Entergy Mississippi announced plans Wednesday afternoon to invest $300 million into upgrading its power grid over the next five years.

Speaking on a stage outside the company’s facility near Lake Hico in Jackson, Entergy President and CEO Haley Fisackerly explained that the investment, dubbed Superpower Mississippi, would mark a 50% increase in its usual power grid spending. The goal, he said, is to reduce outages by half over the next five years by installing stronger poles, increasing maintenance of rights-of-way, as well as installing smart devices and real-time monitoring systems.

The spending still needs Mississippi Public Service Commission approval, but two of the three PSC commissioners were on site for the announcement. Fisackerly, though, said the investment would have no impact on customers’ bills because of revenue increases coming new business from Amazon and other industries.

The CEO echoed past statements that new industries, including energy-intensive data centers, would not lead to rate increases for residential customers. Earlier this month, Fisackerly told Mississippi Today that two new data centers coming into its service area — one in Madison County owned by Amazon and another in Rankin County owned by AVAIO — would provide enough revenue to the utility that rates would actually go up less than they would have otherwise.

Fisackerly declined to say how much Entergy’s revenue had increased from its new industrial customers.

“The fact that we can pay for an additional $300 million effort without increasing rates gives you an idea about the magnitude of that,” he said. “Think of it this way: We have a cost of business, and when you bring a larger user of electricity, we can spread that cost over a greater base. So they help reduce the cost to the other customers.”

De’Keither Stamps and Wayne Carr — the Central and Southern District PSC commissioners, respectively, — spoke at Wednesday’s announcement in support of the project.

“It’s a step forward in getting to where we want to go,” Stamps said, emphasizing the importance of keeping rates affordable in areas with high poverty.

Entergy is the state’s largest utility company, serving about 459,000 customers in 45 counties.

At the PSC’s September docket meeting, Stamps called for an investigation into the company after hearing complaints from Entergy customers over power outages.

“We’re not going to stop anything until the reality of the citizens changes,” Stamps said. “They must not have to live in fear when the rain picks up, and they shouldn’t have to live in fear that their water’s going to go out because the water in rural Hinds County (comes from) ground pumps.”

Fisackerly said the company continues to hold town halls to hear customers’ complaints.

According to an Entergy press release, the number of outages caused by fallen trees has spiked in 2025 because of dead vegetation after the 2023 drought, as well as recent storms and tornados. The release clarified that many of those trees are outside the areas the company can trim.

PETAL — Preschoolers kneel on a kaleidoscope rug, their clumsy hands reaching for wooden blocks, little socked feet tucked underneath.

Block by block, they build a tower that only teeters a little, and for a moment, stands tall. The kids grin proudly. And when it tumbles to the ground a few seconds later, the classroom corner is filled with the sound of giggles.

A bystander might think this is just play. But the teacher watching nearby knows they’re learning essential fine-motor skills. They’re also learning social skills by sharing with their classmates. 

Thanks to a statewide investment in early education more than a decade ago, about one in six Mississippi children is learning these integral skills within the first few years of life at “early learning collaboratives” throughout the state. Experts agree the program is directly connected to the state’s reading gains that have garnered national attention. 

So when lawmakers created another state-funded pre-K program in 2022, some wondered: Why do we need both? One legislative leader who helped create the collaboratives is concerned the new program might siphon away resources, or recreate some of the problems the state faced for decades with early learning.

Early learning collaboratives, a state and taxpayer funded pre-K program established by the Legislature in 2013, created education partnerships in communities across Mississippi. The program has high academic standards, and it brings together child-care centers, nonprofit organizations, school districts and Head Start agencies. It compensates the groups for partnering.

In 2021, just 18 collaboratives were serving about 3,000 4-year-olds throughout the state, but the program still landed Mississippi top marks for early education from a national research group. 

Four years later, that count has more than doubled. Now, 40 collaboratives across Mississippi have more than 6,000 kids enrolled. 

But a new program, called the state-invested pre-K program, or SIP, doesn’t require collaboration with Head Start centers, which provide a myriad of services beyond education for some of the state’s neediest children. Additionally, because of the way the program is set up, there’s less red tape.

For those reasons, it may be a more appealing option for underfunded districts looking to make their dollars go further. It’s frustrating for Sen. Brice Wiggins, a Republican from Pascagoula, who championed the original program that required collaboration among pre-K partners, instead of fighting over students and the money that follows them.

“As I understand it, the SIP program has its roots in something that has always plagued early education in Mississippi,” he said. “Competition.”

‘Skin in the game’

There was an old saying among the police officers and prosecutors in Jackson County, Wiggins remembers from his time working in the district attorney’s office. 

