Jackson politics, property, and power.
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City hall, the courts, and what's happening around the capital city.
The Council set the city's millage at 63.03 mills on Sept. 3, a week before the budget deadline, committing to no tax increase even as Public Works faces a roughly $8 million cut and the city stares down a $23 million to $36 million shortfall.
The Jackson City Council convenes twice today with a week left to pass a fiscal 2027 budget that would cut Public Works by $8 million.
Marcus Chanay starts Sept. 14 as Mayor John Horhn's third chief of staff since July 2025, landing in an office that is also losing its chief administrative officer at the end of the month.
Jackson's plan to move 300 chronically homeless people into rent-free housing starts this month. The city has identified $6 million of the $9.7 million it says the program needs, and it has not yet begun recruiting the landlords who must accept the tenants.
The full Fifth Circuit affirmed dismissal of the class action alleging Jackson knowingly served lead-tainted water, while the council races a Sept. 15 budget deadline.
Mayor Horhn's flat $112.9 million general fund plan trims Public Works by $8 million even as the city folds its parks crews into the department. The council has until Sept. 15 to find a different answer.
The council on Thursday ratified an emergency contract for Baird Engineering to survey a collapsed line running through properties on St. Ann and Laurel streets. It is the latest in a long line of Jackson collapses handled outside the normal bidding process.
The council's 6-1 vote on Aug. 25 marks a shift for JXN Water's fiercest critic, who once demanded the city retake the system outright. Now he wants Jackson in the room when the transition plan is written.
The Jackson City Council convenes at 10 a.m. to adopt the FY27 budget and set property tax rates, while Jackson mourns Grammy-winning jazz vocalist Cassandra Wilson.
Chief U.S. District Judge Halil Ozerden gave the disbarred former DA 30 days to show why he should keep practicing in federal court. That clock runs out around Sept. 3, six weeks before all three defendants are sentenced.
The council paused data center construction for 183 days in July, then voted in August to explore sites anyway. The clock runs out in January, and the city's zoning code still has no definition for a data center.
The Jackson City Council faces a September 15 deadline to adopt a 2026-27 budget while wrestling a more than $30 million shortfall and a proposed Public Works cut.
The proposal would let families use food assistance dollars to cover water bills, a first-of-its-kind move that lands as Jackson faces another rate hike next spring.
One Voice has converted a shuttered school building into an opportunity center offering jobs, after-school care, and other services. It is the latest chapter in Jackson's long struggle to find new uses for its empty schools.
The city transferred operations of the McNair Davis Planetarium to the Mississippi Museum of Art in July. Reopening is expected in about six months, once digital screens go in.
Jackson's fire chief says the latest blaze at the Chapel Ridge complex was set by people, the fifth such fire in nine months. The pattern raises questions about what the city and the property owner are doing in between.
The City Council voted unanimously Tuesday to ask voters for a 0.5% prepared-food tax increase and a 1% lodging tax increase. The money would go to Visit Jackson, and the tax has not moved since the bureau was founded in 1983.
The council has now met on the budget four times in nine days. Thursday's special public hearing comes one day after the regular meeting where the spending plan was expected to go to a vote.
Federal regulators are fighting a request to pause their civil suit against Leigh Bridges, saying her own attorney signaled a bill of information is coming and a guilty plea is likely. The case has already cost the agency $225,625 in security alone.
Interim manager Ted Henifin filed the utility's financial management plan with the federal court Friday, projecting a 10% increase in spring 2027 and further hikes in 2028 and 2029.
Three years apart, the two most magnetic coaches in the state walked away from its Black flagship and its white one, each at the peak of what he built. The departures look like opposites. They are the same story, and it is not really about football.
After two finance committee hearings and a special session, the council faces a regular meeting Tuesday to adopt a budget that is 16.8% smaller than last year's. The calendar shows how compressed the process has become.
Jackson's bus workers voted 29-9 Thursday to end their second strike in two years. The deal delivers the raises they wanted, but it also concedes ground on who is allowed behind the wheel.
Arlington Properties broke ground on a $59 million, 234-unit apartment complex in west Fondren, while the City Council convenes a special teleconference session this morning.
Mayor John Horhn pitched a $112.9 million general fund budget as flat for fiscal 2027. It is $23 million below the current year's adopted budget, and two council members are questioning whether the revenue it counts on will actually arrive.
The city received close to $4 million from HUD three years ago to replace the Eudora Welty Library. No location has been picked, and the drawdown clock is running.
