Jackson Ward 2 City Councilman Melvin Priester, Jr. provided a rather interesting update on yesterday's meeting of the Jackson City Council on his Facebook page:
Today's City Council meeting was interesting in that EVERY major city issue was addressed from code enforcement to JRA to water bills/siemens to abortion to the zoo. We talked about police. We appointed a new planning director. Seriously, everything got laid out today.
I'm very excited that we appointed Jordan Hillman as the new director of planning. That team is in the midst of upgrading operations and rolling out some sorely needed improvements that I'll share in a later post.
With respect to the Zoo, we voted to individually contract with current staff to keep the animals fed but will be shutting the zoo to the public while continuing to explore the possibility of having a new private company take over operations.
I'm not even going to comment on the proposed law limiting harassment outside medical facilities. I think the city attorney very aptly laid out the legal issues and why we have an extremely pressing government interest in trying to bring some sanity to an otherwise bonkers scenario. Okay, I'll make one comment.
I am absolutely, 100% convinced that give or take 20 years from now, one of these bored kids that gets drug to City Council meetings to wait for their parent to make a public comment will be in a bar on whatever 2039's version of a Tindr/Grindr date is.
His/her date is going to ask "so, why did you move here?" And this person is going to reply, "As a kid, my family was SUPER-religious. I didn't even go to school, they just posted me up outside the only abortion clinic in a 3-hour radius day-after-day. Anyway, I'm 12 or 13 and my folks would always take me to Jackson City Council meetings to protest abortion. We'd sit there for HOURS so dad could talk for like 3 minutes. It was soooooo boring. He made me sit there and film it on my cell phone even though it was a televised meeting. Anyway, I swore to myself at like the 4 hour point of dying on one of these hard benches for the millionth time that as SOON as I turned 18, I'd get sooooo far away from Jackson and never look back. So here I am, living in San Francisco, working for planned parenthood. You know how it turns out. Anyway, what was your childhood like?".
What else happened?
We did not get a unanimous vote to borrow money to make repairs to the water-sewer billing system. So unless the administration brings that back at a later date, we're going to have to find a few million to pay for some already in-progress repairs and to repay waste-management for the settlement of our dispute over recycling.
My expectation is that our Bond Insurers and/or the EPA will put the screws in us to raise water-sewer rates since the borrow-to-fund-repair option was shut down. We'll see how long that takes. Hopefully some discussion behind the scenes will occur and we'll take another shot at the borrowing approach. If that doesn't pan out, I genuinely don't know how much time we have left to come up with alternative plans. I doubt it's much time.
You can't make any of this up. Who needs Netflix?
22 comments:
....and to repay waste-management for the settlement of our dispute over recycling.
What in the wide, wide world of sports does that mean?
A zoo, in a bankrupt town, that's located in a ghetto with less income than it's expenses. What could possibly go wrong ?
This guy is brilliant and humorous.
I'd never have guessed that Melvin knows what Grindr is.
the zoo: how can the lack of the proper license have not been noticed by the city when looking at a potential operator??? it’s also clear that the city is desperate to keep the animals at the zoo- leveraging a mystery “six million dollar” water bill out there...
sort of “you don’t have to pay the bill if we get the animals” situation
it could really end up with the animals being replaced and jackson having a zoo without any animals to exhibit...
Melvin went to Harvard and Stanford and is hugely intelligent. I venture to say he's much better educated than all of the wiseguys on this blog.
If the city closes the zoo to the public I sure hope there is a watch dog group out there to keep an eye on that.
Should have let them move the zoo off of I-55, as it was proposed years ago, it's not that far.
I know the area and no offense, but the zoo, animals, and ALL it's patrons would be better served if it had been moved.
You have to admire Melvin for being willing to put up with the buffoonery on the city council. He's exactly what the City of Jackson needs, but I'm shocked that a person of his education and intelligence is willing to deal with that crap. More power to him!
3:11 I'm sure you wrote your seven digit check to put a down payment on your grand idea - that you state was "proposed" but nothing in the proposal you refer to provided anything toward how to pay the fifty to hundred million dollars that move would have cost.
There is no reason at all for the city, the state or any regional group to spend the money to build a new zoo - where you suggest or anywhere else in the metro area.
You, and the City Council, and all the members of the Zoo Board, and all the others that think it would be 'nice' to have a zoo, if it were 'somewhere else', and all the idiots that think the only thing our city should do is maintain the zoo where it is because it is there - and anybody else ----- realize that the city of Jackson can't pay its current bills. It can't pay to keep the doors open on essential operations. It refuses to do what is required to keep its utility system operating, upgrading the accounting system so that bills can be sent and payment demanded.
The city doesn't have the money to keep its basic infrastructure maintained, much less improved. The roads are crumbling; the decades old water lines are rupturing; the sewer lines are collapsing.
Why the hell do we think that maintaining a zoo ---- and I don't give a damn who manages it or where it is located - is essential to the quality of life in the capital city.
Would it be nice? Absolutely. But cleaning up the school system is much more important to maintain the current tax base, the few taxpayers that still live in the city and are fighting to maintain it.
Fixing the roads, the water, and the sewer are more important than 'repairing' the facility at the zoo, much less spending another million or so dollars every year to subsidize the operation.
Just like the convention center - the city can't even clean up the parking lot across the street to keep it from looking like an abandoned manufacturing plant site, but they want to think about funding several tens of millions of dollars to subsidize 'friends' in their scheme to build a convention hotel. Recognize that its too late - that horse left the barn a decade ago.
