Arizona just passed sweeping legislation to empower parents and fund students. The new legislation is the most expansive school choice program in the country.

Empowerment Scholarship Account (ESA) programs date back a decade in Arizona. And under the new bill, the ESA program will now be available to more than one million students. The current program is serving about 10,000 students.

Under the new bill:

• ESAs will be available for every family in the state of Arizona.
• Each family will receive $6,500 every year for each child in the family to put towards private school, homeschooling, tutoring, or any type of education that the specific child needs.
• ESA families can purchase electronic devices, learning tools, and transportation to school.

What is unique is that this expands the ESA to be possibly the broadest stretch of accessibility for families in the nation.

“Most other state programs cap the number of students, set income eligibility requirements, or require students to be enrolled in public schools to apply. Arizona’s program may be the nation’s broadest,” the Wall Street Journal noted in a recent op-ed.

That is certainly the case in Mississippi, where the state’s ESA program is limited to those with special needs and the funding has never kept up with the program, limiting the total seats available.

That was identical to how the program began in Arizona as well. Initially limited to students with special needs, it has been slightly expanded to include those in failing schools and those on Indian reservations. And soon it will be available to all students.

This bill does not harm any already eligible families for the ESA program. The eligibility also doesn’t come with any testing; which is good news for homeschool families when participating in the program. This form of funding doesn’t affect the public schools’ funding but rather ensures funding follows each individual child.

As we saw from the beginning of the pandemic, many parents became much more engaged in their child’s education, often by necessity. Many have found that their children have certain needs and have found temporary solutions to those needs. However, they should be able to be empowered to make those solutions permanent, and in Arizona, they will be through changes with the expanded program.

We know that empowering families to have the freedom and flexibility to choose their child’s education is important to the growth of rising generations and our state’s future. All families should enjoy that freedom.

Do you support education freedom for families in Mississippi?

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A combination of an ammonia leak and improper water treatment has forced all of Jackson’s water customers to boil their water for nearly two weeks straight now. Those boil water notices came only days after the city asked residents to conserve what water they were using because of hotter than average weather. 

City of Jackson officials on Thursday did not have a definitive timeline for lifting the boil water notice, but said the service may be back to fully functioning as early as Friday for well system customers, and as early as Saturday for surface system customers. 

Officials issued the first citywide notice on June 24, after an ammonia leak as well as filtration issues at the O.B. Curtis water treatment plant forced operators to reduce pressure. While the pressure has been restored, Jackson is still working to answer a second citywide notice that the state health department issued on June 30. 

The Mississippi State Department of Health issued the notice because “turbidity levels,” or cloudiness, in the water were too high. Turbidity itself isn’t harmful, but high levels mean a higher likelihood of disease-causing organisms, which can lead to symptoms such as nausea, cramps, diarrhea, and associated headaches, according to the Environmental Protection Agency. 

City officials explained on Thursday that operators use two chemicals to maintain the pH in the water: soda ash and a lime slurry. At the time, the soda ash operation “was not working,” and operators used too much lime in the treatment, causing the high turbidity.

Jackson residents have now received over 50 boil water notices since the start of 2022, according to the city’s press releases. Only the two recent notices covered the whole city. 

On June 21, the city issued a water conservation advisory because of expected hotter than average temperatures this summer, asking residents to take showers instead of baths, only run full loads in dishwashers and laundry machines, among other measures.

The city requires a number of fixes to bring the system as a whole up to par: hiring more operators for its two treatment plants, upgrading equipment at the plants, and replacing aging distribution lines.  

In May, Jackson announced the construction of a new 48-inch distribution line, using about $8 million of the city’s American Rescue Plan Act funds, was underway. The new line is aimed at improving water pressure in the South Jackson, Belhaven, Belhaven Heights, Eastern downtown and I-55 south corridor neighborhoods.

In total, the city has allocated $25 million of the ARPA funds it received for water and sewer improvements. But through county and matching funds the city could receive an additional $33 million, the Clarion Ledger reported in April. 

The city said it plans to distribute bottles of water to residents every day until the boil water notice is lifted. 

The notices advise that residents bring their water to a boil for a minute before drinking as well as: cooking or baking, making ice cubes, taking medication, brushing teeth, washing food, mixing baby formula or food, mixing juices or drinks, feeding pets, washing dishes and all other consumption.

