American Forum Op-Ed: MISSISSIPPI FORUM

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Wednesday, September 14, 2011

The So-Called Personhood Amendment

Posted by American Forum at 12:46 PM

MISSISSIPPI FORUM
By Rims Barber

The law of unintended consequences should temper our resolve when tinkering with laws impacting people’s lives. The consequences of adopting Initiative 26 -- the proposed Personhood Amendment to the Mississippi Constitution -- are far-reaching and potentially devastating to women’s health.

In the 33 years since the first in vitro baby was born, hundreds of Mississippi couples were able to have the baby of their dreams through in vitro fertilization (IVF). Since more than one egg is harvested and fertilized to achieve a successful IVF pregnancy, making all the embryos “people” under Mississippi law will make it difficult if not impossible to continue offering IVF treatment in our state.

When embryos are created and frozen as a part of reproductive fertility treatments, these embryos will be legally persons if this initiative passes, and consequently will have all the rights due persons. The problems resulting from this change would be many.

If embryos are people, is the freezing of embryos considered child abuse? If so, what is the role of the Department of Human Services?

Will these embryos be given names (non-birth certificates)?

If one of these embryos “dies” in some part of the in vitro fertilization process, what kind of investigation will be conducted? Could the technician be tried for manslaughter? Are the county coroners equipped to do this task? What kind of death certificate will be issued?

Are the Chancery Courts ready to apply Termination of Parental Rights laws to these embryos? Adoption laws? Home visits as required by adoption law?

Does this Amendment apply only to embryos conceived in the state of Mississippi, or to any embryo entering the state (having been conceived elsewhere)? If they are transported to another state do they lose their personhood? Citizenship?

What are the property rights of these embryos? Inheritance rights? Under state law, there are many places where “person” is referenced.

If more than five unrelated embryos/persons are housed in a single building, will it have to be licensed as a child residential care home?

In Pearl, there is an ordinance limiting occupancy to two persons in a bedroom. If a pregnant woman is two people, can she be in the same bed as her husband?

Moreover, IVF is not the only medical treatment that could be prevented by passage of the Personhood Amendment. Effective treatment of tubal pregnancies, severe preeclampsia, and molar gestation could be prevented. New stem cell treatments for patients with Parkinson’s, Lou Gehrig’s disease, and cancers like leukemia and choriocarcinoma would also be at risk.

If a physician is faced with the choice saving a woman’s life or refusing to harm an embryo/person, could he or she be sued for malpractice no matter what choice was made?

Do Mississippians really want more lawyers interfering in a family’s personal medical decisions?

I have long been convinced that anyone involved in politics should have a good sense of humor. This issue clearly requires one. Let’s not be so focused on our feelings about abortion that we do something ridiculous when voting in November.

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Barber is director of the Mississippi Human Services Agenda.
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Copyright (C) 2011 by the Mississippi Forum 9/11

**This op-ed ran in the Jackson Clarion Ledger. You can read the response to it here.**

Wednesday, February 16, 2011

Everybody Deserves Smoke-Free Air

Posted by American Forum at 4:16 PM

MISSISSIPPI FORUM

By C. David Hill, MD, F.A.A.P.

Everybody deserves smoke-free air. Pediatricians have first-hand experience about what happens when children and babies breathe second-hand smoke.

Smoking is a known cause of preterm birth, low birth-weight and very low birth-weight infants. Exposure to tobacco smoke in the womb causes increased miscarriages and neonatal deaths. And smoking-related health problems result in increased health care costs for all of us.

Mississippi has the nation’s highest prematurity rate and the highest infant mortality rate. Women who work or must do business in buildings where smoking is prevalent suffer an increased risk to their pregnancy even if they do not smoke.

The American Academy of Pediatrics has found that second-hand smoke also contributes to Sudden Infant Death Syndrome (SIDS). Approximately 430 U.S. newborns die each year from smoking related SIDS. In 2009, 38 Mississippi babies died from SIDS. The Mississippi infant death rate is about 130 percent of the national rate. SIDS is the third most common reason for infant deaths in Mississippi and account for 12 percent of all infant deaths in our state.

Second-hand smoke also exacerbates upper and lower respiratory infections, asthma and ear problems. Children who accompany their parents into buildings where smoking is prevalent are affected by this elevated risk to their health.

Because children breathe faster, they are twice as likely to be affected by exposure to second-hand smoke. Because the chemicals in tobacco smoke linger in clothing, carpet, cars and furniture, children ingest these chemicals even when no one is actively smoking.

This is why the Mississippi Chapter of the American Academy of Pediatrics supports smoke-free air proposals this session. We have joined with other health advocates around the state including the State Department of Health, the American Cancer Society, the American Heart Association, the American Lung Association, the State Medical Association and the Mississippi Nurses Association to tell our legislators that it is time to join 26 other states and ban smoking in the workplace and in public places.

We know that smoking bans decrease the likelihood that teens will start smoking. Cigarette companies target teens as potential smokers because people who start smoking as adolescents are most likely to become addicted to nicotine and continue to smoke into adulthood. Cigarettes are designed for addiction via nicotine and 7,000 other added chemicals and compounds. Adolescents’ physiology is more sensitive to nicotine, which is why about 1,000 teens start smoking every day.

The U.S. Surgeon General has determined that there is no safe level of exposure to tobacco smoke. Even low levels of smoke exposure, including second-hand and residual smoke, lead to an immediate dysfunction and inflammation of the lining of blood vessels, which is implicated in heart attacks and strokes. Cities that have adopted smoke-free laws -- including Starkville and Hattiesburg -- have seen a significant decline in the number of heart attack patients admitted to their hospital emergency rooms.

Every year, approximately 550 Mississippians who do not smoke -- including babies and children -- die from exposure to secondhand smoke. According to Communities for a Clean Bill of Health, smoking-related illnesses cost Mississippi Medicaid alone approximately $264 million a year.

Our legislators are reluctant to pass a smoking ban, believing that large and small businesses should be able to decide for themselves whether to keep their facilities smoke-free. If secondhand smoke at any level was not a proven health risk, that might be a good reason to oppose a smoke-free air law. However, our own experience with smoking bans around the state is proving again that there is no safe level of secondhand smoke. It’s time to support smoke-free public places.
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Dr. Hill is Chapter Tobacco Control Champion for the Mississippi Chapter of the American Academy of Pediatrics.
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Copyright (C) 2011 by the Mississippi Forum 2/11

Public Involvement is Necessary for Fairly Redrawing District Lines

Posted by American Forum at 4:11 PM

MISSISSIPPI FORUM

By Elizabeth Crowell

There was some good news at the state Capitol in January.

The Joint Legislative Redistricting Committee met to announce their plans for passage of a redistricting plan this legislative session. It’s good to see that they are listening to Mississippians and are committed to adopting a timely and fair plan.

Once every 10 years, following the release of the U.S. Census Report, every state must draw new lines for the election of local, state and federal officials. A large part of the ability or inability of those elected officials to get anything done rests with the way district lines are drawn.

Both political parties and sitting legislators want district lines drawn to make theirs a “safe seat.” Too often, a “safe seat” means like-minded, more extreme voters who elect the more extreme members of their party.

In this “echo chamber” environment, there is no room for compromise or even listening to what the other side has to say. Working with constituents to solve problems becomes secondary to political grandstanding. The risk is that these elected officials become overly complacent and lose their sense of accountability to the voters. Governing then becomes the fractured, uncivil process that Americans repeatedly say they do not want. Sadly, community problems go unaddressed.

In a worst-case scenario, seen right here in Mississippi, state legislators cannot even agree on a redistricting plan. The process is thrown into court, and elections have to be “re-done,” which ultimately becomes a waste of time and tax dollars.

After hearings around the state, Joint Redistricting Chairman Sen. Terry Burton reported they had heard citizens’ concerns about “One Man One Vote,” the need for citizen input, and the importance of protecting the geographical integrity of precincts.

