OT: Jackson Crime is Changing
- Thread starter FreeDawg
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Being a democrat doesn't mean you are incapable of being an effective administrator or taht you are against running water, treated sewer, and paved roads. They have had democrat candidates run that would have probably been fine. But they have insisted on incompetence. If there is a whiff that a candidate in the democrat primary has some support from the business community or god forbid, northeast jackson, they are pretty much cooked.
Listen to Kim Wade and you'll learn that support from local churches has a huge impact on Jackson municipal elections.
To be fair, the last two candidates that I recall that got business support and won (Melton and Yarber) didn't do well when they were mayor.
Lumumba Sr. was someone I had concerns about but he did better than I expected before he passed away.
Lumumba Sr. was someone I had concerns about but he did better than I expected before he passed away.
Separation of Church and State was implemented for a reason. Of course they are, 501(c)(3) provides a plethora of avenues by which to rank up and get rich while doing it.
The current fight for the airport is a good example of the stubbornness of Jackson leadership. It could bring sooooo much revenue into the city with the MS Braves, the brandon amphitheater, nissan, Amazon (coming to Canton), etc...but because the council is mayor-appointed cronies, it is mismanaged and under utilized. The city doesn't want to give it up to the state, ultimately (leadership gist, not mine) because they view it as a "white man power grab." It's ridiculous.
The current fight for the airport is a good example of the stubbornness of Jackson leadership. It could bring sooooo much revenue into the city with the MS Braves, the brandon amphitheater, nissan, Amazon (coming to Canton), etc...but because the council is mayor-appointed cronies, it is mismanaged and under utilized. The city doesn't want to give it up to the state, ultimately (leadership gist, not mine) because they view it as a "white man power grab." It's ridiculous.
I agree with you about Lumumba Sr. He was a lot better as mayor than he was as a councilman. But really neither of those other examples failed because of decisions on infrastructure or economic development. Yarber couldn't keep it in his pants, and Melton always tiptoed along the edge of sanity and then fell off that cliff near the end of his term.
Fair enough, but do you think they did better than the likely alternatives would have? As crazy as Melton was and as many counterproductive things as he did, I think he was actually a net positive, but I didn't live in Jackson at that time, just worked there a good bit, so I could be way off.
I've heard several people say that Chokwe Senior was surprisingly good. Not sure how low a bar they were comparing him too though; some of them acted impressed that he was willing to come talk to them about the additional sales tax without demonizing them.
I could tell you a story about him as a councilman that would scare anyone wanting to do business in Jackson away... So I'm one of those who was pleasantly shocked at how uncontroversial and fair he was as mayor.
The city and county worked together more often when Melton was mayor and that's a definite positive. There was so much drama/comedy though that I think that outweighed the positives.
Sometimes I think of Frank Melton as Jackson's own version of Trump.
I agree with you on the low bar that was set for Lumumba Sr.
Sometimes I think of Frank Melton as Jackson's own version of Trump.
I agree with you on the low bar that was set for Lumumba Sr.
Not exactly true. This article is several years old but offers some insight as to why the folks in Rankin want to get their hands on that land. Follow the money and look at who is making these assertions. https://www.jacksonfreepress.com/news/2016/mar/09/airport-takeover-all-about-road/
Rankin county leadership (to include mayors) seems to have a more successful track record than hinds (primarily Jackson). I don’t see it as a bad thing if people want to improve the area. It has sat borderline dormant for years, come close to losing the few regional airlines that fly in and out bc Jackson didn’t want to pay the price for FAA criteria. Jackson has had their shot to capitalize on the airport, if they can’t do the job, give it to somebody that can/wants to. If you can accomplish a task/objective by giving it to somebody that has a desire to do it, half of your battle is won.
I'm not giving them a click, but the Jackson Free Press is a far left leaning news source and will defend Jackson city leadership even in the most idiotic situations. It is about as reputable as MSNBC, CNN and FNC, etc.
There is some of the best commercial real estate in MS on airport property (in the Jxn city limits), but smack dab in the middle of Flowood, Pearl and Brandon. That property should have been developed decades ago, it could be a cash cow for Jxn.
A lot of that is due to Rankin Co. having deep coffers to spend unlike Jackson. Jackson paid for the land, Jackson issued and paid off the bonds to build it. It's their land to develop as they see fit. The person sponsoring the bill is a Rankin Co. realtor. What they are trying to do is very transparent.
Would it help if you had a semi-metro police department, meaning combining Jackson, Madison, Brandon, and any other small towns that now have police forces, and let the sheriff handle the rural areas of the Census Bureau's metropolitan area (defined by county lines)? Talking about just the urbanized area. There are probably similar problems with the fire department as well.
No way to do that politically. Other municipalities would be crazy to let Jackson influence their departments and no way Jackson is going to (or maybe even can) authorize a police force to operate in the city that they have no control over.