“They said they determined the amount of prison beds by how well kids performed in the third and fourth grade,” he recalled, in his office at the state Capitol in June. “That resonated.”

When he was elected to the state Senate, those kids were fresh on his mind.

Wiggins spent 2012, his first year at the Capitol, advocating for early childhood education and began working up a plan to reshape the state’s system with policy researcher Rachel Canter. They partnered with then-Republican Rep. Toby Barker, who is now an independent and serves as mayor of Hattiesburg. By the time the next year rolled around — 2013, a seminal year for education in Mississippi — Wiggins thought he had something good. 

As lawmakers were working up what would become the literacy act that fundamentally changed reading education in Mississippi, leaders in the Legislature were signing off on Wiggins’ early education plan. It addressed the “patchwork of pre-kindergarten entities” in Mississippi and the lack of coordination between them. When students enroll in different pre-K programs, money follows — tuition at private day-care facilities or federal funding at Head Start are two examples. The collaboratives had a goal of eliminating the infighting that happens in communities over 4-year-olds by giving stakeholders a financial incentive to work together.

The bill passed by a vast bipartisan majority in 2013 and lawmakers appropriated $3 million for it. The Mississippi Department of Education selected 11 communities to host the first collaboratives.

In a collaborative, there’s a lead partner — usually the local school district, but it can be a nonprofit organization — that has local responsibility over the program. They’re in charge of disbursing funds, facilitating professional development and ensuring everyone is adhering to standards. 

Those standards are rigorous. The bill requires collaboratives to use a curriculum that aligns with benchmarks from the National Institute of Early Education Research. This includes having teachers with bachelor’s degrees and at least 15 hours of professional development a year.

The collaborative’s lead partner is required to work with other local pre-kindergarten providers such as child care and Head Start centers to be eligible for the collaborative and its funding, which was originally $2,150 per student (That amount has since increased to $5,000). But the costs quickly add up. The $3 million from the Legislature got them started The state agreed to pay half of each student’s education costs. The rest had to come from the communities. 

Enter the part that Wiggins is most proud of: To make up the other half, the Legislature created a tax-credit program. That means businesses and individuals can donate to their local collaborative and receive a dollar-for-dollar credit on their taxes. 

“That created some skin in the game,” he said. 

Setting students up for success

Deanna Hathorn holds open a book at the front of the classroom, and every face is turned toward her. 

“‘Justin dreamt that he could fly,’” she reads in a lilting voice. 

Then Hathorn directs her students: “Hold one finger up if you have dreams!”

Immediately, tiny index fingers fly into the air.

Petal, a suburb of Hattiesburg, was one of the first communities to opt into the early learning collaborative program. 

Prior to the program, it was relatively common for Petal students to enter kindergarten without any classroom education because options were limited to Head Start and a handful of Christian-based schools, similar to many other Mississippi towns, according Jana Perry. Perry is Petal’s former primary school assistant principal and the current director of the district’s Coleman Center for Children and Families, the lead partner for the Petal Early Learning Collaborative.

That’s because pre-kindergarten was not funded by the state before 2013. 

“The act was a game-changer,” she said. “If we didn’t have this, we would be so far behind. Why we are doing so well as a state is because of early childhood education.” 

Wiggins said Petal is one of the state’s most successful early learning collaboratives, in its reach and academic achievement. About 300 kids in Petal enter the district’s kindergarten program every year. Most will have gone through the collaborative, which currently has 179 students across 10 classrooms at five sites. 

The difference between the students who have had a year in the collaborative and the ones who haven’t is stark, Perry said.

Mississippi Department of Education data shows that collaborative students outperform their peers on the statewide kindergarten readiness assessment. That’s because the collaborative students enter kindergarten more familiar with classroom structure and the curriculum. Plus, some potential barriers to learning may have already been identified, Perry said. For example, collaborative teachers can intervene if a child has a speech impediment, potentially making a year’s worth of progress by the time that student enters kindergarten. 

“We can go ahead and get them set up to succeed once they walk in the door,” she said. “And they know how to do school. Kids who haven’t been through pre-K really struggle in their first year in kindergarten.”

The impact of early education echoes throughout a child’s life, said Steven Barnett, founder of the National Institute for Early Education Research. 

“The first thing you’ll notice is that the students do better when they get to kindergarten, and then they do better on those early grade exams,” Barnett said. “But the next thing you’ll notice is they’re less likely to fail and have to repeat. They’re less likely to need special education, and they’re going to be more likely to graduate from high school and go on to higher education. 

“That’s the big payoff, because that’s where you get better health outcomes, better employment, better incomes.”

Petal superintendent Matt Dillon said the first cohort of early learning collaborative students are now in high school, and the impact of the program is tangible — in test scores, expected graduation rates and school environment. 