On a motion from House Redistricting Chair Rep. Tommy Reynolds, the committee unanimously adopted the following guidelines for their process:

1. That each new voting district population number within 5 percent of the mean voting population for all state districts;

2. That each new voting district’s territory be contiguous [hopefully this means compact]; and

3. That the redistricting plan follows all applicable federal and state laws [this would include the federal “One Man, One Vote” provision of the Civil Rights Act, as well as the precinct and county integrity guidelines in current state law].

Both Burton and Reynolds repeated that they plan to see each chamber’s plan adopted by the other without the political posturing and obduracy promised by a few well-placed candidates for higher office.

The Joint Legislative Redistricting Committee plans to hold four public hearings throughout the state the weekend following the Census’s release of the precincts’ population count on February 12. Common Cause Mississippi, the League of Women Voters, the ACLU and other good government groups are urging Mississippians to participate in these forums to provide the community voice necessary to out-weigh partisan pressure to control the process.

Thirteen states around the nation have established nonpartisan or bipartisan commissions whose charge is to redraw their state’s political map to reflect both our racial and ethnic diversity, and to honestly redistribute power based on shifts in in-state population from region to region, and from city to suburb.

If history is any lesson, the political party holding the governor’s office or the balance of power in the legislature will attempt to draw district lines to assure their ascendance and stifle any opposition from the other party. If that happens, the result is bound to be more gridlock.

Mississippians deserve better. We deserve a system where voters choose their elected representatives -- and not one where politicians choose the voters they want to elect them.
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Crowell represents Common Cause Mississippi at the state Capitol.
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Copyright (C) 2011 by the Mississippi Forum 1/11

Wednesday, October 27, 2010

Remember the Mortgage Crisis on Election Day

Posted by American Forum at 4:02 PM

MISSISSIPPI FORUM

By Lynn Evans

For anyone planning to vote in the November elections, “The Big Short” by Michael Lewis should be required reading.

Author of “The Blind Side,” on which the Oscar-winning film was based, Lewis went to Wall Street to try to understand the causes of the great Subprime Mortgage Meltdown of 2007-2008 and the resulting government bail-out that has so angered the American public.

As Lewis makes clear, there were few people who understood what was happening inside the world of mortgage investments, but they were not the people in charge of either the investments themselves or the government and ratings oversight agencies that were supposed to protect ordinary consumers.

The story begins with the Shadow Banking Industry that sprang up after banking deregulation during the Reagan years. Local banks no longer hold the mortgages in their communities like Jimmie Stewart’s bank did in “It’s a Wonderful Life.” They sell them to bigger banks based on what money can be expected to be earned in the future, given the credit worthiness of the borrower and the worth of the property. Since ordinary families’ incomes have not kept up with inflation over the past two decades, refinancing to get the equity out of their homes has been the way many Americans have chosen to maintain their standard of living or pay off big expenses. This lending was based on the assumption that housing prices would always go up and Americans would always pay their mortgages. Therefore investing in mortgages was, as the British say, “safe as houses.”

Wall Street investment banks figured out that they could “bundle” these individual mortgages and sell them as big investments, again based on the assumptions that housing prices would always go up and never go down, and that mortgages were based on real worth. The bundled investments were called Mortgage Bonds, and they were highly rated by Moody’s and S&P. The SEC concluded this month that Moody’s, at least, used a flawed ratings model in calculating how safe these mortgage bonds were.

According to Lewis, most of the bond raters had no idea what was even in the mortgage bonds they were rating AA and AAA. They, too, were sold on the notion that the bonds were all “safe as houses.”

Seeing what great money they were making off mortgage bonds, investment banks realized they could create even more bonds by inserting more and more subprime loans into their big bundles of mortgage loans. This sent eager local agents out scurrying for borrowers, resulting in some of the unbelievable stories Lewis relates like the New York nanny with five mortgages. The eventual result was that banks all over the world owned mortgage bonds consisting of more and more subprime mortgages presented as solid investments.

In the end, too few of the investment bankers and hedge fund managers who created the feeding frenzy that led to the subprime meltdown were held accountable for their actions. Under the bail-out program set up by Bush, Treasury Secretary Henry Paulson used money from Congress to prop up the biggest investors in the subprime business, like AIG and Citigroup. And, as we all know now, too many of those institutions turned around and paid huge bonuses to the very employees who either dreamed up the increasingly exotic mortgage instruments or ignored their risk.

The American people need and deserve a federal government that has the enforcement power to make sure everyday people are not made the dupes of the big banks and corporations whose one purpose is to make lots of money. We need to stop blaming government for creating a crisis which was in fact created by a lack of government oversight. And for those who don’t get that yet, the assigned reading is “The Big Short.”
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Evans is an activist and writer.
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Copyright (C) 2010 by Mississippi Forum 10/10

Thursday, October 14, 2010

Too Many Children Dying is a Distinction Mississippi Can Do Without

Posted by American Forum at 4:30 PM

MISSISSIPPI FORUM

By Hazel Gaines, MS, RN

Once again, Mississippi is the state with the highest rate of child deaths in the nation. The average rate for the country, according to the latest Centers for Disease Control and Prevention statistics available (2007), is 19 child deaths for every 100,000 children age birth to 14 years. The rate for Mississippi is almost twice that: 34 child deaths for every 100,000 children under age 15.

Mississippi’s Child Death Review Panel (CDRP) has been working since 2006 to bring down the number of preventable child deaths by determining why and how Mississippi children die. Operating under the auspices of the Mississippi State Department of Health, the CDRP works with over 20 state agencies, community organizations, and professional organizations to coordinate a review of unexpected child deaths from birth to age 18, including Sudden Infant Death Syndrome (SIDS). The CDRP issues a report for the previous year each December detailing the causes of the deaths of Mississippi children, and making recommendations for ways to decrease those deaths.

The latest CDRP Report details the causes of 278 deaths of the total 709 child deaths statewide in 2008. The 709 deaths in 2008 are a significant drop from the 745 child deaths reported for 2006 and the 765 deaths reported for 2007. Harrison and Rankin Counties had the highest number of child deaths at 17 and 13 respectively. Hinds County reported 11 child deaths, and Lincoln, Pearl River, Scott, Warren and Washington Counties each reported 8 deaths.

Of the 278 cases reviewed, more than 60 percent of the children who died were boys, 50 percent were white and 47 percent were African American. More than 15 percent of the children who died had an illness or other medical problem.

Of the 38 SIDS deaths, most babies died sleeping on their stomachs rather than on their backs, most had a smoker in the household (which has been associated with SIDS), and 76 percent were under four months of age.

The greatest number of preventable deaths, 76, was caused by vehicular crashes, most of which were car crashes. Forty, or more than half of the children killed in car crashes, were age 15-17. The number of children killed who were not wearing seatbelts has decreased since 2006 when Mississippi’s Primary Seatbelt Law was passed; in 2007 it was less than 40 percent. The overall numbers of children killed has also decreased since 2006, when 87 children were killed.

An increasing number of Mississippi children are killed or maimed in ATV crashes each year. Ten children were killed in ATV crashes in 2008.

Thirty Mississippi children were killed by firearms; 14 of these deaths were homicides, eight were suicides, and seven were accidental. Twenty-five of the children who died were boys, 23 were teens age 15-17, and 17 were killed by handguns. Firearms deaths have been increasing since 2006, when 18 such deaths were reported.

Mississippi has a high rate of fire deaths compared to other states: in 2008, seven children died and 71 percent were under three years of age. In 2007, 19 children died in fires.

Mississippi also has a high rate of child drownings compared to other states. In 2008, 14 children drowned and nine of those were under 5 years old. Most of the drownings happened in a natural setting such as a creek, a river or a pond.