The former Fortification Street YMCA cleared a key rezoning hurdle Monday, clearing the way for a $60 million residential and recreation project along the I-55 corridor.
A week after the council voted to explore data center sites, records show the city's hired consultant cautioned that the industry's defining input, water, is the one most directly tied to Jackson's vulnerabilities.
Zach Servis finished third in the 2025 mayoral race with 2.5 percent of the vote. Now his federal lawsuit over a campaign shirt and a city ordinance is forcing Jackson to defend how it lets residents speak at council meetings.
The owner of the building housing Jackson's most-used library wants to give it to the city, but repair costs could run millions the city doesn't have.
Chief U.S. District Judge Halil Ozerden has ordered Jody Owens to show why he should keep practicing in federal court after the state permanently disbarred him. His response is limited to two narrow claims, and his own words may have already foreclosed them.
Jackson Police Chief RaShall Brackney told the council a proposed $5 million cut would freeze hiring and take the department back to 2021 staffing levels.
RaSean Thomas told the Finance Committee Thursday that $1.68 million would add 25 personnel this year, the first step toward 75 new hires by the end of Mayor John Horhn's term. The math starts with a staffing gap the state flagged in May.
The City Council takes up police, fire, public works and water rates today as it races a Sept. 15 budget deadline under a revenue shortfall.
The six-month moratorium on data centers goes into force today, banning them at most Jackson locations. On Tuesday the council voted 5-2 to urge the administration to find places to build them anyway.
Fire, police and public works make their FY27 budget pitches today as the council weighs a flat $112.9 million general fund against shrinking revenues.
The joint committee that will redraw Mississippi's legislative, congressional and Supreme Court maps holds its first public hearing Aug. 18. Voting-rights advocates say the process is starting without a single draft map, and they want to know why.
The Jackson City Council voted 5-2 to explore data center locations even as a six-month moratorium takes effect Thursday, while JTRAN's strike nears its one-month mark.
Mayor Horhn's $112.9 million general fund proposal holds spending flat, but two revenue lines drew sharp questions from the council's finance committee on Monday.
The council's Finance Committee reconvenes today for day two of departmental budget hearings after Mayor Horhn proposed a flat $112.9 million general fund.
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.
The city's 2026-27 departmental budget hearings open Monday at 9 a.m. with an overview of revenues and debt service, landing amid the council's unresolved fight over the current-year shortfall.
A man interviewed in the death of Tasia Fortune sits in jail on an unrelated gun charge, while Jackson's budget hearings open Monday amid a disputed $36 million deficit.
A 3-4 vote and a withdrawn motion leave the city's books showing a $135 million budget against roughly $99 million in projected revenue, with the CFO warning of audit findings and personal liability.
Jackson's 2026-27 budget hearings open Monday as the council and mayor remain at odds over a projected revenue shortfall the council has refused to formally acknowledge.
The city releases its 2026-27 budget hearing schedule as council members clash over a revenue shortfall, and the state moves to demolish a North Jackson eyesore.
Jackson's homicide count through July is up 26% over last year, and the JTRAN strike enters its fourth week with the union walking out of mediated talks.
JTRAN bus operators remain on the picket line as MV Transportation touts an enhanced wage offer, while JXN Water reports record monthly collections and Hinds supervisors weigh a one-mill increase.
The state's 2024 rate of 9.7 deaths per 1,000 births is the highest in 10 years, and Hinds County's five-year mark runs higher still. MSDH is turning to community meetings to find out why.
A heat advisory blankets central Mississippi with indices near 110 as Leflore County reports two heat deaths.
The Hinds County Board of Supervisors convenes today for its first regular meeting since floating a 1.5-mill tax increase to close an $8 million budget gap.
The former Hinds County district attorney cannot practice law in Mississippi again. The court's order was both immediate and permanent, an unusual departure from the state's normal 30-day grace period.
Bus operators walked off the job July 13. Friday's mediation in Pearl produced no announced agreement, and the strike has now outlasted the 14-day stoppage of 2024.
Mississippi's medical examiner completed Nolan Wells's autopsy with results sealed for a grand jury, while Jackson's council adjourned without acting on a budget amendment tied to a $36 million revenue shortfall.
Ward Three Councilman Kenneth Stokes wants to dissolve the city's Planning and Development Department and move most of its divisions under the Jackson Police Department. The council deferred the ordinance to committee.
The 3-4 vote leaves the city's books out of compliance with state law. The council recessed until Friday, when the amendment could resurface.