“This is a community that really recognized the importance of early education,” he said. “And fast forward to today, we’re reaping the benefits.”

That success of early learning collaboratives is why, when Wiggins heard about the new state-funded pre-kindergarten program created in 2022, he was confused — and, honestly, a little agitated. 

“Nobody asked me about it,” Wiggins said. “And if they had, I would have said, ‘No.’”

New program may fit smaller communities

Union, a tiny town in piney central Mississippi anchored by a couple of four-way stops, is home to about 2,000 people. Most of the town’s 4-year-olds are in three classrooms at the Union Elementary School’s campus, thanks to funding from the new SIP program. 

On the whole, it’s not dissimilar from early learning collaborative classrooms in Petal. In rainbow-decorated rooms, children take care of baby dolls, listen to stories read aloud and match letters on worksheets.

But policy differences set the two programs apart.

The SIP program, which was funded in 2022, paid schools $100,000 for each early education classroom, and an extra $25,000 each if the school partnered with its local Head Start. However, that partnership is not required. This policy was slightly changed for the newest batch of participating schools — now, if they do not partner with the local Head Start, the district receives a fraction of that money.

Additionally, while the early learning collaboratives are enshrined in and regulated by state law, the SIP program is simply a line item in the annual education appropriation bill. That means its existence is subject to the whims of legislative approval each year.

The Mississippi Department of Education works hard to make sure all participating schools are in compliance — the SIP program meets all 10 of NIEER’s quality early education benchmarks, as does the collaborative program — but the agency doesn’t have to. 

Jill Dent, the agency’s early childhood director, said in an emailed statement that the department advocates equally for both programs. 

“Our goal is to support districts in choosing the model that best fits their local needs and capacity,” she wrote. 

It’s not unusual, Barnett said, for states to have more than one early education program. But it does beg the question: Who does the SIP program serve? 

“Sometimes, one program doesn’t fit everybody,” he said. “But sometimes, it’s just politics.” 

The politics didn’t matter to longtime Union Superintendent Tyler Hansford. He just didn’t see a collaborative working for his community. It’s small, doesn’t have many child care centers and the closest Head Start — which Union does work with — is a 30-minute drive. And he’s happy with the decision he’s made, already able to see the positive impact the program is having in Union.

“We’re able to reach more students and get them in early,” he said. “What we’ve seen is that there’s tremendous benefit in that.”

Hansford saw more bang for his buck with the SIP program, along with 32 other communities across Mississippi. Perry and Barnett said they both understand why those districts have made the decision to opt into the SIP program over the collaborative program.

Some districts might not want to partner with as many entities as the collaboratives require because they’re happy with the way they do things. Others, such as Union, might not have as many resources or options in their community to support a collaborative. 

But some places that are short on money have made the collaborative structure work, such as Tallahatchie County, a tiny community in the Delta with a median household income of $23,000. 

Tallahatchie hosts one of the state’s original early learning collaboratives. The lead partner, nonprofit Tallahatchie Early Learning Alliance, brings together local Head Starts and East Tallahatchie School District and has served more than 1,000 students since the local program began in 2014. 

There were no publicly funded pre-K classrooms prior to the collaborative and only a handful of child-care centers. Only two served low-income children and they had long waitlists, said Cheryl Swoopes, director of community engagement for SonEdna, which launched Tallahatchie Early Learning Alliance. 

“With limited resources, it’s a process, but we’ve stayed the course,” she said. “We’ve had teachers and administrators tell us that they wouldn’t know what to do if TELA wasn’t here.”

Today, the Tallahatchie collaborative is the only coordinated, fully funded pre-K effort in the county, and in Wiggins’ view, if Tallahatchie can do it, anyone can. 

“The ELC, it is work,” said Perry, from Petal. “There’s a lot of work. But it’s very worth it.”

Looking ahead

Despite stagnant state test scores this year, Mississippi continues to revel in the glow of its national academic achievements, particularly in literacy and early education.

Wiggins believes those achievements are in no small part due to the collaboratives. He hopes to see the program expand to include younger students and more communities in the next 10 years.

Access is still low, with enrollment rates of 17.7% of all Mississippi 4-year-olds. The SIP program reaches about 900 kids, or about 2.4% of 4-year-olds.  A recent report from Barnett’s organization noted that neighboring Alabama serves twice as many four-year-olds.

Neither of Mississippi’s pre-K programs serve 3-year-olds.

Since early learning collaboratives were established, funding has steadily increased. The original $3 million allotment is now up to $29 million, plus $3.25 million for the program’s coaches. 

The SIP program received $13 million in the most recent appropriations bill. 