The post Boil and conserve: Treatment issues and hot weather put strain on Jackson water appeared first on Mississippi Today.

Gazing across a subway car full of enticing, strange faces, young Milo thrusts his imagination into action. 

The wondrous train ride is the setting of “Milo Imagines the World,” a children’s picture book written by Matt de la Peña and illustrated by Christian Robinson. 

The story follows Milo, who wields his sketchpad to explore the mysterious lives of his fellow passengers. But while diving deep into his make-believe backstories, the boy pauses to reflect, and begins to see the boundaries of first impressions.

“Milo Imagines the World,” published last summer, is the duo’s second picture book exploring the world of public transportation through the lens of working class communities. The two also partnered on the New York Times bestseller “Last Stop on Market Street,” which won the 2016 Newbery Medal. 

De la Peña, set to appear at the Mississippi Book Festival in Jackson on Aug. 20, spoke with Mississippi Today about his latest work. 

Editor’s note: This interview has been edited for clarity and length.

Mississippi Today: You mentioned having a focus on writing for working class folks and exploring public transportation, with this book and your last one, “Last Stop on Market Street.” Can you talk a little bit about that intersection in your work?

Matt de la Peña: I’m always drawn to working class communities, just because I grew up in one. I grew up near the border of San Diego and Mexico, and I have grandparents from Mexico, and my dad was first gen. So that’s something I always want to feature in anything I write, people who are working hard and trying to make a life in America.  

The way I describe it is, my goal is to be as honest as possible, but in the back of my head I want to show moments of grace and dignity in these communities.

It’s funny because when I first started out writing, my stories would always be pushed toward kids who were living in those communities or who were diverse racially. That was annoying to me because these stories are for everyone. I think we’re seeing a push now, where a story that focuses on a kid like Milo, now will be celebrated in a private school with predominantly white kids, well-to-do kids. That’s a nice thing to see.

Early in my career, I remember a teacher at a conference finding me and saying, ‘Hey Matt, I really like your books. But I’ll be honest, we don’t really have those kids at our schools, so we don’t have that many copies.’

I remember saying to her, ‘How many wizards do you have at your school?’ Because of this idea of, we can read books about wizards but not kids from different backgrounds.

What’s interesting is public transportation, it really depends on where you are, who’s on it. So in “Last Stop on Market Street” and where I grew up in San Diego, if you’re on the bus, you are there –  pretty much 99% chance – because you don’t have a car, you can’t afford a car. It’s usually all working class people on the bus. If you go to New York City, you could be on the subway next to a CEO, and on the other side of you is someone who cleans that building. So I find those stories change dramatically if you’re going to explore public transportation depending on what city it is. 

That also factors into Milo’s journey. He’s looking around at these people and sees the kid with the perfect part (in his hair) and thinks, ‘This kid’s rich.’ He sees the guy with the scruffy face and thinks, ‘This guy’s poor and lonely.’ So part of his journey is to kind of challenge that idea.

MT: On the subway, you’re exposed to so much from so many different people at once. How do you capture that from a young child’s perspective?

MD: You know what’s amazing about public transportation is, you learn the truth, which I think kids growing up in car culture don’t quite grasp. The truth is, we kind of think our story is the most important. And if you’re in a car, you think that even more. It’s almost like everyone’s in the movie starring you. 

But if you grow up taking public transportation and you just look around and watch people and listen to conversations, it’s so much easier to grasp that you are just one of millions of stories. 

So I actually think that’s one of the healthiest parts about growing up taking public transportation, is you sort of position your story alongside other stories. And when you’re in a car culture, you don’t have as many opportunities to see that. 

MT: I wanted to ask you about, you kind of summarized it nicely in the dedication page – the message: “For those who dare to imagine beyond the first impression.” It got me thinking about the fact you’re writing through a child’s perspective, and how we typically think of kids being more imaginative. I was wondering if you thought writing from Milo’s perspective made it easier to give him a broader imagination of what people might be like because he’s a kid and he’s got this creative mind. Is that fair to say?

MD:  I actually think I would approach it almost the same way from an adult’s perspective. I just think the big difference would be the arc of an adult’s story. If it was the same storyline, I would approach the arc of it, the movement at the end where Milo’s re-thinking the pictures, I think with an adult it would be louder, and it would be more direct. 