The Grand Chateau Apartments sit vacant after Entergy cut power amid a heat emergency. The owner says he wants to turn the building into student housing for Jackson State University, but safety concerns and a history of meter tampering have stalled the plan.
Hinds County supervisors propose a 1.5-mill tax increase that would cost homeowners $30 a year as the Jackson City Council approves $24 million in infrastructure projects and JPS students head back to class.
Prado Vista will put a county-owned conference center, a 250-room luxury hotel, and four restaurants on 77 acres off I-55. The developer is Gabriel Prado, the same man asking to build an off-grid AI campus while Jackson debates banning data centers.
Chief Brackney's calendar reveals city officials met with the camera manufacturer whose hardware was specified in the contract more than two months before the emergency was declared, undercutting the city's justification for bypassing competitive bidding.
The 3-1 vote authorizes urban renewal bonds for a 1,800-person venue near Sunnybrook Road. A private developer plans a 250-room hotel next door. Critics say taxpayers are on the hook if revenue falls short.
Mayor John Horhn told WLBT on Monday that talks about a data center at the Lake Hico site are "very premature," walking back records showing his administration quietly planned the hub for months. Separately, a federal judge has raised concerns about what the project could mean for JXN Water.
About 50 people gathered Saturday on Dana Road to oppose the Amazon Web Services project, citing concerns over energy costs, water use, and health risks. The protest comes days after Jackson passed its own data center moratorium.
Brad McCullouch, appointed to replace Jody Owens after his federal guilty plea, invited Shad White to audit the Hinds County District Attorney's Office. Owens separately moved to surrender his law license.
Internal documents obtained by WLBT reveal the city eyed a $5 billion to $15 billion hyperscale data center at the former Rex Brown plant site, projecting $9 million to $20 million a year in new revenue. The council passed a moratorium on data centers two days before the records came out.
The six-month pause blocks new data center proposals while the city drafts regulations. The vote split the council along familiar lines: economic opportunity versus neighborhood control.
The Mississippi Legislature passed a sweeping youth court reform bill in special session, sending it to Gov. Tate Reeves for signature before a July 24 Supreme Court deadline.
The former councilman turned down a government offer that required cooperation with prosecutors. His two co-defendants also pleaded guilty without cooperating.
The Jackson City Council voted 5-2 to pause new data center development for 183 days, while JTRAN's strike enters its third day with out-of-state operators filling routes.
The City Council will vote Tuesday on applying for a competitive federal grant that would award Jackson up to $300 million for public safety, technology, and crime reduction. Only two to four cities nationwide are expected to win.
The Jackson City Council votes this morning on a six-month moratorium on data center construction as the JTRAN strike enters its second day and MBI investigates an overnight officer-involved shooting downtown.
Jackson's bus system shuts down at 4 a.m. as more than 60 JTRAN workers walk off the job, and the City Council prepares to vote on a six-month data center moratorium Tuesday.
A state law governing how youth court records are shared expired when the Legislature failed to act. The Mississippi Supreme Court issued a temporary order that runs out July 24. The governor has not yet called a special session.
More than 60 JTRAN workers will walk off the job at 4 a.m. Monday unless a last-minute deal is reached, leaving Jackson without public transit.
More than 60 bus drivers and transit workers will walk off the job at 4 a.m. Monday if no deal is reached with MV Transportation. The strike would strand thousands of riders who depend on Jackson's only public transit system.
The Jackson City Council on Tuesday will consider a six-month moratorium on data center projects, while the Hinds County District 2 special election remains in legal limbo three days before its scheduled date.
After two meetings on July 6 and months of debate, the Jackson City Council will vote Tuesday on a six-month pause on new data center construction. The margin is uncertain.
The Jackson City Council will consider a six-month moratorium on data center projects at its next regular meeting on Tuesday, as Hinds County voters in District 2 head to the polls the same day for a supervisor special election.
The former mayor's signed plea agreement, filed in federal court July 6, surrenders his rights to appeal, to FOIA records, and to control his assets. A probation officer has now been assigned to build the pre-sentence report that will shape all three sentencings on October 15.
The Jackson City Council will consider a six-month moratorium on data center projects at its next regular meeting after residents packed City Hall on Monday demanding a full ban.
The Jackson City Council held a Planning Committee meeting and a special public hearing on data centers July 6. Speaker after speaker told council members a temporary pause is not enough.
