Jackson Jambalaya

There should NOW be a re-call on The Mayor. Impeachment ? And i'm being serious here. What would it hurt.

See the game? As he now effectively recognizes no formal Council authority to say 'No' to anything, Lumumba is going to get Richards paid (since he controls all the mechanisms to do so) before the Court shuts him down.

So, the Mayor can govern by decree?

so the Mayor will ignore democracy at work? This is very creative interpretation in my eyes, b/c the judge stated, the mayor can over-rule the councils rejection by engaging the judicial process, having to show the "council was arbitrary and capricious in overriding his veto." It appears, the Mayor has interpreted that as he is the final say as to wether or not the council was arbitrary and capricious, and HE decides the final say no matter what....I read it as if he feels the council was wrong in over riding his veto, then the burden of proof is on him to prove the council is wrong to the detriment of the city and it's citizens, and he can do this in a COURT of LAW. IMO, the Mayor is currently acting as "Lord High Supreme Enlightened One"

I have never heard of veto'ing something that has been rejected. Even if that WAS a thing, the legislative branch is still the only branch that can approve or reject.. he doesn't automatically get dual-powers here. Technically, if he could legally veto, then there's nothing... no contract and no vote. Nothing has been approved.

WHEREAS, why have a city council, right?

What a truly colossal mistake on Dickinsin's part. He was obviously clueless as to lengths Lumumba will go to abuse power.

The Mayor's best friend is making 700k+ just to install internet in a trailer for Richard's Disposal on this invalid contract..

tl;dr--The statute itself says the mayor can't veto a "no" vote. But even if he can, the result would be a non-vote, not a "yes" vote.

The notion that the mayor can "veto" a council vote that does not pass comes from Justice Dickinson's musing that the mayor can veto an "ordinance," that "ordinance" includes "any other official actions of the council," and that a vote to reject a contract is an "official action" of the council, and that therefore a vote to reject must be an "ordinance" that is subject to veto. Aside from being conceptually absurd, that interpretation doesn't even mesh with the rest of the statute.

Section 21-8-17(2) explains the mechanism for how the mayor's veto power works, and it says that when the mayor receives an "ordinance" that has been "submitted" to him, he's got 10 days to "either approve the ordinance by affixing his signature thereto or return it to the council by delivering it to the clerk of the council together with a statement setting forth his objections thereto or to any item or part thereof." So right there in the section giving the mayor veto power, it's clear that an "ordinance" is something that is submitted to the mayor and is capable of being either signed or returned to the clerk of the council.

Also, as Justice Dickinson noted, section 21-8-17(2) does say that only "ordinances adopted by the council" are subject to veto. I wonder if the code says anything about how the council "adopts" an ordinance?

Section 21-8-11(2) explains how council voting works, and it says that "the affirmative vote of a majority of the quorum at any meeting shall be necessary to adopt any motion, resolution or ordinance, or to pass any measure whatever unless otherwise provided in this chapter." So there it is. The only way for the council to "adopt" an ordinance is by an "affirmative vote of a majority of the quorum," which means a vote in which a majority votes "yea" on the ordinance. By definition, a vote that fails is not an "affirmative vote" and therefore cannot be an ordinance "adopted" by the council subject to veto.

But let's just say that all this is completely wrong. Let's assume the mayor can veto a no vote. What does that do?

Section 21-8-17(2) says that "no ordinance or any item or part thereof shall take effect without the mayor's approval," unless he fails to return it on time or the council overrides the veto. So an effective veto of an ordinance means the ordinance doesn't take effect. As Justice Dickinson said, a contract is not binding or enforceable unless it has been properly approved by the council. So council APPROVAL is needed.

If the council holds a vote to approve the contract and the vote fails, if it is possible for the mayor to effectively "veto" that failed vote, then at best the effect of the veto is that the council's no vote does not take effect. The result would be the same as if the council did not have the vote at all. It would not be the same as if the council had voted "yea."