One of my favorite things about writing a picture book and thinking about the character’s arc is that, really, I don’t think it’s truthful if you get to the end of a picture book and the character has arced dramatically. I think it’s much more honest to show a character who is just beginning that arc. Things like Milo’s experience, it has to happen dozens of times for it to sink in and for you to move as a person. 

As an adult, I think a lot of people are just as imaginative, maybe not quite as imaginative as a kid, but you still tell yourself the story of the people around you. But I think the ending of a picture book shouldn’t be as dramatic.         

MT: (Spoiler alert) The end of the book (where the reader learns Milo is going to visit his mother in prison) caught me off guard. Was it important for you to make that a surprise, and if so what do you think was the effect of that?

MD: It is kind of a surprise, but my hope is that if you read it again, everything is leading that direction. He’s a shook-up soda, because he’s excited to see his mom but he’s also anxious. He doesn’t know how to feel about it. The whole story is about where he’s going, but it’s quiet. And then at the end it’s a revelation about where he’s going, but it’s not that I wanted it to be a big surprise. 

It fits with the story, if that makes sense. He’s looking out so that he doesn’t have to directly look in, although like we talked about that’s what he’s kind of processing. 

And at the very end he’s showing his mom this picture he worked very hard on the night before. He of course shows her a picture of them, sitting on the stoop, and she’s not in prison. 

So he’s doing something that I have taped on my wall, above my computer, as a writer, I live by this motto: do not write what you see, write what will be seen. Because one of the things you can do writing a kid’s book is help sort of reveal the world of tomorrow. And I think what he’s doing when he’s showing them the picture is he’s also drawing not what he sees today but he hopes will be seen tomorrow.  

Really, the surprise ending for me as the writer is not that his mom is in prison, but it’s the piece of art that he shows his mom. 

MT: There was a part in the book, it might feel like a small detail, but it told me, okay, you’ve clearly spent some time thinking through the mind of a kid: Milo is looking at his reflection and thinking about his own life and his aunt’s apartment, and the fact he calls it his “aunt’s apartment near the cemetery” really stood out to me because that’s something I remember doing as a kid, associating these two things that aren’t related but are just next to each other. 

How do you generally get in the process of getting into a kid’s mind and transport yourself there?

MD: Forgive me if I’m going a little too deep on this, but you identified what this book is really about. There is so much going on in Milo’s unconscious through the book. Because if you look at each vignette he comes up with for the people he’s looking at, he’s sketching out who he thinks they are, where they’re going, but he’s also sort of exorcising his own situation, because every vignette has some form of, either emancipation or building up a wall. He’s really thinking about his mother being in a place where he can’t access her all the time. 

If you look at the first vignette, he’s looking at a bird in a cage, but in his vignette the birds get to go free. And the married couple, they rise above the walls of the city and they’re free. And then the boy who’s wealthy, he’s got this castle, and after he goes through, the drawbridge is going to close again so he can protect all his stuff. Every vignette is about other people, but he’s using it as a way to explore his current situation.  

Now, does any kid get that? Probably not. But I have this theory, especially for writing about young people: we often say it’s more valid to get something consciously than it is to get it viscerally. 

And what I love about kids books is, kids are mostly operating on that visceral feeling. Even if a kid can’t say, ‘Oh I see there’s a form of emancipation in each vignette,’ a kid might feel it. And that to me is just as valid as, you’re in a college course and pulling out every symbol and every detail.    

MT: What do you think Milo learns on this journey? Like you said, it takes a while and it’s not a complete learning experience by the end, but how do you think this learning experience is helping Milo grow?

MD: I think what Milo is doing at the end of the book is he’s starting to question the way he sees other people, and whether or not his first impression is the right impression. And he’s starting to think that way because he’s also along the way starting to understand how others might see him.   

So when he looks at his reflection, he’s starting to think, what do people think of my face? And then he lists a few things that are real, this is who he is to himself, but maybe others can’t access that. Through that, and misjudging this boy with the part, I think he’s beginning to question this idea of first impressions. 

As kids, we learn how to access those stereotypes, but to be an intelligent person, you have to then almost dismantle those stereotypes. So he’s learning through early life how to acquire those stereotypes. Maybe he’s just beginning to question them, which may ultimately lead to him dismantling them.