The Child Death Review Panel continues to recommend that child injury and death prevention be a priority for policy makers. The Booster Seat Law of 2008, the Graduated Teen Driver’s License Bill of 2009, and the Jason Flatt Act of 2009 will all help to prevent child deaths in our state. The CDRP now recommends new ATV Safety laws in hopes of reversing the increasing number of children killed and severely injured in roll-overs and other ATV crashes. Too many children dying needlessly is one distinction Mississippi could do without.
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Gaines, MS, RN, is the coordinator of the Child Death Review Panel for the Mississippi State Department of Health.
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Copyright (C) 2010 by the Mississippi Forum 10/10

Tuesday, August 24, 2010

Hospitals Must Better Inform Patients about Charity Care

Posted by American Forum at 3:32 PM

MISSISSIPPI FORUM

By Rims Barber

There is a provision of the new Health Reform Law that will help sick Mississippians this year. Nonprofit hospitals will have to meet new indigent care requirements.

Mary Jo went to the hospital recently and was given a bill of over $15,000. She was uninsured and unable to pay more than about $20 per week. It would take her about 15 years to get out from under this debt. Many hospitals are established as private nonprofit entities, and are expected to give back charity care to the community in exchange for their tax-exempt status.

The new Health Reform Law, passed by Congress this year, The Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act, amended Section 501c(3) of the Internal Revenue Code. It now requires nonprofit hospitals to publish guidelines for financial assistance, explain who is eligible, and how a person can apply for assistance.

In order to qualify for nonprofit status, a hospital must:

• Develop written financial assistance policies

• Limit what they charge for services

• Observe fair billing and debt collection practices

• Conduct regular community needs assessments.

With the exception of the needs assessment, these requirements go into effect this year. The Secretary of the Treasury is charged with enforcing the new provisions and has authority to issue further guidance and regulations as needed to make sure they are correctly implemented. The hospitals will report to the I.R.S on their annual 990 forms.

The Mississippi Human Services Agenda wrote all the private nonprofit hospitals in Mississippi asking them how they intended to comply with this new requirement. Only three hospitals responded to our survey, and we were directed to their websites for specifics on their financial assistance/charity care policies.

The web-published sliding scale showed discounts from the hospital charges, based on income. Since most hospitals accept a discount from insurance companies of 30-40 percent as payment in full, we can see that the hospitals are using their sliding scale to grant some patients the same discount as they give insurance companies.

Two hospitals used this sliding scale:

% of Poverty $ for Family of 4 Discount from charges

Below poverty $22,050 100%

100 – 119% $26,240 100%

120 – 139% $30,650 90%

140 – 169% $37,265 80%

170 – 199% $43,880 70%

200 – 299% $62,930 40%

Persons would have to bring documents with them to verify their income when they enter the hospital and declare that they are uninsured.

A major religious nonprofit medical center recently released a policy that allows any uninsured patient who applies during the admission process to have their hospital charges discounted by at least 50 percent (regardless of income), and free care for those under 200 percent of the federal poverty level.

If all our state’s nonprofit hospitals would make the effort to obey the law, and let people know that they may be eligible for discounts on their hospital care (and how they can qualify for this benefit), we would be much better off. People should let their local nonprofit hospitals know that they expect them to follow the law and treat the needy with equity.

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Barber is director of the Mississippi Human Services Agenda.
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Copyright (C) 2010 by Mississippi Forum 8/10

Monday, August 9, 2010

Recognizing Our State and Local Public Service Workers

Posted by American Forum at 4:17 PM

MISSISSIPPI FORUM
By Michael Lipsky and Ed Sivak

Presently, the work environments of our state and local public service workers are being crippled by the fiscal crisis in the states. Legislatures around the country face gaps of $260 billion in the next two fiscal years, according to the Center on Budget and Policy Priorities. In Mississippi, we estimate a shortfall of over $500 million over each of the next two budget cycles in relation to needs.

For the public workforce, this fiscal crisis threatens functions critical to our communities’ sense of well-being, as well as the economic status of our workforce. County governments have laid-off workers, and state employees have been asked to accept unpaid furloughs and increase their contribution to their retirement funds. Critical positions will remain unfilled, and caseloads will increase. Once again state and local workers will be asked to do more with less.

In Mississippi, 226,000 people work in state, county and municipal governments, part of a workforce of 15 million in these sectors around the country.

The enduring value of the state and local public service was recently dramatized in the aftermath of the tornadoes that swept through Mississippi this spring.

Within 12 hours, responders from state and local law enforcement and the Mississippi National Guard came from around the state to assist with storm recovery. Within 48 hours, employees of the Mississippi Commission for Volunteer Service had deployed over 200 volunteers to the area creating a “volunteer city” that served as a clearinghouse for state employees and volunteers to provide urgently needed relief ranging from infant formula to disaster counseling.

Another example of the dedication of state workers is of course happening daily on the Gulf Coast. As oil from the broken well endangers our shorelines and threatens the way of life for many Gulf Coast residents, state workers tirelessly strive to mitigate the damage to the region’s economy and environment.

Technicians in the departments of Environmental Quality and Marine Resources are monitoring the Gulf’s waters, air, beaches, and commercial fisheries. Specialists in the Department of Employment Security are connecting people to thousands of jobs related to oil spill recovery. Workers with the Board of Animal Health are coordinating efforts to rehabilitate wildlife. As is the case with any disaster in the state, the dedicated people at the Mississippi Emergency Management Agency provide the leadership to pull all these pieces together.

To work in public service means that the final decision about what constitutes a job well-done is made by determining that you have met a public need, and knowing that you have extended yourself on behalf of others. In contrast to private sector counterparts, the bottom line for public service workers is not profitability but the public good.

Police and highway patrol troopers, who represent one out of every 25 state and local workers, are never off duty, and teachers, who represent more than one out of every four state and local public employees, are always asking whether they have extended themselves enough with the time and resources available to them. There is always another client to see at a work-training center, or another call that a social worker could make on behalf of an elder requiring services.

In short, public sector work requires deep commitment to the service ideal.

Our state and local public service workers deserve better. Mississippi must ensure that we not only recognize the admirable work of our public service workers, but also find revenue sources to properly staff and fund these services for the good of Mississippi.
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Sivak is the Director of Mississippi Economic Policy Center. Lipsky is a Distinguished Senior Fellow at Dēmos. An expanded 30th Anniversary edition of his book, Street Level Bureaucracy, was recently published.
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Copyright (C) 2010 by Mississippi Forum 8/10

Friday, April 23, 2010

Three Ways to Help Raise Revenue in Mississippi

Posted by American Forum at 11:24 AM

MISSISSIPPI FORUM

By Ed Sivak

The governor’s office projects that state revenue estimates will fall $1.2 billion short of what the state needs this year. This means that Mississippi will have significantly less money than in past years to educate children, train the workforce and maintain the roads and infrastructure that foster economic development.

The magnitude of the crisis requires a balanced approach that includes raising revenue to keep the state from moving backwards. Three revenue raising recommendations offer a starting point for helping to solve this problem. The recommendations would produce much needed funds while allowing Mississippi’s tax structure to keep pace with advancements in the global economy.

First, modernize Mississippi’s sales tax to reflect today’s purchasing habits. The sales tax was designed during the Great Depression to provide the state with revenue based on what people bought. Back then, people spent most of their money on things, rather than services. In recent decades, however, the share of spending that households devote to goods has declined. And what households spend on services -- many of which didn’t even exist during the Depression -- has increased. The shift not only costs the state money, it also sets up some imbalances that work against middle-income people. For example, if one buys a lawnmower in Mississippi to cut his or her grass, they pay sales tax on the purchase. If one pays a lawn service, he or she does not pay the tax.

Recognizing this, the Mississippi Tax Study Commission, appointed by Governor Barbour in 2008, recommended adding additional services to the list of what is taxable. The recommendation included 21 items ranging from tanning services to pet grooming. Taxing the 21 items would generate $80 million annually.

Second, update the personal income tax. Mississippi’s tax brackets are the same as they were 25 years ago back when a family could live on $30,000 a year. Today, a family of four with two children that makes $30,000 a year is in the same tax bracket as a similar family earning $1 million a year.

Recent income trends call into question the current tax brackets. According to the Center on Budget and Policy Priorities, over the last two decades, Mississippians with incomes above $117,000 have experienced over twice the rate of income growth as middle income families earning $40,000. A well-structured income tax system would take into account the trends. By adding a new state income tax bracket of 6 percent on taxable income of over $45,000 (roughly that of a household with a little over $64,000 a year in total income for a family of four), Mississippi would generate approximately $64 million.