The mayor gets away from Judge Dickenson and to the only Hinds County Judge (circuit or chancery) not recusing him/herself to get Richard's paid. The matter will be appealed either way but now he at least gets his foot firmly in the legal door.

@2:58
Who is the friend making 700k? Is it Socretes?

So the key Council strategy is that they CAN override the Mayor's veto "With the majority of those present and voting" makes it simple. I'm more than certain Kenny Stokes can hold a door closed with Virgi, Angelique and Grizzel pushing against him from the other side. Nobody said anything about losing a quorum, yet. Right?

Dickinson is less and less impressive with each outing.

Anybody picking up garbage today?

What's the point of the city council then?
Seems like the mayor is going to do whatever he wants from now on.
This is ridiculous!
I wish he would fight against crime this hard.

Pretty poor judge if your decision cannot be understood by either party. Time for a new judge.

Akil Bakari

@3:17 - Asking the question that counts.

No Justice No Peace No Garbage Pickup

Mayor runs screaming from the judge that has been bending over backwards to help him.

3:01 pm. You cited only part of the statute, go to § 21-8-47 which defines ordinance:

The term “ordinance” as used in this chapter shall be deemed to include ordinances, resolutions, orders and any other official actions of the council, except those procedural actions governing the conduct of the council's meetings, appointing a clerk of council, and exercising the council's investigative functions under Section 21-8-13(4).

The city Council's disapproval or refusal to approved the contract submitted by the Mayor is clear an "ordinance" or "resolution" or Order. It can was veto by the Mayor, the city council can only override that veto 2/3 vote. If they fail to do so then the Richard's contract is approved.

For those of you that claim mayor can't veto a "no vote" you are just wrong in my opinion. The veto is of an "Order" disapproving or refusing to approve the contact and not "no vote".

He never stops with the bullshit.

Lumumba: "I see Judge Dickinson as an academician. And simply what that means is he is scholarly as it pertains to the law."

@3:41 PM, then why didn't he veto the disapproval of FCC Environmental?

You don't have a clue.

@ 3:01 for the win!

Thank you for taking the time to share your expertise with all of us keyboard counselors.

Now the next question: Does any of this apply in Hinds County or, will the boy mayor get his way?

Boy mayor's serial catastrophes ought be compared to as:
1. a series of mined corpses along a bomb cratered street in Ukraine;
2. a gunsmoke filled M-bar megalomania where civic duty becomes despotic tyranny;
3. a pimp surfing atop his impoverished, murderous W. Jackson depravity which he leverages as if his personal whore to get a hollow trophy from Harvard.

@ 3:41PM has shown he obviously does not understand what a veto is... A veto strikes down a decision, it does not implement a different and/or opposite decision

3:41 - actually a very weak, and wrong, response to 3:01.

Yes, 21-8-47 does define an ordinance as "any action" of the council, which would include a vote; positive or negative. This is where the Honorable Justice Special Chancellor ate his rear end.

One cannot just read one part of a statute, especially skipping over important parts to get to others.

The vote was an action. But as 3:01 stated, you need to go read 21-8-17(2) - which by the way the Mayor misquoted reference in his veto message, but who's counting the Mayor's duplicity - which reads: Any Ordinance ADOPTED by the Council can be vetoed. Yes, the action of the Council to vote was an Ordinance by 47 which you are hanging your arse on, but that action was not and Ordinance ADOPTED. Kinda hard to get past that one. And as 3:01 stated, this section goes on to say an Ordinance passed on to the Mayor could be reviewed and approved or vetoed. This Action, which is by 47 an Ordinance, was not passed on to the Mayor. It died on the calendar, never to be revived again. And I'm not sure of the religion of those involved but once this Ordinance was dead for the past three days, it does not have the ability to rise again into life.

Simply, it was an ordinance. It was not an ordinance ADOPTED. Your simple argument that it was an ordinance making it vetoable is weaker even than Dickenson's first ruling.

