City of Ocean Springs, Mississippi calls for Strategic Petroluem Reserve hearings

OCEAN SPRINGS — Mayor Connie Moran and the Ocean Springs Board of Aldermen have unanimously approved a resolution requesting public hearings be held in Jackson, George and Greene counties on the proposed Richton Salt Dome project and its environmental impact to the area.

City leaders say that no public hearings have been held on the proposed project in the three counties, nor has the residents of these counties been notified of the proposed impact of the project on the Pascagoula River and the expected impact on the environment of these counties.

"As a city, it is our responsibility to speak out and request the facts about this project," Moran says. "Our citizens deserve a public hearing that is scheduled at a convenient time and location in our community. This is far too important of an issue for us not to be given that right."

"The city would like to thank Rep. Gene Taylor (D-Miss.) for his recent efforts to ensure that public hearings will be held on the Gulf Coast," says Julia Weaver, alderman-at-large.

The Richton Salt Dome is a proposed site for a new strategic petroleum reserve (spr).

Proponents point to its numbers. The U.S. Department of Energy (DOE) estimates it would cost at least $1 billion to construct, perhaps $1.5 billion. The construction and implementation of the project will bring 1,000 jobs.

The facility is projected to hold 160 million barrels of crude oil with pipelines running from Pascagoula to Richton and Richton to Liberty.

However, the project has its opponents, particularly environmentalists and outdoor enthusiasts. In December, Taylor wrote a letter to the DOE urging it to hold additional hearings so that the department could directly hear the questions and concerns of the people of South Mississippi. In addition, Taylor, along with Sen. Thad Cochran (R-Miss.) and Sen. Roger Wicker (R-Miss.), sent the department an additional letter asking them to hold more hearings.

"I have said before that the Department of Energy must do this project right or not do it at all," Taylor said.

Last month, the DOE agreed to prepare a new environmental impact statement (EIS), in which the department will address and consider relocating the proposed raw water intake on the Leaf River, brine disposal in the Gulf of Mexico and location of the oil terminal in Pascagoula to reduce any potential environmental impact that the project may have. This would include at least one additional public hearing on the project.

The City of Ocean Springs has requested that Taylor, Wicker, Sen. Thad Cochran (R-Miss.), the DOE and President George W. Bush take necessary action to provide public hearings in Jackson, George, and Greene counties on the proposal. Additionally, city officials have requested that any EIS prepared on the project be made available on-line and in the counties' public libraries.

From the Mississippi Business Journal February 21, 2008

Alabama vs. California

Survey USA is out with polling data that shows Democratic-friendly California and Republican-friendly Alabama will likely play their standard roles in the upcoming presidential election.
In short, Republican John McCain holds a huge lead over either Hillary Clinton or Barack Obama in Alabama.
Meanwhile in California, Obama and Clinton are far ahead of McCain.
If the trend holds, it would make up the ground lost by Republicans in the primaries.

A Changing Political Race

A recent poll by Public Policy Polling suggests that the entry of Patrick McCrory, the Republican mayor of Charlotte, into North Carolina's gubernatorial race is shaking up the contest.

The new poll of likely voters shows McCrory running even with both major Democratic candidates, Lt. Gov. Beverly Perdue and state Treasurer Richard Moore, in hypothetical general election match-ups. McCrory performs far better than any other GOP candidate and also seems to attract a significant Democratic cross-over vote.

While much of McCrory's appeal may be tied to his name recognition in the Charlotte area and his recent entry into the race, the early numbers suggest that he has the ability to change the dynamics of both the primary and general election campaigns.

Times: Race matters less in South

An interesting story in today's issue of The New York Times highlights how race matters less and less politically in the South in, of all places (the story says), Alabama.

The story highlights how voters in an Alabama county that is 96 percent white chose an African American man to represent voters in the Alabama House of Representatives -- a first in the state for a black to represent a majority-white district. From the story:

Yet in a state once synonymous with racial strife, there is no denying this milestone, for all its tentativeness. Everyone — the voter in Cullman, the Alabama politician, the local historian — is rubbing his or her eyes, a little.

“It strikes me as a real watershed event,” said Samuel L. Webb, a historian at the University of Alabama at Birmingham.

Cigarette tax hike advances; House bill aims to resolve Medicaid shortfall; levy would rise from 18 cents to $1.18 in Mississippi

The House Ways and Means Committee on Monday approved two pieces of legislation aimed at creating revenue sources for the Division of Medicaid and the state's struggling trauma-care system.

Committee members heard from House Medicaid Chairman Dirk Dedeaux, D-Gulfport, who explained that one bill would increase the excise tax on cigarettes by $1.

Currently, Mississippi's cigarette excise tax is 18 cents per pack - among the lowest in the nation. Gov. Haley Barbour has vetoed past cigarette tax legislation, and Senate Finance Committee Chairman Dean Kirby, R-Pearl, has said he won't consider any tax bills this year.