Third, update Mississippi’s Corporate Income Tax. Given the link between the personal income tax and the corporate income tax, Mississippi’s corporate income tax could also be updated. Estimates from the Institution of Taxation and Economic Policy show that a new 6 percent bracket on corporate taxable income over $45,000 could raise approximately $55 million annually in Mississippi.

It’s important to note that these revenue recommendations only cover part of the anticipated gap in forthcoming years. There will also be budget cuts. That’s the point of a balanced approach it recognizes that no one strategy is enough to solve a problem this big and that relying too heavily on spending cuts hurts the economy, hurts working families and limits the state’s ability to move forward when prosperity returns.
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Sivak is the director of Mississippi Economic Policy Center.
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Copyright (C) 2010 by the Mississippi Forum 4/10

Thursday, April 22, 2010

Immigration Can Help Us

Posted by American Forum at 3:53 PM

MISSISSIPPI FORUM

By Bill Chandler

We should be welcoming immigrants to Mississippi, the ”Hospitality State.”

Instead of having xenophobic reactions, we should be looking at the benefits they bring to our economy. In recent years Republican and Democrats alike have called for kicking immigrants out of Mississippi. Legislators introduced scores of bills intended to make immigrants so uncomfortable they’ll leave. Some law enforcement jurisdictions have made it their mission to target Latinos without provocation. Candidates for public offices have made attacking immigrants the centerpieces of their campaigns. One candidate attempted to show that the presence of immigrants cost the state millions, in his publicly funded reports mostly based on false statistics gathered from a notorious hate group.

The facts paint a different picture of the contributions of immigrants. For example, the worlds’ dominant economy, and one of the richest, is the United States—a country populated almost entirely by immigrants and their descendants. The U.S. population has more than doubled over the last century, yet the country has become wealthier and wealthier.

A study conducted by the National Academy of Sciences found that undocumented immigrants added some $10 billion to the U.S. economy. The NAS study also found that native-born workers whose skills were complimentary to those of immigrants, benefited from their presence in their workplaces. Immigrants’ paychecks have the same deductions for income taxes as their fellow native born workers. Their payroll deductions also contribute to the Social Security fund helping to create a multi-billion dollar surplus that they have no hope to access, which has helped save that system from collapse.

Census data shows that the Latino share of Mississippi’s population grew from 0.6% in 1990, to 1.4% in 2000, and since then, growth of these communities in the state has at least doubled. Across the state, workers with the mississippi immigrant rights alliance counted at least 100,000 more immigrants in the state than were accounted for in the census, and by last year, at least another 100,000 more. While some of these immigrants may be undocumented, overstaying their work visas or entering without authorization, many eventually become U.S. citizens as shown by voter data. Latinos comprised 4% of Mississippi voters in the 2008 elections, according to CNN exit polls.

In Mississippi, Asians and Latinos as consumers, workers and business owners have helped grow our economy. According to the Selig Center for Economic Growth at the University of Georgia, in 2008, the purchasing power of Latinos in Mississippi totaled $1.3 billion, while the purchasing power of Asians was $842 million – with the continued growth in working immigrant communities, here and across the country these numbers have undoubtedly grown. Mississippi’s 1,326 Latino-owned businesses had sales receipts of $213 million and provided jobs to 2,080 workers in 2002, the last year for which data is available. The state’s 2,921 Asian owned firms had sales and receipts of $1.2 billion and provided jobs to 9,232 workers, according to the Census Bureau.

The kinds of jobs immigrants typically do, the so called “3-D”—dirty, difficult and dangerous: agricultural, food processing, day labor, cleaning offices and hotel rooms—are jobs which native born workers are conditioned to reject. Further, with the growing proportion of our youth opting for cleaner, white-collar work through education, far fewer workers are available for the 3-D jobs.

Instead of deporting immigrants we should welcome them and give them a clear path to citizenship. The American public will benefit from the full movement of undocumented workers into the economy. Legalizing immigrant workers will generate tax revenue which will provide an important boost to cash-strapped state and local governments. Legalizing undocumented workers would also eliminate unscrupulous employers’ ability to exploit immigrant’s vulnerability. It would raise American worker’s wages and working conditions by putting all workers on equal footing.

The homage to xenophobia itself jeopardizes our economy. Mississippi calls itself the “Hospitality State.” We should adhere to our slogan and be welcoming to our new residents—we all benefit by their presence and their industry.
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Bill Chandler is Executive Director of the Mississippi Immigrants Rights Alliance (MIRA).
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Copyright (C) 2010 by the Mississippi Forum 3/10

Tuesday, March 30, 2010

It’s Time to Reform Unemployment Benefits

Posted by American Forum at 1:54 PM

MISSISSIPPI FORUM

By Warren Yoder

Just when we need it the most, thousands of Mississippi workers are being denied unemployment benefits because of a broken, outdated system. When the national unemployment system was created in 1935, the work force was made up predominately of full-time, male workers. Today, that work force includes more part-time and female workers. Although America’s economy has changed, our state unemployment insurance system has not. This spring, fewer than 4 of 10 Mississippi workers qualified for unemployment benefits.

Because of the base period the state uses to consider eligibility, workers can have up to six months of their most recent earnings excluded when determining eligibility for unemployment benefits. This rule disproportionately hurts low-wage workers, because monetary qualification is based on earnings during the base period. A Mississippian can work more than other employees, yet not receive unemployment benefits simply because they are paid less. This is one of the reasons low-wage workers are half as likely as higher wage workers to receive unemployment benefits.

Recognizing the need for reform, Congress provided funds through the 2009 American Recovery and Reinvestment Act for states to modernize their unemployment insurance system. Mississippi is eligible for nearly $60 million of this incentive funding. Should the state adjust its base period, as mentioned above, and consider workers’ most recent earnings, Mississippi can receive as much as $21.7 million. It can receive another $37.4 million by making two of the following four changes:

• Allow unemployment compensation for certain people seeking only part-time work (More than 40% of women heading families with children work part-time).

• Allow unemployment compensation for persons leaving work for compelling family reasons, such as domestic violence, illness or disability of an immediate family member, or the need to accompany a spouse whose employment is beyond commuting distance;

• Allow unemployment compensation for permanently laid-off workers who need extra unemployment benefits to continue participation in training authorized under the Workforce Investment Act;

• Allow a dependent allowance of at least $15 per dependent for workers who qualify for state benefits.

The Mississippi Department of Employment Security has adopted some reforms in recent years, including allowing victims of domestic abuse and workers forced to relocate because of military service of a spouse to remain eligible for unemployment benefits.

Opponents of reform claim the changes will increase employer taxes and threaten solvency of the state trust fund. But the National Employment Law Project estimates the federal dollars would cover the additional benefit costs for up to 4.5 years, after which Mississippi can determine whether to eliminate or scale back the reforms to ensure system solvency without raising Mississippi business taxes. Even should the state choose to keep the reforms after federal dollars are gone, concerns about cost are exaggerated. Many newly covered workers will be low-wage workers who receive 25 percent to 40 percent smaller benefit checks. The National Employment Law Project estimates that the average payout from the state unemployment trust fund will increase by only 4 percent to 6 percent in a typical year -- certainly no threat to solvency.

In truth, additional unemployment benefits could provide a boost to the state economy when it's most needed. According to the U.S. Department of Labor, every $1 paid in jobless benefits causes the economy to grow by more than $1, because these benefits are spent immediately and have multiplier effects. Thus, $56.1 million in stimulus funds for unemployment benefits could generate almost $100 million in economic activity for Mississippi.

