The Legislature built a new authority to take Jackson's water and sewer systems away from the city. On June 1, a federal judge told that authority to sit still.

U.S. District Judge Henry Wingate granted part of Jackson's request for an injunction against the Metro Jackson Water Authority, the body created this year to eventually run the capital city's utilities. According to Mississippi Today, the order lets the authority's board appoint and seat its members, and nothing more. The board cannot pick a president, write regulations, sign leases, issue bonds, or take any operational control of the systems unless Wingate says so.

Wingate's language left little room to maneuver. The authority “shall enact no regulatory measures, finalize no lease agreements, issue no bonds, and assume no managerial influence or deputy control over Jackson’s water and sewer systems,” his order read, per Mississippi Today, until the court alters the decree or steps back from the systems itself.

The authority is the product of House Bill 1677, which Gov. Tate Reeves signed in April. It sets up a nine-member board drawn from state and local officials. Jackson leaders fought the law because it does not give the city a majority of the appointments — the central grievance that has driven the dispute from the start, as WLBT and Mississippi Today have reported.

The case turns on a question of who is already in charge. Jackson argued the new law collided with the federal receivership Wingate opened in 2022, when the court installed an interim third-party manager over the failing systems. That manager, Ted Henifin, and his organization, JXN Water, have run day-to-day operations since. “When a federal court takes control of property through a receivership, it draws to itself the sole power to decide all questions concerning the management and disposition of that property,” Wingate wrote, according to WLBT.

For now, the judge framed the state law as a structure with no power to use. As things stand, he wrote, HB 1677 doesn't interfere with his 2022 order because the authority only takes over once the court allows JXN Water to step down, Mississippi Today reported. Wingate described the law as an unexecuted contingency — and signaled he could reject the authority altogether.

Mayor John Horhn, who spent months pushing for a city-controlled authority, claimed the moment. “This is a victory for our city and for the residents who depend on a lawful, orderly process,” he said at a June 2 press conference, as reported by the Mississippi Free Press. He was blunter about the law itself the next day: “House Bill 1677 was a classic example of the state not listening to the local interests of the city of Jackson,” he said, per WLBT. “We don’t mind if you want to have some involvement, but not control.”

The appointments are the one thing still moving. Mississippi Today reported that Horhn selected water treatment professional Daniel Walker, longtime political operative Austin Barbour, and Jackson businesswoman Shirley Tucker, though the City Council still has to confirm his picks. Lt. Gov. Delbert Hosemann named Jackson businessman Sandy Carter, Ridgeland put forward its city engineer Paul Forster, and Byram chose engineer Tramone Smith. Reeves, who controls two seats, declined to name them, citing Wingate's earlier hold.

The governor has not softened his read of the city's record. Reeves has said Jackson “proven they do not need majority control” of the board, pointing back to the 2022 emergency that put the state's hand on the system in the first place, according to WLBT. That is the gap the court now sits inside: a state that does not trust the city to run its water, and a city that does not trust the state to take it.

Nothing is settled. Wingate has tasked Henifin with producing a transition plan by Oct. 5, and the interim manager's tenure is expected to run into 2027, the Magnolia Tribune reported. Until the receivership ends, the new authority is a board with names and no job. The fight over who controls Jackson's water is paused, not finished — and the next move belongs to the judge.