Dedeaux said the tax would generate about $174 million annually, based on figures from the Stennis Institute of Government at Mississippi State University. He said 90 percent of the revenue would be earmarked for Medicaid. The rest would go to the trauma system.

Lawmakers are seeking a revenue source for Medicaid , as the health-care program for the underprivileged is facing a $92 million deficit in the current fiscal year. And Medicaid Executive Director Robert L. Robinson has told lawmakers the program will need an extra $168 million in funding for the fiscal year that begins July 1.

The bill also has provisions for technical changes to the program, including how patients can select prescription drugs. Dedeaux said going to a preferred and non-preferred prescription list rather than brand name and generic would allow the program to save more money through rebates and supplements.

The cigarette tax bill was amended by the Ways and Means Committee to change its effective date from July 1 to June 1. The bill now must go back to the Medicaid Committee for approval before it progresses in the House.

From the February 20, 2008 edition of The Clarion-Ledger

Slip Sliding Away

(This is an edited version of a post that first appeared on The Progressive Pulse, an NC blog)

Despite mounting concerns regarding mismatches between the skills demanded by local employers and those possessed by the incumbent workforce, the federal government continues to disinvest in initiatives that help improve the competitiveness of workers and firms.

The Bush Administration's most recent budget request proposes significant reductions to key education and training programs. Under this proposal, funding for a variety of workforce services would be reduced and then consolidated into a block grant. Such a measure, for instance, would reduce North Carolina's annual Workforce Investment Act funding — funding that helps train adults, dislocated workers and youth — by $9.3 million and lead 3,720 Tar Heels to lose access to training. Click here for state-level impact estimates.

Sadly, this is consistent with a decades-long reduction in funding for workforce services. Unless such trends are reversed, both the state and nation will lack the ability to remain competitive in a changing global economy.

Love and ...

Facing South, a product of the Institute for Southern Studies, compiles an interesting set of stats on the heels of Valentine's Day.

Here's what its writers found:
 Bible Belt's rank among U.S. regions for the highest divorce rate: 1
 Number of Southern states among the 10 with the highest divorce rates: 6
 Number of Southern states among the 10 with the highest teen birth rates: 6
 Rank of the South among U.S. regions for rates of chlamydia, gonorrhea and syphilis: 1
 Number of Southern states among the 10 with the highest concentration of couples as a percent of total households: 0
 Number of Southern states among those that allow same-sex marriage or civil unions: 0
 Of the 13 Southern states, number with constitutional bans on same-sex marriage or civil unions: 10
 Percent of Southern states that still banned interracial marriage in 1966, the year before the U.S. Supreme Court's Loving v. Virginia decision struck down such laws: 100
 Estimated average African-American possession of European DNA for the U.S. overall: 25 percent
 For the Northeast: 50 percent
 For the South: 10 percent
 Estimated average European-American possession of African DNA for the U.S. overall: 2 to 20 percent
 Year in which the U.S. Supreme Court declared illegal the interracial dating ban at Bob Jones University in Greenville, S.C.: 1983
 Amount the school paid in back taxes rather than lift the ban: $1 million
 Year the school finally dropped the policy: 2000

Speed to head tax study commission in Mississippi

From The Mississippi Business Journal January 04, 2008:

JACKSON — Gov. Haley Barbour has named Leland Speed, a Jackson businessman and former executive director of the Mississippi Development Authority, to chair a public-private commission that will study Mississippi's tax code and recommend reforms.

Barbour says. "Taxes have such a profound effect on the financial well-being of Mississippi families and the operations of state government that it's imperative the system be fair and equitable.

"The purpose of this commission is to conduct a comprehensive study of the state tax system, taking into consideration the federal and local tax loads, as well. This unified approach will provide a clearer, more accurate picture of the entire tax system than has been available to the Legislature and the public in the past."

Barbour adds that any adjustments in the state tax code must complement federal and local tax codes in providing a stable source of revenue for essential public services while encouraging economic growth and job creation.

The commission will provide a report by August 31, 2008, after completion of fiscal year 2008, to the governor, Legislature and the public on recommendations for any adjustments. In addition, the staff of the Mississippi State Tax Commission will be asked to provide information requested by the commission, and the Legislature will be asked for a small, one-time appropriation to pay for support of the commission.

A compete list of commission members will be announced soon; members will be drawn from a variety of private business, government and education fields, including legislators, as well as tax specialists.

Turning the numbers over

UPDATE: For what it's worth, here is what we came up with.

The editorial board of The Anniston Star has been crunching numbers. What it has come up with is that more Democrats than Republicans are turning out in most Southern primaries.
We're still wrestling with what this means ahead of penning an editorial. Is it energetic Democrats getting out to the polls while discouraged Republicans are staying home? Is it a turning away from the sorts of hot-buttons that have previously energized Southern voters? We don't know, but we're trying to find some clarity.
Want to do the math yourself? Check out the New York Times election Web site.