More important than the potential boost in economic activity are needs of struggling families. Almost 40,000 Mississippi workers could benefit from this money. These families are suffering from the greatest recession since the Great Depression. They did not get fired because of misconduct, and they did not stop looking for work. They are not strangers; they are sisters and brothers, neighbors and friends, fellow church members, and fellow Mississippians.
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Yoder is executive director of the Public Policy Center of Mississippi.
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Copyright (C) 2010 by the Mississippi Forum. 3/10

Wednesday, March 10, 2010

Education Innovation in Tough Economic Times

Posted by American Forum at 4:38 PM

MISSISSIPPI FORUM

By Ellen Collins and Gregory Taylor

Mississippi is a state that has historically faced severe economic challenges, as well as high rates of poverty, dropouts, and illiteracy. Efforts though to bring community partners together have gained traction to create a system of quality education for young children.

Community, state and national leaders saw the need for action to improve the state’s ability to compete economically, to enhance the quality of life for its children and families, and to increase opportunities for all Mississippi children to achieve success. With the support of business, philanthropic, community and education leaders, many child care programs and preschools are receiving help to increase quality early childhood education.

Mississippi has adopted a quality rating system to promote quality improvements and business leaders have backed an early childhood education demonstration model that aims to improve the quality and delivery of services to children in early learning settings. At the same time, coalitions and calls for early education innovation and investments that will benefit young children across the state continue to grow.
Supporting Partnerships to Assure Ready Kids (SPARK) Mississippi has helped to lay a foundation from which an early learning system in Mississippi can evolve. This system includes multiple strategies and service components that ensure children’s health care needs are addressed, parents are supported in their efforts to provide nurturing and stable home environments, and that early care and education settings provide high-quality learning experiences while working with schools to develop effective transition plans.

Starting their work in five locations, mainly in the Mississippi Delta, SPARK staff worked with cohorts of three-year-olds in each community to provide them and their families with the supports and services needed to ensure their seamless transition into school and academic success through the third grade. By providing transition strategies, intense intervention, and scaling the SPARK work, we were able to make a difference in the early childhood education community in our selected sites; Most of which have evolved into model programs that can be replicated statewide using existing governmental resources.

Intervention strategies include: professional development and technical assistance for early learning center staff; resource fairs and cultural awareness activities for children and families; home visitation and the coordination of transition activities between early learning settings and public schools. In a recent evaluation, SPARK children, with all of these interventions, out-performed students in a comparable school district who did not have access to these interventions on a statewide achievement test.

A key component that has led to the success of SPARK Mississippi is the formation of Local Children’s Partnerships. These partnerships are made up of community members representing early education, local school districts, business leaders, parents, health providers, SPARK staff and other stakeholders who realize that the success of their community and ultimately the state rests upon meaningful investments in its children. These stakeholders work together to act on issues of quality, transition and alignment of the early education community.

The next phase of work plans to take the lessons learned from the first six years of the initiative and expand the model into additional communities throughout the state. We want to ensure that the investments made will continue to build support for early childhood care and education and influence early childhood policy and practice across the state.

To help share the lessons learned through SPARK’s early learning initiatives, the W.K. Kellogg Foundation partnered with IDEO, a renowned design and innovation consulting firm, to help communities improve their learning systems. Instead of relying on outside experts — the usual method for reforming schools — these communities are looking inward, tapping parents, teachers, business and faith leaders, and even students to help generate solutions that work for them.
The best programs, we continue to learn, link parents, teachers, and students and create strong connections between classrooms and communities, building an educational continuum.

Communities, school districts, and policymakers are creating new ways to teach and nurture children from age 3 through third grade. National leaders are taking notice and, more important, taking steps to replicate successful programs across the map. President Obama is asking states and communities with innovative ideas to help reshape American education. To propel these innovative ideas, two new federal funds for innovation will provide a total of $5 billion to inspire communities to shake up the education landscape.

Through the President’s initiative we have the chance to further revolutionize learning and set Mississippi’s children on a path to long-term success despite the current economic crisis.

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Collins is the executive director of SPARK-MS, an initiative of the Children’s Defense Fund – Southern Regional Office. Taylor is vice president for programs at the W.K. Kellogg Foundation.
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Copyright (C) 2010 by the Mississippi Forum 2/10

Monday, December 7, 2009

Building a Better Revenue Picture for Mississippi’s Future

Posted by American Forum at 10:25 AM

MISSISSIPPI FORUM

By Lynn Evans

This was certainly not the way Gov. Haley Barbour wanted to end his term in state office. Tax revenues are down $371 million and counting. State budget alternatives are grim, with cuts of at least 12 percent for most agencies, including education.

Seeking opportunity amid crisis, Barbour is recommending major government realignment and simplification, as well as consolidation in K-12 and at the university level. By including such incendiary proposals as combining Alcorn State and Mississippi Valley with Jackson State University, Barbour took the chance that his proposals will be dead on arrival at the Capitol in January. His challenge to support his proposals or “come up with a better way” ought to be taken seriously.

Cuts and consolidation should not be the only options on the table. The kind of cuts the governor is proposing will be a severe shock to the economy, just when Mississippi and the nation are trying to climb out of the Great Recession. This decade’s declining growth in Mississippi’s major revenue sources – personal and corporate income and sales taxes – should have lawmakers looking at the state’s tax structure.

There at least five ways Mississippi could adjust its tax structure to help make it through the current economic troubles and to build a better revenue picture for the future.

1. Mississippi could join the 20-plus other states in the Multistate Tax Commission to prevent large corporations from playing shell games to avoid paying state taxes.

The U.S. Government Accountability Office reported last July that 30 percent of corporations with earnings of $50 million or more paid no federal income taxes between 1998 and 2005. In 2003, the Multi-state Tax Commission found that large corporations avoided $7 billion in state corporate income taxes by, among other tactics, shifting reports of profits from state to state. Corporate income tax revenue accounts for only about 5 percent of overall revenues in Mississippi.

The solution is to join the Multistate Tax Compact and require every multistate corporation to follow uniformity guidelines when reporting income and profits. This will give the state a way to validate corporate returns. It works for other states and it could work here, too.

2. Mississippi could increase the top personal income tax for the wealthiest among us. Personal income taxes make up about 25 percent of state and local tax revenue. The wealthiest 20 percent of all Mississippians take home almost half of all income earned. The real income of top earners has increased 23 percent from 1999-2005, while the bottom 60 percent of Mississippians saw a drop in real income when adjusted for inflation – even while worker productivity increased. Creating a new state income tax bracket of 6 percent for taxable income over $125,000 certainly would be a better alternative than closing 10 mental health crisis centers and hospitals.

3. The National Association of State Budget Officers suggests that each state monitor tax breaks it gives corporations. If the return from these tax breaks falls short of promised benefits to the state economy, a state could choose to impose a surcharge. Hiring more tax auditors also could net millions of dollars.

4. The Mississippi House has tried for a number of years to increase fees and fines to generate revenue, and to ensure that fees for state services actually reflect the cost of those services. Penalties and fines for violations of labor safety and environmental regulations, for example, should be costly enough to deter such practices, to clean up problems, and to adequately support state agency efforts to oversee and enforce regulations protecting the public. DUI fines also could be increased for each succeeding arrest, as is done in Louisiana.

5. Many health advocates support following the lead of Arkansas and other states in taxing sugary soft drinks and nutrition-poor, salty and sugary snacks. Mississippi still has the nation’s highest obesity rate. Making foods that contribute to obesity more expensive will help families choose healthier foods, and help persuade food manufacturers to change ingredients in those unhealthy snacks.

By not including any proposals to increase state revenues, Gov. Barbour is sticking to the GOP playbook of “Government is the problem --Don’t raise my taxes.” But this budget crisis is severe enough that, combined with the devastating farm losses throughout the state, it could send Mississippi’s economy back into recession. Our government should be better than that. It is time to look at the big picture and re-imagine what we expect from state government. There is another way, if only there are enough real leaders to champion it.
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Evans is a Jackson health care activist and writer.
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Copyright (C) 2009 by the Mississippi Forum 12/09

Tuesday, October 20, 2009

A Moral Mandate: Education for Life Choices

Posted by American Forum at 9:22 AM

MISSISSIPPI FORUM
By Marsha Meeks Kelly

In another life, I was a public school teacher. English, math and eventually “Skills for Adolescence” were the subjects that consumed my days along with an average of 140 seventh graders.