The post Beginning to question first impressions: Q&A with author Matt de la Peña appeared first on Mississippi Today.

Contrary to a front-page story in a major Mississippi newspaper, the phase-down of Mississippi income taxes will not begin until January of next year. The new law setting that phase-down in motion technically took effect July 1, the usual date each year for new laws to actually become law. But changes in tax laws usually apply to calendar years, since most taxpayers operate on a calendar (not fiscal) year basis, and this law is no exception.

While it’s on people’s minds, though, we thought we’d remind everyone what the bill calls for and what effect it will have on various taxpayers.

The first point to note is that these reductions only apply to personal income taxes. There were no cuts to corporate income taxes. However, the income of most small business owners, even if their business is technically a “corporation,” is taxed at the personal rate (for reasons we won’t go into here), so the vast majority of Mississippians will benefit, including business owners.

For calendar year 2023, any taxpayer who has more than $10,000 in taxable income (total income minus exemptions and deductions) will receive a $200 tax reduction. That’s because the first year’s cut is the elimination of the 4% bracket, which is currently applied to a $5,000 block of income (4% x $5,000 = $200).

Because the 3% rate on the first $5,000 of taxable income had already been eliminated by previous law, Mississippi will no longer tax the first $10,000 in taxable income, beginning in 2023. That will leave the state with a flat rate of 5% on income over $10,000.

In 2024, the 5% rate will be reduced to 4.7%. In 2025, it will be reduced to 4.4%. And in 2026, it will be reduced to 4%.

This table shows the effects for each year for various taxpayers.

*A single person with children, if designated as “Head of Family,” technically has a $9,500 exemption, but that includes 1 child at $1,500 exemption. Since we are showing a single person with 2 children, we included the exemption for the first child in the total for Dependent Exemptions to limit confusion when comparing to the married couple with 2 children.

Highlighted by the largest tax cut in state history, a number of bills that were adopted earlier this year became law on Friday.

House Bill 531, the Mississippi Tax Freedom Act of 2022, phases in the more than $500 million tax cut over the next four years. In the first year, it would eliminate Mississippi’s current 4 percent bracket that currently applies to the first $5,000 in taxed income. In years two through four, it would reduce the rate that applies to all income over $10,000 from 5 percent down to 4 percent.

The change in tax code will begin impacting Mississippians in January.

Under the change, individuals will not pay income taxes on their first $18,300 of taxable income and families will not pay taxes on their first $36,600 of income. A worker who makes $40,000 per year will see their taxes reduced by $417 a year, while a married couple making $80,000 would save $834 a year.

Other new laws:

– One of the goals of the session for virtually everyone in Jackson, teacher pay raises, was also adopted this year. With this, teachers will see an average raise of over $5,000, while teacher assistants will receive a raise of about $2,000. The starting salary for a teacher with a Bachelor’s Degree will be over $41,000.

– House Bill 1416 will ensure that public school students can engage in political activities or discussions.

– Senate Bill 2422 will ensure teachers receive their supply cards before school begins.

– House Bill 1509, which will prohibit any government entity in Mississippi from mandating COVID-19 vaccines, is headed to the governor. The language also prohibits any public or private school from requiring the vaccine and allows any public or private employee to claim a religious exemption to the vaccine.

– Senate Bill 2273 will allow employers to submit proof of employment as a substitute for regular meetings with their parole or probation officer, which can often be a hindrance to steady employment.

There’s nothing more American than July 4th. The burgers. The watermelon. The fireworks. As a kid, my mom’s entire family would gather at my great grandparents’ house for barbecue and seafood before making our way, down Ballentine Street in Bay Saint Louis, for some time at the beach which would lead to rockets lighting up the night sky. Those were good times.

The older I’ve gotten, the more nostalgic I am about those times. I now reflect more on the “Independence” in Independence Day, too. Our nation is exceptional because it was founded on an exceptional set of ideas—that rights come from God, that government exists to protect these natural rights, and that the power over government resides in the people. Ours was not just an independence from England, but independence to chart our own destinies.

Increasingly, the founding and the founders have come under scrutiny. Some of it is due. Because while we declared the equality of mankind and the right to life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness, we denied those things to whole classes of people. These inconsistencies certainly deserve recognition in the annals of history, but they do not demean the expressed ideals. There is a difference between pure principle and poor application. The principles of the founding were true. The application at that time, and since, has never been perfect.