“Our scores in kindergarten readiness continue to go up, and the nation understands what we’ve done,” Wiggins said. “But we’ve got to continue to do things. 

“We’ve got to reduce the friction in the early education world in Mississippi because it should be about the kids. We have something that works. We need to continue to support that.”

A Black college student who was found hanging from a tree on his school’s campus in Mississippi was not the victim of foul play law enforcement officials said, countering online speculation that he was the victim of a lynching.

Demartravion “Trey” Reed, a 21-year-old from Grenada, Mississippi, was discovered at Delta State University the morning of Sept. 15. Reed had only attended classes at the university for a month before his death, his family’s attorney, Vanessa Jones, said at a news conference on Tuesday evening. 

Reed’s family said on Sept. 3 the college student spent time with his loved ones in his hometown, where city officials hosted Grenada Day. They said he had a fun and loving spirit and they now want answers about the circumstances surrounding his death.

“He went back to Delta State University — and our question is what happened,” Jones said. “We’re not going to point fingers at anybody. We’re not going to call anybody any names. All we want is answers.”

What happened to Demartravion “Trey” Reed?  

The Cleveland Police Department notified the Bolivar County Coroner’s Office at 7:32 a.m. that the student, later identified as Reed, was found unresponsive.

Bolivar County Coroner Randolph “Rudy” Seals Jr. wrote in a report that, based on a preliminary examination, Reed did not suffer any lacerations, contusions, compound fractures, broken bones, or injuries consistent with an assault.

“At this time, there is no evidence to suggest the individual was physically attacked before his death,” Seals added in the report. 

At a press conference on Monday afternoon, the university’s Chief of Police and Director of Public Safety, Michael Peele, said investigators found no evidence of foul play. Reed’s attorney said the family has not received a copy of the report.

Reed’s uncle, Rev. Jerry L. Reed, said the 21-year-old was joyful, happy and obedient. Every other Sunday, Jerry, a pastor at Living Faith Miracle Temple Cogic in Grenada, said Trey would attend church.

“One thing he said [that] he wanted to be a truck driver. He wanted to go to college,” said Reed’s uncle.  He added that he and his family want to “bring the truth to the light. That’s what we’re looking for.”

How is the community reacting to the student’s death?

As news of Reed’s death spread across social media and the country, so did unanswered questions and speculation about what may have happened to the student. 

Renowned civil rights attorney Ben Crump shared a post on Instagram, calling for full transparency and prayers for the family.

“His family deserves answers,” he wrote. 

In a separate statement, Crump said he’s been retained by the family and he “will work with a number of civil rights organizations to conduct a thorough and transparent investigation.”

Despite the coroner’s report, legislators and community members said they are still seeking answers surrounding Reed’s death. 

The Mississippi Legislative Black Caucus wrote in a statement, “We are continuing to ask questions of local officials and remain engaged as the investigation unfolds.”

“We are closely watching developments to determine what further action, if any, may be necessary to ensure transparency and accountability,” they wrote.

U.S. Rep. Bennie Thompson, a Democrat from Mississippi, said he spoke to Reed’s family and said he is calling for a full federal investigation into his death.

“We must leave no stone unturned,” Thompson said in a statement. “Mississippi’s history of racial violence against African Americans cannot be ignored, and our community deserves both truth and accountability.”

Delta State is a small four-year institution with a student enrollment of 2,700. During the fall semester last year, white students were 48% of its population, while Black students made up 42%, according to data from the university’s Mini Factbook. The university, which had been celebrating its centennial, canceled classes and events on Monday.

On Monday night, students gathered on campus for a prayer vigil in honor of Reed’s life.

What happens next?

Peeler requested the assistance of multiple law enforcement agencies, including the Mississippi Bureau of Investigation, Bolivar County Sheriff’s Office, and Cleveland Police Department, to work on the investigation, according to the school. 

University President Dan Ennis said at the press conference that he spoke to Reed’s family and “expressed our heartbreak.”

“Our community is deeply saddened by this loss,” Ennis said.

Jones, the family’s attorney, said neither Ennis nor any officials have contacted the family directly. She said the family has only received information through the media or secondhand sources.

The post Black Student Found Hanging at Delta State. Police Say No Foul Play. appeared first on Capital B News.

Despite twists and turns, Mississippi took a step forward this week in expanding broadband access in the state.

There have been concerns that the Trump administration would make cuts to the Biden era program.

While there have not been cuts to the bulk of the money, the changes to the federal program have caused concern for advocates about the program’s affordability, technology/stability and community engagement. 