Every day I worked hard to meet the needs of my students in “inner-city” public schools in Mississippi. I remember the tears of the student who came to me to discuss her pregnancy and how she was going to tell her parents and whether she should get married at 13 years of age.

That year we started a “Peer Ears” program, a peer counseling program, and the next year we started survival skills classes called “Skills for Adolescence.” Too many pregnancies and too many sexually-transmitted diseases forced our school district to incorporate classes to educate our students about their life decisions.

Reading the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) report on the sexual and reproductive health of young people was depressing. So little progress has been made here! Twenty years ago several concerned Mississippians formed a statewide coalition to work with the legislature to ensure a comprehensive K-12 health education curriculum, but we still do not have even a pilot program offering students sex education, despite attempts to institute such a program in the 2009 legislative session.

The CDC reports that Mississippi is still among the top states in the nation in the spread of HIV and AIDS among pre-teens. We also have the highest birth rate in the nation for mothers ages 10-14 and 15-17, and have seen a spike in sexually-transmitted diseases. Several government studies have confirmed that about 60 percent of Mississippi high school students are sexually active, but most do not use birth control. The statistics are heart-rending and constitute a moral mandate for action by the leadership of this state.

Mississippi can change such statistics, but like every problem, leaders must step up, understand the issues, look at possible curriculums, get educated and educate our citizens and our youth.

In all my years in public service, I have always been more interested in the opinions of folks in the field rather than critics on the sidelines. I ask the state legislature, the Governor, and the Lieutenant Governor to once more convene a working group focused on comprehensive sex education. This group should include educators, parents, students, social workers and health professionals who deal with youth to ensure that people on the frontlines of teen pregnancy and HIV/AIDS prevention are at the planning table. There are models from other states, like the F.L.A.S.H. program in Washington State, which can be considered.

Young people in Mississippi make tough decisions every day. We can’t be with them all the time, but we can increase their ability to make informed, responsible decisions by giving them the information they need. Comprehensive sex education delays sexual activity and promotes healthier life choices, according to a review of research on the subject by the National Campaign to Prevent Teen Pregnancy.

It is time to set aside emotions and focus on filling the educational gap that jeopardizes the future of so many of our youth. We need a model program that can be set in place across the state. Our young people are counting on us; their health and their future are at stake.
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Kelly is the recently retired executive director of the Mississippi Commission for Volunteer Service.
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Copyright (C) 2009 by the Mississippi Forum 10/09

Monday, October 19, 2009

Who Benefits from Health Care Reform Misinformation?

Posted by American Forum at 9:27 AM

MISSISSIPPI FORUM
By Lynn Evans

The latest polls on health care reform find that most Americans support it, but they are also confused about what is in the proposals currently being worked on by Congress. No wonder. The amount of misinformation floating around is enough to confuse a rocket scientist.

If the American public is feeling left out of the debate on health care reform, it just might have something to do with the $1.4 million per day being spent on lobbying this single issue by the drug, health insurance and other health-related industries. In addition, according to the Center for Responsive Politics, the health care industry has given members of Congress nearly $24 million in campaign contributions this year, on top of the $170 million they gave during the last election.

The drug manufacturers’ trade association, known as PHARMA, has spent more than $92 million lobbying Congress this year and is about to roll out a $150 million ad campaign to cut the discounts on drug products that are being planned to help reduce spiraling health care costs. Having enjoyed the largess of the Bush years, these companies are willing to spend big to keep their profits flowing.

Looking just at the committees that have jurisdiction over drafting the proposals that will go to the full Senate, the health care industry has given in excess of $13 million to the members of the Senate Finance Committee and more than $6 million to the “Gang of Six” who have been working over the summer on the Baucus proposal. As might be expected, the most money -- about $3.6 million -- is roughly split between Senator Baucus and the top Republican on the Senate Finance Committee, Senator Chuck Grassley.

When the Medicare Part D legislation was before Congress, an equally obscene amount of money was thrown at the negotiators who then somehow came up with a program that pays drug companies money to run private money-making programs to help seniors buy their products.

Polls show that most Americans support health care reform that includes universal coverage, some kind of nonprofit option, and paying for the changes with increased taxes on high income Americans and employer contributions.

Most Americans understand that when 46 million of their neighbors do not have health insurance and more are losing their health coverage every day, and when a health insurance crisis is the No. 1 reason for bankruptcy filings, that health reform is needed now. Most people agree we need regulations to make insurance companies play fair and cover people with existing conditions, and that the goal should be universal coverage – especially for children. Most people would like to keep the coverage they have but are afraid that, if costs keep going up, no middle class families will be able to afford private insurance coverage that would meet their needs. So, most Americans support tax credits and subsidies that will enable working families who really cannot afford health coverage to get it.

People are very confused about the public option, and fear it will take away from what they have, rather than make the kind of coverage Congress gets, available to everybody. This might have something to do with private health insurance companies’ fear that the competition from a public option might force them to cut administrative costs and shareholder profits.

It’s time to take back our government from the Big Money interests who are muddying the waters of the current debate. We have an out-of-control system now and the companies who are benefiting financially would like to keep it that way, so they are spending a lot of money to kill reforms Americans want, and need.
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Evans is a Jackson health care activist and writer.
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Copyright (C) 2009 by the Mississippi Forum 10/09

Thursday, September 24, 2009

Kemper County Coal Plant: Unnecessary, Expensive and Dirty

Posted by American Forum at 2:17 PM

MISSISSIPPI FORUM
By Louis Miller

The Mississippi Sierra Club, AFL-CIO and NAACP strongly oppose Mississippi Power Company’s (MPCO) proposal to build a $2.4 billion dollar ‘clean coal’ plant and adjoining mine in Kemper County.

Mississippi Power’s arguments for the plant are built on three myths that have little or no basis in fact.

The truth is that the Kemper coal plant: 1. is unnecessary; 2. is astronomically expensive and will drive up customer bills; and 3. would be a major polluter.

Let’s start with Myth No. 1. MPCO argues that South Mississippi will run out of electricity if this plant is not built. This is not true. Mississippi currently has independently-owned power plants that can supply almost three times the amount of power the entire state requires at peak times. But MPCO refuses to purchase power from these plants except on rare occasions.

Twelve natural gas-fired power plants sit idle 85 percent of the time but could provide up to 7,993 megawatts of power, according to the Public Service Commission (PSC). MPCO’s proposal would produce less than 600 megawatts of power.

Myth No. 2 is that the plant will not raise the bills of MPCO’s customers. The price tag for the plant is $2.4 billion -- and rising. This represents by far the largest capital expenditure ever put into an electric utility’s customer rate base in the history of our state.

A PSC expert testified this year that if the cost of the Kemper plant were “allowed to be put into rates, then Mississippi Power’s rates would increase substantially as compared to rates of today”

MPCO’s wants consumers to foot the bill for this $2.4 billion plant upfront, even if they never use the electricity. MPCO spent hundreds of thousands of dollars lobbying the state legislature to change state law to allow the cost of this plant to be shifted from stockholders to customers. If this plant makes financial sense, MPCO shareholders should fund it.

Myth No. 3 is that the Kemper coal plant is “clean coal.” MPCO’s proposal involves digging up 45 square miles of Kemper County for strip mining, displacing hundreds of residents while destroying streams and wetlands. Five hundred acres would become a dump for toxic coal ash from the plant. The plant itself would be classified as a major air polluter under the federal Clean Air Act.

MPCO proposes to capture and sell 65 percent of the carbon dioxide emissions from the plant. However, the company does not yet have anyone to buy this carbon dioxide, and until a buyer is secured, MPCO will not commit to this reduction in emissions in its air permit. Alternatively, consumers would bear the cost of disposing of these emissions.

The Kemper plant will also emit up to 63pounds of mercury per year, despite new technologies used. Over time, that’s enough toxic mercury to contaminate thousands of water bodies and millions of pounds of fish. When whole river systems in Mississippi are already so contaminated with mercury that the fish pose a danger to pregnant women, why allow more contamination when there are better alternatives? Just improving efficiency in energy use could prevent the need to expand capacity for years.