Even still, embracing the idea of individual freedom was revolutionary in a world where kings ruled over subjects and abject poverty was the natural state for most. Freedom of religion has allowed people to connect with God in their own personal way. Free speech has permitted the unfettered exchange of ideas that allows the cream of thought to rise to the top. The ability to determine your own path to success, to develop skills, and create products and services that make people’s lives better, has generated unfathomable progress and unprecedented prosperity.

Every generation of Americans has faced significant challenges, but most of those challenges are rooted in deviations from principle. Slavery is not only a stain on our nation’s history, but a marked deviation from the principles of freedom and equality—an outgrowth of which was both the Civil War and the struggle for civil rights. Wars have been waged as oppressive governments attempted to stifle people’s freedom or treat a class of people as less than. Periods of financial despair, including the one we are now experiencing, are a byproduct of government attempting to control the economy.

Our generation certainly has its own challenges. We find ourselves in an era of profound division. We can be hostile to perspectives and people who do not fit neatly into our worldview. We participate in echo chambers. And, in truth, there is a strange convergence of players on both the right and left against the fundamental value of freedom.

More and more, elements of both socialism and fascism emerge for the purpose of trying to control others and impose upon them each tribe’s worldview. For some, this power lust operates under the guise of preventing “the other side” from gaining it. This is not in keeping with the spirit of the American founding and it is a dangerous threat to human flourishing. If we forfeit principle to gain power, and in so doing, become what we once disdained, what have we gained?

So this Independence Day, grill those hotdogs, swim in the pool, play a little backyard baseball, and watch the “bombs” bursting in mid-air, but commit. Commit to thinking for yourself. Commit to preserving freedoms not only for yourself but for people with whom you find disagreement. Commit to fighting against any ideology, whether stoked on the right or left, that would find us more dependent on and more controlled by central planners. Find and embrace your revolutionary spirit.

It’s been nearly 70 years since Emmett Till was lynched in the Mississippi Delta, but his family has not given up on justice. 

Last week, a search team that includes Till family members Deborah and Teri Watts discovered the original, unserved arrest warrant for the only living accomplice to Till’s death in the basement of the Leflore County courthouse in Greenwood. 

Deborah Watts, Till’s cousin and founder of the Emmett Till Legacy Foundation, said uncovering the document is the result of the family’s perseverance and determination. 

“We never accepted (the) closing of this case by the authorities or gave up hope,” she said in a Thursday statement. “We have always pushed for full accountability of all those involved in Emmett’s murder who may still be alive.”

The uncovered warrant is for Carolyn Bryant Donham, listed as “Mrs. Roy Bryant,” and is dated Aug. 29, 1955, days after Till’s death. The document had been in the courthouse for 67 years.

She was formerly married to Roy Bryant, who with his half-brother, J.W. Milam, killed 14-year-old Till who was visiting family from Chicago. They kidnapped him after Donham wrongfully accused Till of grabbing her and making unwanted advances. 

Donham is now in her 80s and most recently lived in North Carolina. 

The Department of Justice reopened Till’s case several times in the past two decades, but no new charges were made. The two men tried for his murder in 1955 were acquitted by an all-white jury. 

For several years, family members, supporters and the foundation have called for justice for Till and for Donham to be held accountable. Finding the original warrant could make that happen, they say. 

The Till family sent certified copies of the warrant to local and federal law enforcement, according to the Emmett Till Legacy Foundation. They are asking the U.S. Department of Justice Civil Rights Division and the Mississippi Fourth District Attorney’s Office to consider the warrant new evidence, investigate and charge Donham as an accessory in Till’s death. 

The search team, which also includes foundation ambassador Melissa Earnest, family ambassador Khali Rasheed and filmmaker and justice advocate Keith Beauchamp, received access to the courthouse on June 21, according to the foundation.

The team went through boxes organized by decade, and Rasheed found a file folder containing the warrant, according to the foundation.The original warrant and file and a certified copy can be found at the Leflore County courthouse. 

Beauchamp was granted access in March for an initial search for the warrant, according to the foundation. A few months earlier, Earnest told Watts that the warrant may possibly be in Leflore County. 

