# Stokes Wants Code Enforcement Under JPD. The Police Chief Says No.

> Ward 3 Councilman Kenneth Stokes is pushing to dissolve the Planning and Development Department and hand code enforcement to police. The city's top cop, who would inherit the job, opposes the move.

*Politics · By Jackson Wire Staff · August 10, 2026*

Ward 3 Councilman Kenneth Stokes wants Jackson's police officers to answer the city's housing complaints. The person who would run those officers says the idea would hurt the city, the department, and the residents it is meant to help.

Stokes introduced an ordinance in late July that would dissolve the Planning and Development Department and move Building and Permits, Planning and Zoning, and Developmental Assistance under the Jackson Police Department. Rental Registration and JTRAN would shift to Human and Cultural Services. He has kept pushing the measure since, telling WLBT that community improvement and code enforcement are the two divisions he most wants under JPD.

“When citizens call to get some help in some of these neighborhoods where they're experiencing all kinds of problems, they need to see a police officer,” Stokes said. “With all the problems we have in housing in the city of Jackson, squatters and all other things, the police officers must be the ones to make this problem disappear.”

The move would also redirect money Stokes says is not being used properly under the current structure, with the goal of funding crime-fighting technology for JPD. He acknowledged he does not yet know how much money the reorganization would free up, and that he has not spoken directly with Police Chief RaShall Brackney about it.

Brackney has made her position clear. Asked about the ordinance at the council's Planning and Economic Development Committee meeting on Aug. 6, she said no one reached out to her on the front end, and that she does not back the idea.

“But wholesale planning and economic development, those kinds of things, in my spaces, the HUD stuff in that public safety space, does not benefit the city, JPD, or the citizens of Jackson,” Brackney said. She said she would favor intentional conversations about overlap, and if it makes sense for some functions to sit under JPD, “that we do that.”

Chief Administrative Officer Pieter Teeuwissen told the committee he recommended consolidating some city departments to Mayor John Horhn last year, but never suggested dissolving Planning or Code Enforcement. “This was not one I had presented,” he said.

The numbers behind the debate are stark. Planning Director Angela Brown told the committee the city has spent roughly $900,000 this year to demolish or clear 40 properties, with another $1 million in cleanup projects in the works. It has recouped about $12,000 of that through liens and collections, a recovery rate near one percent. Brackney said even in a best-case scenario, a blighted property can take three years to move from an open case to a torn-down building.

Stokes has history on his side of the argument. He has noted the city had no Planning and Development Department when he first joined the council, and that under former Mayor Tony Yarber, code enforcement was placed under Jackson Police. Council President Vernon Hartley has kept the ordinance in committee, saying the council needs time to explore the ramifications. “A couple more weeks won't hurt,” he said.

The council is split. Ward 6's LaShia Brown-Thomas agrees code enforcement should fall under JPD but wants to narrow the rest of the proposal. Ward 4's Brian Grizzell wants to see it through, saying it is time to “reimagine what Code Enforcement looks like.” Ward 1's Ashby Foote argues the real fix is money from the Legislature and Congress, not a reshuffling of departments.

The ordinance sits in committee as the city opens its budget hearings this week, where the same council will weigh a disputed deficit and how to pay for the departments it keeps. Whether Stokes can move his plan forward may depend less on the merits than on whether the council that refused to declare a $36 million shortfall is willing to fund a police department that would suddenly own the city's blight problem.

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