Priester is somewhat recognizing the reality of the situation in his post here, but still holding out hope that 'maybe' we can open the zoo sometime soon, once they negotiate a deal with this new 'operator' that Chockwae promises us is one of the best in the world. But of course it has yet to be told how much we will have to subsidize this group in order to maintain this dinosaur.
The hope is that Jackson can keep its financial head above water - that the bondholders and other creditors of the city don't pull the plug as payments are not made promptly.
Forget moving the zoo. Forget spending money to do necessary 'repairs' to the zoo. Deal with relocating the animals and forget having to keep the employees on a payroll, and having to purchase feed and medical care for them.
Turn the property into a playground if you want. But admit that the city can't have everything it has always provided; hell it can't even keep up the required services.
Hopefully a few folks on the council will face reality and stop this madness.
But I guess that hope is just as foolish as hoping the Great Pumpkin will visit Charlie Brown next month.
12:49, I doubt you’ve noticed, but Melvin is well liked on this blog. He’s respected for being pretty much the only person in city hall articulating coherent thoughts. Jackson would be better off with him as mayor. His campaign never got much traction, as he doesn’t hate whitey enough.
Can't believe they did not re-employ Carl Allen as Planning Director. He's worked for the city (as a subordinate in that dept) six or seven times and is brilliant, so he claims.
Next: The zoo is a lost cause. Why would such a brilliant councilman waste his time pretending that it's not. And why so many 'experts' continue to opine regarding solutions to the zoo is beyond me.
Finally: Melvin is simply another clown, like all the rest who sit beside him and have preceded him for the past twenty five years. But, he's a better educated clown, so that makes some sort of difference. Right? And, oh, besides...when he becomes mayor, who will be our 37th police chief in 26 years?
@5:19
12:49 here... I went to St. Andrews with Melvin and I'm also a friend of his. Why would you send me that message. I do live in NE Jackson and I'm also white. So your post makes absolutely zero sense.
I hope Melvin Priester continues talking. Whether I agree totally or not at all with his opinion, he presents the facts well. There are more articles and post documenting the recent meeting and votes. Jackson’s insolvency has long been predicted and it seems the time is upon us. I’m glad one vote held out. This was not a solution it was a less than guaranteed stop gap measure. The mayor has no answers. The Siemens litigation will take years and will cost millions. The water situation alone will bankrupt the city. The mayor and most of the city leadership are not capable of running a one man business. It’s like a scene out of idiocracy every single time
the mayor and his minions speak. Even worse than hearing these fools speak is when you look at the financials.
The zoo is done. Hiring an non credentialed outfit is beyond pathetic. This is basic due diligence. Did the mayor really attend college?
Next, we will be hearing it will cost 5-10 million to close.
The rest of the city infrastructure is in worse condition. As the deferred maintenance continues the costs to fix it increases exponentially.
Might as well bring the feds in now. These over- employed fools are in way over their heads. The mayor may not have entered into the Siemens deal but he sure as hell was around while it had disaster written all over it. That was the time to play hardball with the vendor.
The mayor failed from day one in office. All the catchy phrases and faux sophicated language in his silly little speeches is only cover for incompetence. Just the fact that he holds s press conference to announce the routine pavement 2000 yards of roadway demonstrates he is smoke and mirrors. The same is true of the last few decades of mayors.
If the Feds audit the books and accurately depict expected long term liabilities, we all know it is going to be much worse than we have been told. But, it is high time to get on with it. Put the city in receivership. Get on with it now before it gets much much worse.
5:19 well said
I'm more surprised they hired a white lady for planning director... of course head of public works hired by baby Chokwe is also white.
Jackson Mississippi has NEVER had political leadership capable or qualified to navigate the kind of financial vacuum it now faces. The politicians have ALWAYS played to the emotions and biases of the ignorant voters, black and white. Priester represents something new and unique in this place but he needs plenty of help which is not forthcoming. He can only chronicle the fall.
Crack is dangerous and makes you say stupid things.
How can the protesters be the biggest issue to solve for these clueless leader?
Its freedom of speech. But oh they are mostly white. How many black babies have to be killed?
So Melvin doesn't mind that Panned Parenthood aborts a far higher percentage of black kids which absolutely fits into the eugenic philosophy of its founders. Yep, you can't make this up.
He's 'well liked' on this blog. As if there's any proof of that and if it were, what the hell difference does it make? F Mickens was 'well liked' too, but he was an imbecile.
10:47:...speaking of saying stupid things, your post makes absolutely no sense.
I feel Priester is taking a stab at those of us who choose to homeschool and are pro- life. I find his frustrations with the city council to be on point, but the middle paragraphs are highly offensive to me. It paints those who have certain convictions out to ALL be the same in the way they express them. Until leadership focuses on the morale of our city -as well as these issues- we will just be putting band aids on huge injuries.
Maybe people homeschool in this city- because sending their kids to public school means exposure to deplorable language by their counterparts, putting them in a classroom where the teacher has no budget to even buy paint to cover the filth written on the classroom walls, and using textbooks that prior students abuse by drawing their own illustrations and writing their own vulgar commentaries in, (and are redistributed to students without consideration). I know the aforementioned to be true- because I taught in JPS... and now choose to not expose my kids to such filth. My taxes still have to support such mayhem- and for that, I more than do my part, but leave us out of the equation of your stereotypical generalities as you express your valid concerns please . We just want the freedoms to truly teach morals to our kids and guard their hearts.
Post a Comment