Watts said the pursuit of justice is dedicated to and honors Till and other late family members: his mother, Mamie Till Mobley; cousin Simeon Wright, who was the last to see him alive; and great uncle Mose Wright, whose home Till stayed at before his death. 

Family members have been seeking justice since Till’s death, according to the foundation. His mother chose to have an open casket at his funeral to show the world what happened to Till, and she continued to fight for justice until her death in 2003. 

In March, Till’s family and supporters visited the Mississippi State Capitol and delivered a petition with over 300,000 signatures to the attorney general’s office calling for Donham to be charged. 

Family members founded the Emmett Till Legacy Foundation, whose goal is to preserve the memory and legacy of Till and his mother’s hope for justice. The group hopes to create a legacy of hope by bridging the past, present and future through programs, according to the foundation’s website. 

In the petition, the foundation links Till’s death to modern killings of Black people, such as George Floyd in Minnesota, Ahmaud Arbery in Georgia, Breonna Taylor in Kentucky, and Eric Garner in New York.

The post Arrest warrant discovery is latest step in Emmett Till family’s decades-long quest for justice appeared first on Mississippi Today.

The 90-day grace period that allowed Blue Cross & Blue Shield of Mississippi customers to receive in-network rates at University of Mississippi Medical Center despite the hospital being outside the insurer’s network expired on Friday, leaving patients with no options other than seeking their care elsewhere or taking on exorbitant out-of-pocket costs. 

UMMC, the state’s safety net hospital, went out of network with the state’s largest private insurer on April 1 due to disagreements over reimbursement rates and Blue Cross’ quality care plan. 

The two parties agreed to enter mediation proceedings in late April, and had agreed on a mediator, Walter Johnson, by May 9, but Mississippi Insurance Commissioner says both parties are being “unreasonable,” indicating they are nowhere close to a deal.

When Blue Cross and UMMC used the mediation process to settle their contract dispute in 2018, it only took around 10 days to strike a deal. 

On Friday, Chaney sent a letter to Blue Cross, informing him that the Mississippi Insurance Department will be conducting a targeted market conduct examination of the insurer to determine whether it is in compliance with the state’s network adequacy regulations. 

He also released a statement saying he has received many emails and calls from Mississippians caught in the middle of the dispute, and that he is disturbed by the impact the dispute is having on them.

“This is a stark reminder that the only ones impacted by the dispute are the consumers,” Chaney said in the statement. “As your Insurance Commissioner, I am doing everything I can to ensure that individuals continue to have access to the healthcare provider of their choice with minimal disruption.”

State law requires insurers to provide reasonable access to all types of care included in the insured’s coverage plan. The concern is that without UMMC in its network, BCBS is not meeting this requirement due to the litany of specialty services UMMC provides that can’t be found elsewhere in the state.

The areas of concern that Chaney signaled out in the letter are:

• The services provided at Blaire E. Batson Children’s Hospital
• Level IV Neonatal Intensive Care Unit (NICU)
• Pediatric and Adult Congenital Heart Programs
• Children’s Cancer Care Program
• Sickle Cell Anemia Program
• Heart, Kidney, Liver and Pancreas Transplant Program
• UMMC’s relationship with Methodist Rehabilitation Center
• UMMC’s Satellite Facilities

Chaney said that MID is in the process of appointing an examiner to conduct the review. If the review finds that Blue Cross is violating network adequacy regulations, Chaney can revoke the authority of the insurer to operate in Mississippi, impose a fine of up to $5,000 per violation, or both. 

It will likely be months before the review is completed and its findings are made publicly available. The Department completed a similar review of United HealthCare on Nov. 10, 2017, and the final report wasn’t sent to the insurer until nearly four months later. 

UMMC spokesperson Marc Rolph declined to comment on the market conduct examination or confirm whether or not the hospital had renewed its contract with Chancellor Consulting Group, a California-based group that UMMC has been paying $50,000 per month since mid-September for help with its negotiation efforts. That contract expired Friday. 

Blue Cross did not respond to request for comment by the time of publication. Earlier this week, Cayla Mangrum, manager of corporate communications at Blue Cross, told Mississippi Today that they are prohibited from discussing mediation, though there is no legal requirement to not discuss the process. 

The post With no deal reached between UMMC, Blue Cross, Chaney announces network adequacy review of insurer appeared first on Mississippi Today.