A Small Step Forward

(This is an edited version of a post that first appeared on The Progressive Pulse, an NC blog)

The day after failing by one vote to break a Republican filibuster, the U.S. Senate passed a fiscal stimulus package similar to the problematic one adopted last week by the U.S. House. The House quickly accepted the Senate's changes and sent the bill to President Bush.

The congressional bill contains three broad measures: a tax rebate for individual tax payers; enhanced expensing and depreciation allowances for businesses and an increase in the size of the mortgages that can be insured by the Federal Housing Authority.

While the final tax rebate provision arguably is more equitable than the House's original version, Congress still failed to include several measures that would help the people most impacted by a downturn while injecting cash effectively and quickly into local economies. Omitted items include a temporary extension in unemployment insurance and a temporary increase in Food Stamp benefits. And the business tax provisions could result in a revenue loss to a number of Southern states, many of which already are facing projected revenue shortfalls. This is due to the inter-connection between the federal and state revenue systems.

Drip, drip, drip

The Christian Science Monitor offers a dire headline this morning, South's ill-timed drought may further crimp US economy.
The newspaper reports:

[H]ow the South responds to the improbably dry weather may affect the broader US economy, since the region's booming metro areas and job growth have so far fended off a national recession.
"The coincidence of having [potential] recession plus drought is a tough one for the economy," says Jeff Humphreys, an economist at the University of Georgia in Athens. "It's coming on top of the housing recession and the oil price shock, making our economy more vulnerable than would otherwise be the case. I don't think the drought alone is able to produce a recession, but it adds to negative forces that are already out there."

For an equally depressing picture of the parched American West, National Geographc's latest edition has a story.

Looking for a sign?

Spotted At Mike Huckabee's appearance in Montgomery Saturday, a young man waving a sign that read, "Us Against Them!"
Not exactly a positive, forward-looking statement. But for conservatives in the Republican Party unhappy with frontrunner John McCain and shaken by the prospect of a Democrat winning the White House this fall, it's a pretty accurate summing up of the political landscape.
Others noted the sign and ones similar to it, here and here.

Short-Term Recession = Long-Term Jobs Problem

(Cross-posted from The Progressive Pulse, a North Carolina blog.)

Over the past few weeks, the nation's economic pundits have gone from saying that the U.S. likely would avoid a recession to saying that that the U.S. likely will enter a recession to saying that the U.S. likely is in a recession but that it will be a brief one. Overlooked is the fact that even a short recession can have long-lasting effects on the labor market.

A new study prepared by the Center for Economic and Policy Research argues that a recession's negative impacts on employment, wages, incomes and poverty will last much longer than the recession itself. Based on an analysis of past downturns, the study's authors estimate that a mild recession will last between six and nine months with the labor market impacts reverberating until 2010.

The authors further forecast that a mild recession will raise the national unemployment rate, reduce the share of people with jobs, drive down family incomes, increase the number of poor households and further reduce the share of the population with health insurance coverage.

Those patterns are consistent with national and state-level developments that unfolded following the last three recessions (1980-82, 1900-91 and 2001). After the 2001 downturn, for instance, it took until 2006 for private-sector employment in North Carolina to return to its pre-recessionary level. And during that same period, according to the NC Budget & Tax Center , the share of Tar Heels with jobs fell while wages and incomes stagnated.

Young Baptists Going Green In Atlanta

Two Better South Issues, faith and the South and environmental policy, were addressed this week in Atlanta at a Baptist convention led by former Vice President Al Gore and former President Jimmy Carter. The Raleigh News and Observer reports on the Celebration of a New Baptist Covenant, “a gathering of black and white Baptists, moderates and liberals,” that met at the Georgia World Congress Center. The event was remarkable for the participation of young divinity students and the priorities they bring to their faith. One of their priorities is the environment.

…the new generation of Baptists who will one day take the helm of churches across the nation. Their passion for environmental stewardship signals a different slate of concerns they'll champion as they move into positions of leadership.

But not just young Baptists are raising environmental concerns. Prominent evangelical Christian leaders -- such as the Rev. Rich Cizik, vice president of governmental affairs for the National Association of Evangelicals -- have warned that global warming is an urgent threat, and that the Bible calls on people to care for God's creation.

The attention given to the environment by the young Baptists marks a change from the denomination’s more traditional voices.

But they have not nearly succeeded in capturing the hearts and minds of more conservative evangelicals. Some, such as James Dobson of Focus on the Family, have seen global warming as a distraction that diverts evangelicals from other issues they deem more important, such as the breakup of the family, abortion and homosexuality.

According to a Barna Group study published last week in the Baptist Press, a publication of the Southern Baptist Convention, global warming was last on the list of problems evangelicals rated. Instead, they listed abortion as the top issue facing America, followed by personal debt, the content of TV and movies, homosexuals, poverty, immigration and HIV/AIDS.

Southern Progressives should see the Celebration of a New Baptist Covenant as a promising development in empowering the region’s strong and extensive faith community to adapt to the changing demands of the new century with potentially progressive and innovative solutions. In summing up his message, former Vice President Gore stated;

"We do not have to countenance the heaving of contempt on God's creation.”