Internet service providers submitted over 300 applications for grant funding to provide internet to underserved areas according to Sally Doty, the director of the Office of Broadband Expansion and Accessibility of Mississippi. BEAM is responsible for managing the $1.2 billion the state plans to receive from the federal Broadband Equity Access and Deployment program.

BEAD is a $42-billion program passed by Congress in 2021 as part of the Infrastructure Investment and Jobs Act. But on June 6, the Department of Commerce’s National Telecommunications and Information Administration altered the criteria to select providers. The notice eliminated the preference for fiber broadband and requirements for labor, community engagement, climate resilience and low cost/affordable plans. It did not change the amount earmarked for each state.

“Shelving the previous Administration’s unnecessary burdens, and opening access to all technology types, connects more Americans to broadband more quickly, and at a lower cost to the American taxpayer,” Secretary of Commerce Howard Lutnick said in the June notice about the changes. 

Areas in need of coverage were identified by asking providers to report what areas and technical capabilities they provided.  Mississippi received $1.2 billion to map underserved and unserved areas and to provide grants for providers to extend coverage to these areas. At the time of the June announcement, BEAM had not awarded any contracts.

In 2022, 80% of Mississippians had broadband service. At the time it was the lowest percentage in the nation. Broadband can open up business opportunities, provide access to telehealth care and more jobs, especially in rural areas that often have the lowest rates of high speed internet availability.

“The most marginalized, rural communities would benefit from this large infrastructure investment in the state,” said Harya Tarekegn, director of advocacy and policy at Mississippi Center for Justice. 

Grants will be given out based on who can build the infrastructure the cheapest, how fast they can set it up and if they’re able to meet the technical requirements, such as upload and download speeds. The new technology neutral plan may mean that more satellite contracts will be awarded to satellite companies, such as SpaceX and Amazon’s Kuiper. 

Advocates are concerned that the elimination of the preference for fiber and the ability for states to consider affordability will result in worse technology at a higher price for individuals. 

“We feel strongly that fiber is the best way to build out connectivity, especially in rural communities,” said Kyra Roby, a consultant with Children’s Defense Fund. 

To install fiber broadband, cables are run along utility poles or underground up to or close to a house. The upfront cost of fiber is higher and more time consuming than other technologies, such as satellite and fixed wireless. However, fiber is generally considered the fastest and most reliable broadband technology with lower long term costs for maintenance and to consumers. 

Under the previous policy, states could use the end cost to consumers and providers’ low-cost programs as part of their decision making process. Now they cannot. 

“The affordability issue is a major issue. Internet service costs are ridiculous and a lot of people are not going to be able to afford market rates,” said Oleta Fitzgerald, Southern Regional Office director of Children’s Defense Fund. 

There are no cuts to BEAD, but in May of this year, the federal government ended the Digital Equity Program. This included $10 million for Mississippi’s Digital Skills & Accessibility Capacity Grant Program to provide digital skills training and education. However, there is more concern about the future of the BEAD program and its ability to reshape internet access. 

Over the next few weeks, BEAM will review applications and make the final proposal available for public comment before submitting it to the Commerce Department. 

“Communities still have a vital role to play in ensuring reliable, affordable access. There has already been significant community engagement around these issues to help get us to where we are now, and we expect even more in the months ahead,” Roby said.

This story from Reasons to be Cheerful is one in a series about the confluence of capitalism, conservation and cultural identity in the Mississippi River Basin. It is part of Waterline and is sponsored by the Walton Family Foundation.

Dorothy Grady pulled at a tuft of green fronds sprouting from one of an array of soil-filled buckets sitting in the driveway of her house. A plump carrot, five inches long and brilliant orange, popped out.

Nearby, a sage shrub grew from another bucket, and scallions crowded a squat grow bag. In about three weeks, Grady would kick off the spring growing season on the land she cultivates around Shelby, Mississippi, including two plots at the now-closed middle school across the street, a small grove of peach and pear trees up the road, and five acres outside of town. She was ready to start planting eggplants, melons, tomatoes and a cornucopia of other produce that would soon end up in the homes of 127 nearby residents. 

Shelby, a few miles east of the Mississippi River, is surrounded by flat, fertile farmland. But Grady’s vegetables and fruit are some of the only crops around that make it to local plates. The vast majority of Mississippi Delta farms are devoted to commodity crops like soy and corn.

Grady is one of almost a dozen local growers supplying produce to Delta GREENS, a collaborative research project that is delivering fresh ingredients to residents of Bolivar, Sunflower and Washington counties with diabetes and monitoring the health impacts. This “food is medicine” project is one of a number of initiatives that are supporting farmers and expanding the market for locally grown produce in this western Mississippi region. The benefits run in both directions: At the same time that community members are getting access to these nutritious ingredients, the small-scale farmers who grow them are getting a leg up.