I came to a full stop at the phrase "arbitrary and capricious." If the Council is a legislative body, it has every right to act just as arbitrarily and capriciously as it likes. It can override a veto for a good reason, a bad reason, or no reason.

@3:41pm:
WitchDocta Omari, is that you, you vaunted sycophantic, albeit hysterical, secretary to the Emperor With No Clothes?

Nowhere in your citation does it state that a motion voted down is an ordinance, nor that it can be reversed by an executive (mayoral) veto.

Jackson's fake mayor is running on fumes, but he sure has a nice big hollow Harvard hood ornament as he careens into another catastrophe.

Judge Peterson SHOULD put Lumumba in his place but who are we really kidding.

KF. Can you be sure to forward 3:01’s excellent explanation of how a veto works to the attorney for the council. He can take that explanation and statutes, find a few cases to back it up, and win.

What is an example of a legislative action that is "arbitrary and capricious"? Capricious is defined in my legal dictionary as arbitrary. The latter is defined as completely unreasonable. It seems the Mayor is certain to pole vault higher than Mr. Begley on that one... if he could argue for himself before the Court.

Thank goodness Antar doesn't have access to nuclear weapons or he'd launch attacks on Madison and Rankin counties.

A Council "vote" is not an action. The vote (in and of itself) to pass/not pass an ordinance is not an "action." Results of a passage due to receiving the required number of votes to pass creates the action.

Council Authority only exists by passage of a vote of members of said Council.

It is a sad day that the Capitol City of the State in 2022 is so incompetent as to even suggest that the Mayor has the capacity to veto non-action, to circumvent the process.

Under his though process, what point does the city council serve? What point is there to a vote or approval process to anything?

Judge....WTF? Look what you have caused. Now the Mayor has full power and can just ignore the council! Do we even need a council anymore if the mayor can just select contracts and pay them without any oversight from the council?

Can we all just veto Antar? Isn’t that how this works?

Jackson Councilman B.C. Grizzell from ward 4 posted on facebook, that citizens should not complain about their trash not being picked up at decent times. He said that Richards literally have till the end of the day to come get it. He is treating this entire ordeal like a laughing matter. Well Mr. Grizzell. It is the end of day and my trash is still on the street. I don’t find anything laughable about this. You seem unconcern as if you have taken a kickback for this contract. Hopefully KF looks into your post on FB and looks into you as well. Because why tell citizens not to complain over lackluster service unless someone is throwing you some cash under the table?

My wife and I went to look at washers and dryers. They showed us one they said was the best. But after discussing we decided not to get it. The manager vetoed our decision and even made use their delivery service. Will sell in exchange for an ounce of logic.

WHEREAS, the city council has been canceled.

Methinks Antar doth protest too much.

This may just be a garbage contract dispute but the ripple effect from this could be very, very bad. The judge here is in over her head.

@6:00 PM
Shhhh.

Judge Peterson is a terrible judge, like all the Hinds county judges. What she lacks in intellect and understanding of the law, she makes up for in political maneuvering. A wise judge would recuse. She won’t.

Is anyone organizing their neighbors in Jackson to get together and carry all their trash that wasn’t picked up to their Mayor’s house? If not, why not?

I really hope that judge Peterson is carefully reading and monitoring this blog,for her own benefit.
It’d be interesting to know 3:01…he/she would be getting a lot of referrals.

Cant wait to see how the City Council votes on Felecia Perkins' invoice for attorney's fees once it hits the claims docket. . . the lawyers may need lawyers once this one is over.

Follow the money

If the mayor holds all the power now…when it comes election time will he just say no need to vote, I am declaring myself mayor for life?!!?!

How did this all start anyway... It has been dragging on so long, I forget now. Why did Waste Management's contract not get renewed? Had they hot been doing an adequate job? Was there a specific reason to replace them?
Maybe the contract was up for renewal and they were under bid?

I have not ever had any complaints about service from Waste Management. Those guys work so hard, and it is not an easy job. They also are always very polite to us older people. I hope they will not lose a job. To my, that would be the most regrettable thing about this whole hiccup in leadership.