The citizens of Mississippi should reject this dirty, expensive and unnecessary coal plant proposal. On October 5th the Mississippi Public Service Commissioners will begin hearings to decide the fate of this proposal. It’s time to say: “Thanks but no thanks,” we can do better.
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Miller is Sierra Club Senior Regional Representative, Mississippi.
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Copyright (C) 2009 by the Mississippi Forum 9/09

Wednesday, September 16, 2009

Early Voting Will Improve Democracy in Mississippi

Posted by American Forum at 1:42 PM

MISSISSIPPI FORUM
By Rachel Ann Hicks

Long lines at polling places made big headlines last election cycle. Though remarkable, many expected the unusual Election Day waits which were caused by a record number of Americans participating in the democratic process.

More surprising though were the pre-Election Day polling lines: due to the new national trend known as in-person early voting, thousands of Americans lined up to vote before Election Day.

Like voters in Arkansas, Georgia, and Tennessee, Mississippi should join in and adopt in-person early voting because it will improve democratic participation -- and, therefore, democracy -- in Mississippi.

Despite experiencing our highest voter turnout during the last presidential election cycle, Mississippi’s rate of voter participation still leaves us below the national average for 2008. Historically, the news is even worse. Turnout statistics from the last two midterm elections, 2002 and 2006, show Mississippi ranked last or next to last nationally. Although more Mississippians vote in our gubernatorial election years than in midterm election years, voter participation in these important state races lags that of states whose officials are elected in the same year as the president.

Low voter turnout sends a signal to our elected officials that they do not need to be accountable to all of their constituents. Unless all registered voters express their desires through the ballot box, we undermine a fundamental principle of American democracy -- that our government is “of the people, by the people, for the people.”

Currently, Mississippi only allows absentee voting, in which the voter is required to give a reason for not voting on Election Day. While absentee voting must continue in Mississippi for voters with extended absences from the state, early voting has distinct advantages. Not only are early voters not required to state a reason for voting before Election Day, they also cast the same ballot (on the same equipment) available to their precinct’s Election Day voters, rather than an absentee ballot.

Furthermore, according to the Early Voting Information Center, states with early voting report high levels of voter satisfaction with the process; many early voters identify convenience as their primary reason for supporting the procedure. Lengthening the time that voters may cast a regular ballot increases the convenience of voting both by allowing voters more flexibility in their schedules and by shortening the lines on Election Day. Working Mississippians, who may find it difficult to stand in long lines on one specific day in the middle of the week, may find the convenience of early voting particularly appealing.

In fact, early voting is most likely to impact Mississippi’s elections for state and local office, the very elections that most deeply affect our day-to-day lives. Researchers find that though early voting does not increase participation rates among new voters, it may increase turnout in lower-intensity elections among regular voters — voters who regularly vote in presidential elections. Increasing the convenience of voting may increase turnout in important state and local elections that do not fall on presidential election years.

Mississippi needs early voting. Because early voters are no more likely to be Democrats or Republicans, early voting is not about empowering a particular political party but about empowering the electorate. With a more engaged citizenry, Mississippians can expect a more responsive and effective government. It’s time for our state leaders to support early voting: it’s good for Mississippi’s democracy.
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Hicks is the executive director of Mississippi First, a civic advocacy organization.
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Copyright (C) 2009 by the Mississippi Forum 9/09

Thursday, September 3, 2009

Not Reforming Health Care is What We Should Fear

Posted by American Forum at 9:50 AM

MISSISSIPPI FORUM
By Mary Margaret Bollinger

Those of us who experienced the 1993 health care debate should remember the “Harry and Louise fear of change” ads that were used to incite public opposition and defeat health care reform efforts.

Most of the changes the ads warned would come with the Clinton proposal, happened anyway: HMOs and insurance plans limited which doctors patients could see, what hospitals they could go to, and what treatments they could receive. Costs went up, more people lost coverage, Medicare costs continued to increase at an unsustainable rate, and everybody with coverage is paying more for it.

The same “fear” strategy is being used this time as our troubled economy, skyrocketing costs, and the sinking quality of American health care drive the current health care reform effort.

We worry that if everybody has access to health care -- universal coverage -- our own access to health care will somehow be lessened and we will pay more even though we know that everyone who currently has health insurance has seen those costs escalate faster than inflation for more than a decade. We worry that we will not have access to the newest tests and the latest procedures. We worry that we will not have access to the physicians we want to see -- even though that access is limited now as Mississippi has the lowest doctor-to-person ratio in the country.

The best argument for universal coverage is that, by providing more preventive care, it will help drive health care costs down by keeping people healthier in the long run. The man with undiagnosed and untreated high blood pressure dramatically increases his chances of a crippling stroke. The child with asthma whose parents cannot afford the medication or regular doctor visits is more likely to miss school and to end up with an expensive hospitalization. The woman who puts off a mammogram because her insurance does not cover it or she has no health insurance dramatically increases the chances that breast cancer will kill her because treating the disease when it can first be detected is cheapest and has the best odds for success.

The reform we should all be pushing for should include regulation so that insurance companies play fair and cover people with existing conditions. There should be mandates so that most employers continue to offer coverage to their employees, and tax credits and subsidies so that working families who really cannot afford health coverage can get it. And there should be competition -- the public option -- so that we really can get more for our money. The public option should make available for buy-in the government programs that work now: Medicare, the Veterans Affairs system, and the health insurance that members of Congress have.

A recent Wall Street Journal poll found that, when they learned what is in the health care bill in Congress, clear majorities supported the basic components: universal coverage, a public option, paying for the changes with increased taxes on high income Americans and employer contributions.

Some for-profit health insurance companies, who have been making record profits since the last health care reform effort, are trying to convince Americans once again that change will make things worse, not better. This time Harry and Louise are on to them; they are pushing for change along with a long list of large and small business associations, and health care advocates including the American Medical Association. About 14,000 Americans are losing health coverage every day. Continuing down this unsustainable path without serious health care reform is what we really have to fear.
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Bollinger is a former tax attorney in Jackson.
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Copyright (C) 2009 by the Mississippi Forum 9/09

Friday, June 26, 2009

A New Model for Cutting Medical Costs

Posted by American Forum at 12:05 PM

MISSISSIPPI FORUM

By Lynn Evans

Word is that Harvard Professor Dr. Atul Gawande’s article on McAllen, Texas, is required reading in the White House. Published in the June 1, 2009 issue of The New Yorker, the Boston surgeon asks why McAllen’s health care costs are the second highest health care costs in the nation, behind Miami. His conclusions have much to teach us about the problems with America’s health care system today.

First, a little background. This year, 64.4 million Americans who are too young for Medicare will spend more than 10 percent of their pre-tax income on health care and health insurance. And that percentage is growing. Buying health insurance for their families is rapidly becoming too expensive for middle-income families, and simply impossible for low-income families. Mississippi’s low median family income makes this problem even more difficult. At 43 percent, Mississippi has the lowest percentage of children covered by private insurance, and the highest percentage of children eligible for Medicaid and CHIP at 89 percent.

Although Mississippi Medicaid’s health care costs for children are among the lowest in the country – about $1,800 each – Medicaid costs for adults are among the highest at almost $8,000. What Dr. Gawande found in McAllen has some clues as to why that might be.

McAllen was not always the high health care cost capital it is today. In 1992, costs were at the national average. What changed, according to McAllen doctors themselves, was overutilization. In McAllen’s case, competition among medical providers did not provide better and less expensive care but rather more expensive and not necessarily better care. According to one surgeon, doctors were no longer paid to think about what may be going on with their patients but were financially rewarded for tests and procedures. An analysis of commercial insurance claims confirmed the McAllen surgeon’s diagnosis; patients in McAllen got more hospital treatments and tests, more surgery, and “more of pretty much everything,” Gawande said.