“What we’re trying to do is build cooperative development amongst the farms,” says Julian Miller, founding director for the Reuben V. Anderson Institute for Social Justice in Jackson, a co-principal investigator for Delta GREENS, and a long-time local food advocate in the Delta region. “Ultimately, we want to be able to give them the capacity to scale and capture the broader market.”

The 200-mile-long Delta region, on the fertile floodplain sandwiched between the Mississippi and Yazoo rivers, has a rich agricultural history. Once known for growing cotton, today the area is dominated by ridged fields growing commodities that will be processed into animal feed or ethanol.

In the past, many Delta residents cultivated fruits and vegetables, says Miller, yet over time, pressures like farming mechanization and loss of land eroded the practice. Miller, a fifth-generation Delta resident who grew up a few miles away from Shelby, never saw anyone with a vegetable garden. “That tradition was lost, as far as growing your food,” he says. 

Today, despite the abundance of fertile land, very little of it is dedicated to edible crops. About 90 percent of the food people eat in this region is grown elsewhere and imported. “That’s the irony,” Miller says.

And even imported fresh food can be hard to access. As of 2021, 63 of Mississippi’s 82 counties were classified as food deserts, meaning there is no grocery store or option to buy fresh ingredients in the immediate area.

Significant health and economic inequities overlay this region. In Bolivar, Sunflower and Washington counties — where the Delta GREENS study is focused — almost a third of residents live at or below the poverty level. Meanwhile, the rate of diabetes is twice the national average.

This confluence of public health disparities, economic inequity and lack of food sovereignty has fueled an effort to reestablish food-growing traditions, led by growers like Grady. A child of sharecroppers, Grady recalls her family always kept a garden when she was growing up, exchanging veggies and fruits with neighbors.

She has been involved with growing the local food movement in the Delta since the 1990s, when she first started working on farm-to-school garden projects.

In addition to helping establish hundreds of community gardens at schools and churches around the region, she’s also expanded her own growing operation, now supplying her harvests to residents in and around Bolivar County. Last year, the peach and pear trees she keeps yielded about 30 bushels of fruit, which went to local schools and was distributed through produce boxes for participants in the Delta GREENS study.

These weekly produce boxes are helping to address one of the structural challenges of developing the local food system in the Delta, explains Miller: the lack of a consistent market. While many residents are interested in eating more local produce, growers don’t have a reliable pathway to sell to the public. But nutrition- and food-security projects that source produce from local farmers are helping those agricultural businesses scale up.

About 40 miles northeast of Shelby, Robbie Pollard is busy planting and tending to more than 10 acres of fruit and vegetable plants. 

Pollard grew up around farming — his grandfather grew commodity crops. But he says he didn’t know anything about cultivating food until he tried growing his own in his backyard. It turned out to be a calling, he says, and he soon left his job in IT to pursue it full time.

Farming fruits and vegetables is more complex than commodity crops, explains Pollard. For one, it’s more labor intensive — weeding, tending and harvesting by hand. Unlike commodity farmers, who deliver their crops directly to local co-ops, distribution is harder for fruits and vegetables, Pollard says: “We have to find our own markets.”

Pollard has found a range of ways to distribute his produce through his farm, Start 2 Finish, and his associated healthy foods initiative Happy Foods Project. Today, he is one of the main growers supplying for Delta GREENS, as well as similar projects that provide households with regular local food boxes, including another food prescription project, Northern Mississippi FoodRx, in conjunction with the University of Mississippi. This summer, he’ll also be distributing through a mobile market, and he recently started selling through a grocery store with a focus on local products that opened in the city of Clarksdale in May.

Produce prescription boxes have given him a way to steadily expand his farm by reinvesting each year in incremental upgrades. He’s progressed from doing all his work by hand, to having a tiller, then a small tractor. He’s now leasing 46 acres of cropland. Last year, he grew four acres. This season, he put in more than 10, with plans in the works to expand hydroponic and aquaponic capacity. Soon, he hopes to work with other local growers to try a range of different techniques across the acreage.

Tyler Yarbrough, Mississippi Delta project manager for the nationwide organization Partnership for a Healthier America, has worked alongside Pollard on a range of projects building out the region’s local food movement, including some that provide households with produce for a limited amount of time — like Good Food at Home, which has supplied about 500,000 servings of produce to local families through weekly boxes, each household eligible for 12 weeks at a time. Through these shorter-term projects, growers are able to take steps to become more stable, while building a demand for local produce among consumers.

“You can leverage it to bring on the consistency, and to further bring those markets into your orbit,” Yarbrough says.