It almost seems that garbage pick up is one of the only things the once Bold New City does consistently well these days.

4:17 pm. So the Mayor clearly under the law must negotiate a contract and present to the council for approval or disapproval. The council disapproved the contract. Somehow you think such is not an “action” of the council. Such is totally illogical. More importantly:

§ 21-8-47 which defines ordinance:

The term “ordinance” as used in this chapter shall be deemed to include ordinances, resolutions, orders and any other official actions of the council, except those procedural actions governing the conduct of the council's meetings, appointing a clerk of council, and exercising the council's investigative functions under Section 21-8-13(4).

So you believe the required approval or disapproval of the council is not “official action of the council”. What is it?

Again you have not cited the first authority that supports what you claims re only “ordinances” can be vetoed.

Finally some argued such puts all the power in the Mayor. Such absolutely is not true, the Mayor can veto but the council can override the veto so it still has the ultimate power by override. Then if Mayor believes council has acted arbitrary or capricious or contrary to law he can appeal such to the Circuit Court.

Do you honestly think that there are ever enough votes on the council to override anything the mayor wants to do? Too much political maneuvering mixed with money and the hunger for power. We the taxpayers are out of the loop.

7:23 I hope to hell you are not a lawyer. If so, your law school should lose its credentials. It’s really embarrassing for the mayor, his lawyers and this pathetic judge. Mediocrity layered in incompetence.

The only good news here is that now this affects many municipalities around the State, not just the incompetent one here. I have no doubt that Judge Peterson will accept the Mayor's absolutely incorrect interpretation of the statutes - assuming they are even capable of citing all of the correct applicable statutes - but since this lunacy now affects others, this will make it to the Supreme Court, likely pretty quickly, which will tell the mayor and whichever of his bought and paid for social hangers on 7:23 a.m. is that they need to work on their reading comprehension skills.

7:53, what you are describing is a complete bastardization of a mayor-council form of government. And no, a vote to NOT sign a contract does not allow the mayor to veto it and magically render it signed. Gtfo.

7:23

Let's entertain your weak attempts.

1. If the Mayor clearly under the law must negotiate a contract and present it to the Council for approval, why? If the Mayor can "veto" the vote regardless, why would rules governing the Mayor/Council form of municipal government require a vote by the Council?

2. The term "ordinance" as used in that chapter is deemed to include (only things listed are votes of affirmation. Action of a Council is defined via it's Authority in that it exist solely through the majority vote of a quorum.

3. You are providing your own language, which is intellectually dishonest and simple logical fallacy. There is no required "approval or disapproval." There is only the required majority affirmation vote of a quorum of Council members.

4. You fail at simple logic. Using a layman's idea of "action" is if a Councilperson does anything is grasping at straws. Actions of a Council (Parliamentary Rules) is "enacted" via passage of a vote. The act of voting for or against such action IS NOT the action itself.

5. I am simply assuming that you are just ignorant and am attempting to educate you. If you continue with this ignorant viewpoint, I'll just assume you are the ignorant counsel of the Mayor and are trying to justify you dumb move the Mayor's office made here.

6. Personally, I think this is a calculated conspiratorial move by the Office of Mayor and would hope that the State Auditor's office is already investigating this. Dismissing the RFP process, the voting down of contract, the misuse of the emergency contract clause, awarding a contract without approval and putting a business on the streets expecting the taxpayer to pay for an unapproved service certainly warrants investigation

City Council hired Martin AND Scanlon.

Our government is founded upon the strict separation of powers because the agglomeration of too much authority in any governmental actor’s hands is the express train to tyranny. This is especially so in matters of law enforcement, where the judiciary is a key check on executive excess but, in order to forfend judicial excess, is deprived the executive power of the sword.
…..The Jackson City Council, in stark contrast, has combined the executive and judicial functions, such that its prosecutors are the aggressive arm of the tribunal. Our City government is showing its corruption and abuse owes to its complete lack of both political accountability and objective judicial oversight.