It turns out that more is not necessarily better for patients. In fact, it seems to be worse. According to a Dartmouth study, patients in high-cost areas around the country were less likely to receive preventive services like flu and pneumonia vaccines, waited longer to receive medical care, and were less likely to have a medical home. “They got more of the stuff that cost more, but not more of what they needed,” Gawande explained.

In comparison, Rochester, Minnesota – home of the Mayo Clinic – has lower health care costs than the national average and a significantly higher quality of care. The Mayo Clinic uses a collaborative model where health care leaders are rewarded for focusing on what is best for patients and sharing expertise, rather than what is the most cost-productive business model. Their example of lessening financial incentives for individual physicians and taking collective responsibility for improving quality of care has been replicated in other cities around the nation such as Durham, North Carolina and Seattle, Washington. These medical centers are centered on not-for-profit institutions. All have higher quality of care and lower costs than the national average.

Community collaboration and accountability are the keys to providing a better quality of health care at a lower cost nationwide. Unfortunately, our current system of payments – private as well as government insurers – does not reward reducing unnecessary procedures, covering everyone, and improving the quality of patient outcomes. The national debate about access to health care – not to mention the Mississippi debate about Medicaid – must incorporate a discussion about how to promote more Mayo Clinics and fewer McAllens.
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Evans is a Jackson health care activist and writer.
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Copyright (C) 2009 by the Mississippi Forum 6/09

Thursday, June 11, 2009

Fair and Just Immigration Reform

Posted by American Forum at 11:20 AM

MISSISSIPPI FORUM

By Rev. Jeremy Tobin

The history of immigrant labor in this country is as old as the country itself.

Given political or economical expediency, immigrants were given legal protection and a path to citizenship, or were locked out due to politically dominated regulations. That being said, goods we take for granted, and can purchase fairly cheaply, are often the result of immigrant labor.

The 12 million undocumented workers in the U.S. are usually paid below standard wages with no health or other benefits. Many are often cheated. Threatened with deportation, or worse, immigrants do not call on law enforcement for help. Recently an undocumented immigrant died, afraid to call for help after his home was invaded. These conditions create a subclass of people with a strong work ethic, who are easy to exploit, and readily available.

This is not the “American way.” The situation has to change, and it has to be on the side of foreign born workers who only want what everyone else wants -- the opportunity to support their families and live with dignity.

Immigration laws and regulations are a patchwork of inconsistencies, contradictions, and injustices. State laws are often worse. The raids on workplaces that have captured media attention tear families apart and trash human rights.

Organizations long associated with anti-black racism have reinvented themselves as watchdogs of national security. They are xenophobic and racist. They are afraid that if immigrants unite with other exploited groups, real reform in American labor law might happen. Massive profits, at the expense of exploited groups while the average Joe is able to buy things cheaply, is what has been accepted as the status quo.

To exploit people for profit is unjust. The current restrictions on visas are largely driven by racism. In the 50s it was the “yellow peril.” In the 2000s it is the “brown peril.” The folks that are benefitting from this racism are laughing all the way to the bank.

Fair and just immigration policy must include: a path to legal standing for those currently undocumented; no guest worker provisions; the right to seek employment like everyone else, with the same pay scale and benefits as everyone else; and the right to organize and/or join unions.

Those espousing comprehensive immigration policy say they want guest workers, but “they should be treated fairly and humanely.” In fact, there have been guest workers in one form or another over the past 40 years and they have been consistently exploited. If they quit, or get fired, they lose their status. If they seek better employment, they lose their status. In effect, guest workers are all but indentured servants to the company that sponsors and hires them. Their pay is at the mercy of the company. The imbalance between profit and employment all but guarantees worker exploitation.

Further, many of the crazy schemes like a great wall to keep out immigrants are a sham. As long as NAFTA and CAFTA are ruining native economies and driving farmers and others into destitution, the migration of the desperate to find work is unstoppable. The United Nations and religious leaders everywhere, defend the right to migrate, not only for decent work, but to escape persecution.

We have the opportunity and the will to correct the imbalances of our immigration laws. We can do it both to benefit immigrants by giving them the opportunity for a new life, and to enrich our country with their many cultures. This is our challenge in 2009.
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Rev. Tobin is a member of the Mississippi Immigrant Rights Alliance.
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Copyright (C) 2009 by the Mississippi Forum 5/09

Wednesday, March 25, 2009

Investing in Early Education:the Building Blocks for Success

Posted by American Forum at 10:56 AM

MISSISSIPPI FORUM

By Dr. Laurie J. Smith and Rhea Williams-Bishop

At a time when the stock market is slumping, Mississippians are making the smartest investment possible in an uncertain economy: providing a better start in life for some of our most vulnerable children.

Together with national foundations, Mississippi’s business and charitable communities have contributed $5 million -- and aim to raise a total of $10 million -- for an early childhood education program that will reap returns in an improved business climate, a better-prepared workforce, and more good-paying jobs. On top of that, we’ll strengthen our social fabric and our state’s finances, as more vulnerable young people are put on a path that leads to productive lives and responsible citizenship, not dependency and anti-social behavior.

Quality early care and preschool aren’t only educational priorities -- they’re economic priorities. When corporate chief executive officers and site selectors decide where to locate or expand a business, they explore whether communities have skilled workforces, good schools, and high-quality early care. Good school systems and early childhood programs not only produce and prepare capable workers but also attract and retain workers who don’t want to worry about the quality of education that their children are receiving.

These reasons explain why, the Children’s Defense Fund, Momentum Mississippi, and Leadership Mississippi in coordination with the Mississippi Economic Council, have created a new early childhood education pilot project. The program, Mississippi Building Blocks, is designed to improve early childhood education by enhancing the quality of early care and education provided to young children beginning with infants and toddlers. The goals: improving teaching in these centers, providing educational and developmentally appropriate materials for children, preparing parents to play more of a part in their children’s education, and ensuring that youngsters are better equipped to enter kindergarten. This program is supported by private funding partners, including Mississippi Power Foundation and its president Anthony Topazi, The Phil Hardin Foundation and the Barksdale Reading Institute.

To achieve these ambitious goals, Mississippi Building Blocks has a detailed and attainable action plan. The centers will be provided with materials, resources, and business advice to improve their programs and, yes, their profitability. Mentors will work in the centers’ classrooms to help the teachers.

Parent advocates will visit the parents in their homes to help them help their kids. As with any sound business venture, the results will be measured. A statistically valid sample of students will be tracked over time to determine the outcomes and to decide what works and what doesn’t, and what needs to be improved.

There is real reason to hope that the results will be beneficial not only to the children and their families but to our entire state and its educational system and economic environment. Better parenting skills for mothers and fathers; improved school readiness for entering kindergartners; reduced drop-out rates and improved graduation rates among high school students; more good-paying jobs for workers and better-prepared employees for businesses; and less crime, less dependency and more prosperity for Mississippi -- all these outcomes will begin to be possible if all of us -- business people, parents and educators -- do our part to make this program succeed.

We couldn’t help but be inspired and encouraged when we attended a statewide conference on early childhood education in Jackson at the end of last year. Attended by educators, children’s advocates and business leaders and assisted by the W. K. Kellogg Foundation, the conference helped to create a consensus that investing in early childhood programs is absolutely essential for Mississippi.

In addition to the efforts of business leaders, education professionals, and children’s advocates, state and local government leaders will need to take further actions to ensure that all the young children in our state have access to safe, affordable, high-quality early education that prepares them for kindergarten so that they can succeed in school and become lifelong learners. As Governor Barbour declared at the conference, “the goals of this all are consistent with the other goals we have going on in our state to build a better Mississippi dropout recovery, workforce development and career readiness.”

With Mississippi Building Blocks, we’ve made a good start towards giving all of our children a good start in schooling and in life. Let’s all build this pilot project into a successful program -- and build that program until all of our children are prepared to succeed in school, at work, and in every aspect of their lives.
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Smith is executive director for Mississippi Building Blocks. Williams-Bishop is deputy director of the Children’s Defense Fund.
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Copyright (C) 2009 by the Mississippi Forum 3/09

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