While produce box models have yielded success, they have the most impact for farmers when they’re paired with other initiatives, according to Yarbrough. What’s key is to give growers flexibility with funding so they can build up over time.

“It can’t just be one thing,” Yarbrough says. “It needs to be coupled with funds for these farmers to actually build their capacity on their farm. It needs to be coupled with connecting all the dots with the market. It has to be a holistic approach.”

Within the Delta region, the local food movement still faces many barriers, according to Natalie Minton, a University of Mississippi researcher who is working with Pollard to study the local food market, and on North Mississippi Food Rx. Growers struggle to find — and afford — workers. And without a reliable market, growing their business is very difficult.

There are also environmental factors. Beyond extreme weather, like drought and severe storms, growers face challenges related to the dominant commodity cropland. Pesticides and chemicals routinely used on commodity crops drift, harming food crops.

Yet, Minton says the roots of change in the local food system are taking hold. The success of farmers like Pollard is showing how specialty farming can be a viable career.

For projects that rely on grants and outside funding like Mississippi Fresh, another major challenge is working with federal programs, according to Miller. Trump administration cuts, including to subsidies that support buying from local producers, are straining local food systems. Delta GREENS is funded through the National Institutes of Health, and Miller says there is uncertainty around whether support will continue. 

Despite the uncertainty, the local food movement in the Mississippi Delta is notable because it is so locally driven, says Marlene Manzo, of HEAL Food Alliance, a food justice coalition that works with groups across the country, including Mississippi Fresh. Manzo says that the growth of the local food supply within the Mississippi Delta shows the power of working at a small scale to make changes that really respond to the community.

“What we do know is building collective power within our communities and in regional systems can really make a large, lasting impact,” she says.

Grady sees a shift happening in the community. She knows more people, including her family members, who are starting to grow some of their own food. One former student is now a chef in a nearby school district. He’s keeping a garden and using the ingredients in the school kitchen.

“The interest of other people wanting to do this kind of work was the greatest reward of it all,” she says.

Elizabeth Hewitt is a freelance journalist based in the Netherlands. She’s interested in how policy-making impacts lives, and likes to write about local solutions to big problems.

School districts in Humphreys County and Yazoo City are one step closer to regaining local control. 

The Mississippi Department of Education on Tuesday disbanded the Mississippi Achievement School District, which consolidated the struggling school districts in 2019 into a single one under direct state supervision. 

The Legislature created the Mississippi Achievement School District in 2016 to target the lowest-performing schools in the state. Yazoo City and Humphreys County, both majority-Black and low-income areas, were the district’s inaugural school systems. 

But House Bill 1696 passed in 2024 — co-authored by Democratic Rep. Timaka James-Jones, who represents Humphreys — dissolved the Mississippi Achievement School District starting July 1, 2025. 

Republican Rep. Kent McCarty of Lamar County, who authored the bill as vice-chair of the House Education Committee, said the legislation was aimed at giving districts more control.

“I hope the extra flexibility allows them to move toward more independence,” McCarty said Thursday. “Eventually, we’d love to see every district function independently without oversight from the department and make the improvements they need to be high-performing districts.”

But that doesn’t mean the districts are fully back to local control. They’ve just separated and become “districts of transformation” — a different, more widespread framework for low-performing schools to improve their student achievement. 

School systems can become districts of transformation if they consistently receive failing grades in the state’s accountability report card. Under that model, those districts have to develop and implement improvement plans. They get support from the state education department and are closely overseen by the agency. State takeovers can mean more teaching observations and frequent classroom visits from administrators. 

Since 1996, school districts have been taken over using the “district of transformation” model 23 times. Four districts currently operate under the model: Holmes, Noxubee, Humphreys County and Yazoo City.

Earl Watkins, who previously managed the Humphreys County and Yazoo City schools as superintendent of the achievement district, will take the helm of the Yazoo City school district, while Stanley Ellis will lead the Humphrey County district. 

The two superintendents will still answer directly to the state Board of Education.

That’ll be the case for at least one more year — both Yazoo City and Humphreys County received “C” marks on their state report card this past school year, so if they receive “C” grades this year, they still need one more consecutive year of that grade or higher to regain local control. 

“With the scores we have, we’re well on the way to the next steps,” James-Jones said. “It really does boost the pride of our community and we have this united goal now. We’re looking forward to our students getting everything that they need to be successful.”

Humphreys, which received a “D” rating during the 2023-2024 school year, made a “C” by two points.

The growth was largely due to higher scores among the bottom 25% of 3rd to 8th grade students in math and English. Both English and math test scores are given extra weight along with any improvements made by students in the bottom 25%.

Yazoo City raised its grade from an “F” through similar means, with math students in the bottom 25% showing more growth from last year. 

