access.

Failure to move the Zoo years ago has led to this.

Dang 11:38 - let's don't stop there. How much is MDOT spending to rebuild Highway 49S? $35 million? Imagine what that could do for the zoo.

What a stupid comment, trying to continue the farce that Melinda Mc started (with the help of a couple of political operatives, and the inept coopting of Pender) while hoping to try to make dirty water stick to glue.

Try again with an actual scandal next time. Or, just stick with the scandal of Ms. Poff's and a couple of the ExBoard of the Society stealing of public funds secured by the zoo's highly paid lobbyist.

Why in the hell did you let her do this Kingfish? Were you too busy blogging to provide proper oversight?

@10:39

I believe the zoo opens every day at 8am, but that could be wrong. I know I've been there at 9am a few times recently on the weekends and it was open.

Ms. Poff defense will be "I am a zoo keeper and I do not know anything about handling money. I am suppose to have several aids for that".

Would Someone Please Answer This "How is the Jackson Zoo gonna pay back 350,000 dollars by November 16th?"

Also, from the way this story is unfolding, it seems like there's something unethical and fishy on both sides. Anyone agree??

I wonder what "Kingfish" would be posting were he not on the GD BOARD! He would be profiling every one of the board members and skewering their "negligent asses".

King Fish, sorry about my previous comment. This whole affair with the zoo just keeps pissing me off. I would like more info on the oversight responsibility for Zoo Boss and how she was able to do what she did for so long. I respect the fact that you are not giving personal opinions because you are on the board.

2:29, the difference is that people actually use 49 or 220. Literally no one will use that Dogwood Festival access road.

$2.5 million could feed a lot of animals and renovate a lot of cages, or it could buy Potato a private road to Belk so he can buy his empty suits.

Is somebody going to ask how they hell DFA didn't figure this out. If this has been going on 9 years, at some point shouldn't they ask why the money has not been spent on capital improvements? Hell, this just tells everybody else in the state to do the same thing. DFA is asleep.

What backs these bonds revenue from Zoo or full faith and credit of City? Is the CPA audit done each year and how long has it been shown the money was being mishandled?

1038, a lot more people would use the access road than would visit the zoo. My point about Hwy 49 was,that one can always find money that could be used other ways but you want to try to trot out a non-story political hit piece and make,an absurd connection - just,as feeding the animals with Hwy 49 dollars,is,an absurd example. (Or we could go get the $3,5 million from the Oxford road project that for some reason never gets mentioned - maybe because of its 'sponsor'?)

The state has no business being in the JACKSON zoo. The state has every business in building roads - and access roads. If you want to continue your diatribe on the access road, why don't you first look at why, and how, the Jackson zoo continued to get a million dollars,every year from the state. They paid big dollars to a highly paid lobbyist and her one job was to continue getting bond money sent to the city's zoo - with what they hoped evidently had little strings attached.

I believe these were bonds issued by the state, so they are backed by the state, not the COJ. And....shows why these boondoggle bond projects every year are a bad idea. You got a hundred entities lobbying for their little critical project, and their legislator goes hat in hand to the speaker and the Lt Gov. And the state goes to issue bonds and dole out the political favors. Bad politics.

So the State of Mississippi messed all this up due to a lack of oversight. That money is gone and will never be repaid to the State. State will pay off this and many many other fool bonds and no one is the wiser. Move on this is SOP.

Why in the hell did you let her do this Kingfish? Were you too busy blogging to provide proper oversight?

Excellent Question. Yup. That is a very good question. Sure is.