It is a cash cow and that is why Jackson doesn't see fit to share. They bought the land, they paid off all the bonds to build the airport. It's their property. What it boils down to is this: Jackson wants all the profit for themselves and they want to keep it in their (black) good ol boy network while Rankin Co. sees how big a cash cow this will be and are trying to scam some of that profit for their (white) good ol boy network.
That dog won't hunt. HCSO and JPD seem to have their own issues so I could only imagine what bringing in Flowood, Brandon, Madison, Ridgeland, Richland and Pearl under one umbrella would do.
Besides, who would Stokes tell his constituents to throw bottles and rocks at if it was a Metro Unit.
What kind of pistols did they have in the early 2000s if not semiautomatics? Derringers? Single shots? Mississippi really is behind the times.
The number of homicides in Jackson is huge compared to the nation's largest city -- 128 vs 447. And NYC made national news for having so many killings, while Jackson did not. Birmingham and Memphis, while much larger, are pretty much in the same boat. Something has to be done or the city will just dry up.
Downtown Jackson is fine. At least during the day and not too bad if you’re around restaurants/bars at night. I’ve worked down there for years and never had an issue.
Jackson has its issue for sure but it’s not near as bad as the people who live in rural MS and come to Jackson to Christmas shop would lead you to believe. Every city has issues.
It is not a cash cow, but should have been for the last 40 years. Sharing it is not the issue i'm concerned with. Jackson having this great asset for a half century or more and doing absolutely nothing with it, it is shame for Jackson, the sheer incompetence and corruption. There should have been liquor stores, strip clubs, night clubs, restaurants, hotels, etc., on airport property in the 90s.
I agree whole heartedly which is why I said in an earlier reply the state will have to step in at some point. The baffling thing is that it appears the leadership in Jackson looks at the surrounding communities as competition instead of seeing what they are doing right and trying to emulate it. What they fail to grasp is that decades of poor leadership in Jackson created much of the rush of businesses to the surrounding communities in the first place.
Jackson has only one, yes one, Walmart. How does that happen with a city the size of Jackson. It doesn't have a single movie theater and hasn't for years. I know one is planned for Fondren but the last movie theater was the one at Metrocenter which closed in the 1990's.
Unfortunately it will have to get much worse before anything is done.
I have worked in downtown JXN since 2001......
During the day it is fine. I only go at night maybe once or twice a year for a function of some sort. IMO Katrina had the biggest impact on the decline of downtown. With the introduction of Go-Zone financing there were several large professional firms (CPAs, lawyers, Regions, etc) most who took the opportunity to move into nicer new facilities in Madison/Rankin and take advantage of owning vs leasing. This left a huge void. Then, the State explored moving the Department of Revenue into the Landmark building (which is now a disaster zone thanks to the recent ice storm) but Philip Gunn diverted them to the old WorldComm building in his home district of Clinton. The Landmark was bustling 15-20 years ago but is now empty. There have been several recent improvements on Capitol Street. The old Courthouse building, the Edison Walthall, King Edward, etc but I imagine those all have some tax credit incentives attached. I hear downtown residential occupancy is very high but I can’t verify. The 2 museums have helped and I heard a presentation recently about the re-do of the Planetarium which will be nice. All this to say, my experience working downtown has been without incident and Downtown Jackson Partners patrol are very visible every day........but I do live in Jackson and the wife and I have begun discussing a move recently out of the city.
During the day it is fine. I only go at night maybe once or twice a year for a function of some sort. IMO Katrina had the biggest impact on the decline of downtown. With the introduction of Go-Zone financing there were several large professional firms (CPAs, lawyers, Regions, etc) most who took the opportunity to move into nicer new facilities in Madison/Rankin and take advantage of owning vs leasing. This left a huge void. Then, the State explored moving the Department of Revenue into the Landmark building (which is now a disaster zone thanks to the recent ice storm) but Philip Gunn diverted them to the old WorldComm building in his home district of Clinton. The Landmark was bustling 15-20 years ago but is now empty. There have been several recent improvements on Capitol Street. The old Courthouse building, the Edison Walthall, King Edward, etc but I imagine those all have some tax credit incentives attached. I hear downtown residential occupancy is very high but I can’t verify. The 2 museums have helped and I heard a presentation recently about the re-do of the Planetarium which will be nice. All this to say, my experience working downtown has been without incident and Downtown Jackson Partners patrol are very visible every day........but I do live in Jackson and the wife and I have begun discussing a move recently out of the city.
Seems to me they (Rankin Co) sees potential and a problem (Jackson) lying in the way of that potential, so they’re doing something about it. Jackson, in turn, is trying to prevent the advancement/betterment of those around them by cutting off their nose to spite their face. They haven’t done anything with that property and now can’t afford to do anything because they have bigger fish to fry....or that should be fried
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