Tenashe White, who teaches 8th grade math in Humphreys, gives credit foremost to her students. But she also acknowledges the help of educational consultants and her fellow teachers who helped plan activities that helped students master math standards through play.

“We threw math bowls, science bowls, spelling competitions to kind of open it up more so they can have some fun but also perform on the tests,” White said. “We had different incentives like ice cream socials.”

Ellis started as the Humphreys superintendent Tuesday. He said anyone who’s not focused on teaching and learning will find themselves “out of place” at the district. 

“Our motto is, ‘New day, new direction,’” he said. “This is our opportunity to get a new start.”

The Trump administration has repeatedly denied disaster mitigation funding to states hit by extreme weather events, another step in President Donald Trump’s plan to downsize and phase out the Federal Emergency Management Agency, and lawmakers aren’t sure why it keeps happening.

Since March, states including Oklahoma, Missouri, Iowa and Mississippi suffered severe storms, winds or wildfires and requested assistance through the Hazard Mitigation Grant Program at FEMA, which provides funds to help protect against future natural disasters. Unlike the Biden administration, Trump is no longer automatically approving those grants and has denied seven requests this spring, according to Bloomberg, while six requests remain under review.

Oklahoma made one such funding request after March wildfires and winds ravaged the state, killing several people and damaging hundreds of homes, according to the Oklahoma Department of Emergency Management. Those fires burned Gov. Kevin Stitt’s farmhouse to the ground.

FEMA approved several Fire Management Assistance Grants in Oklahoma, which help state, local and tribal governments cover fire-related damage costs, but it denied a request for mitigation funding in early June.

“Well, I’m usually on the side of my state, so we’ll wait and see what happens,” Rep. Tom Cole of Oklahoma said of the funding denial.

Oklahoma Sen. James Lankford said he’d have to see the requests in order to answer questions about the resilience funds. But while disaster aid is often necessary, it’s not simple, he said.

“There’s not a time, obviously, when there’s a disaster — maybe it would be a flood, a wildfire or our famous tornadoes — that we don’t need help from someone,” Lankford said. “But there’s a mixture of private insurance, state funding and federal funding, a formula set up on the federal side, to try to figure out when that actually kicks in. We’ve got to be able to make sure we actually meet that.”

At the beginning of June, the administration denied two requests from Missouri after tornadoes and storms in March and April killed residents and tore up communities.

Sen. Josh Hawley said he had talked to Trump about FEMA grants for Missouri in the past, which he was grateful the president had approved. But Hawley supports his state’s request for mitigation funding that Trump has since denied.

“It’s been a really tough spring in our state for natural disasters. We’ve lost almost 20 people, and all across the state, suffered a lot of damage,” Hawley said.

“We may have to go back and ask for more,” he said of FEMA funding. “We’re not able to do the recovery with what we’ve got.”

Bloomberg reported that Oklahoma received other federal funds it could use in a similar way to the HMGP grants and is not appealing the administration’s decision, but Missouri officials were already putting together an appeal.

In late May, the entire Washington delegation wrote to Trump after he denied aid funding for a November bomb cyclone that hit the state. The letter said the state’s request detailed over $30 million in damages, costs that local governments cannot and should not be expected to shoulder alone, including mitigation funding.

“Washington state’s first responders, local governments, and emergency management professionals have done everything within their means to begin recovery, but the scale of the damage requires federal support through the Public Assistance Program and the Hazard Mitigation Grant Program,” the letter read.

The administration denied the state’s appeal last week, according to The Seattle Times.

The White House said it’s seeing large amounts of funding across the board that haven’t been delegated to any specific project yet, and it wants to decrease that spending.

“The Trump administration is monitoring the approval of HMGP with states’ ability to execute those funds,” White House spokesperson Abigail Jackson said in a statement. “We are working with states to assist them in identifying projects and drawing down balances in a way that makes the nation more resilient.”

The post Lawmakers Don’t Know Why Trump Keeps Denying Disaster Mitigation Grants appeared first on Oklahoma Watch.

Between 350 and 400 people showed up to speak up against the Trump administration and its policies on immigration, executive power and more in Oxford, Mississippi, as part of the nationwide No Kings Day protests on Saturday, June 14, 2025.

The post Photos: No Kings Day Protests in Oxford, Mississippi appeared first on Mississippi Free Press.

The power to grant a disaster declaration and access to the FEMA assistance programs for states hit by storms lies solely in the hands of President Trump, who wants to scale back FEMA and pass recovery costs to states. State officials say they’re not ready to take on that burden.

The post Uncertainty About Federal Disaster Aid Looms As Storms Roll In appeared first on Mississippi Free Press.