The Planning and Economic Development Committee reviewed a draft regulatory framework Monday afternoon. The full council took up a six-month moratorium that night. No vote was taken, but the path forward is clearer than it was.
The Jackson bribery case now moves to the only courtroom fight left: punishment. A person-by-person guide to the exposure, the guidelines math, the cooperation credit, and the order in which the bills come due.
The Mississippi Bar asked the state Supreme Court on July 6 to suspend Jody Owens from practicing law, the near-automatic consequence of his felony plea. The harder problem arrives later: six years of Hinds County convictions won by an office whose leader was committing federal crimes while running it.
Hours after Lumumba folded, the last defendant did too. The biggest corruption case in the city's modern history is over: one mayor, one district attorney, one council president, one councilwoman, one associate, all guilty by their own word. What remains is the sentencing calendar, and the questions no jury will ever answer.
The former mayor, twice elected and the heir to a movement, has changed his plea in the federal bribery case. Seven days before opening statements, only Aaron Banks still says he is innocent.
Chief Administrative Officer Pieter Teeuwissen is stepping down after less than a year on the job, citing personal obligations. His departure comes as the city faces a budget shortfall, a data center fight, and the fallout from Jody Owens's guilty plea.
The City Council holds a Planning Committee meeting at 4 p.m. and a public hearing at 6 p.m., both on data centers, as the fourth suspect in the Queen Alexandria Lane triple homicide is extradited from Texas.
The council will consider a temporary ban on new data center development at a 6 p.m. public hearing Monday, following a committee discussion at 4 p.m. Both meetings are at City Hall.
Con Edison cut power to thousands and reduced voltage for 400,000 customers during the heat wave, a preview of what a grid without slack looks like. Jackson votes on its data center rules July 14. The two stories are the same story.
Jackson police confirm a department-issued SWAT rifle stolen eight weeks ago was used in the Queen Alexandria Lane triple homicide that killed two women and a toddler.
Lumumba has called his indictment a political prosecution timed to destroy him. In a city that watched the state take its airport, its courts, and its water, that theory did not come from nowhere. An examination of the case his defenders make, and where it collides with the record.
The former mayor loses the cover of a co-defendant's entrapment fight and gains a star witness against him. Banks loses the same cover and may be better off without it. A strategic map of the trial that opens July 13.
For the first time in a generation, the world's biggest sporting event is being played within driving distance of Mississippi. Two African teams remain. One plays in Houston today. The other faces Argentina in Atlanta on Tuesday.
After a standing-room-only public hearing where 25 of 26 speakers opposed data centers, the Jackson City Council is drafting regulations that will determine whether Saxum's 230-acre rezoning moves forward. The next vote is July 14.
Closing arguments are done in the decade-long airport control trial, and Judge Carlton Reeves now holds the fate of Jackson-Medgar Wiley Evers International Airport.
After seven days of testimony and nearly four hours of closing arguments, the decade-old fight over Jackson-Medgar Wiley Evers International Airport now rests with one man. A ruling could take months.
After a standing-room-only public hearing where 25 of 26 speakers opposed data centers, the City Council is expected to release a draft ordinance and hold another hearing before any vote. The Saxum rezoning remains in limbo.
Between July 11 and July 14, the capital city faces a new district attorney, a federal corruption trial, a court-ordered election do-over, and a possible transit strike. None of these deadlines was planned. All of them are about the same thing.
First Assistant DA Brad McCullouch is holding the office while Governor Tate Reeves decides who gets it. Under state law, Reeves has 10 days to make an emergency appointment and must call a special election. The politics here are not simple.
Document 205, filed June 29, reveals an asset freeze, a full waiver of all appeal rights, and a sealed supplement that almost certainly contains the cooperation terms. The fine print tells a story the courtroom summary did not.
Jody Owens brought Gary Kohlman, one of Washington's most decorated trial lawyers, to lead the defense. Legal observers expected the other two defendants to ride in his wake. Owens is gone. The question is what his departure leaves behind.
Jody Owens admitted Monday he funneled more than $80,000 in FBI cash to the mayor and a city councilman. He resigned as Hinds County DA effective Wednesday. Lumumba and Banks go to trial July 13.
The former Hinds County DA faces conspiracy, money laundering, and honest services fraud. Federal guidelines point to 2 to 3.5 years. One question will determine whether he gets less.
The former Jackson City Council president just dropped a legal bombshell on prosecutors, arguing they illegally crammed multiple separate crimes into a single count. His lawyers want the judge to make the government show its hand before trial.
A Ward 7 councilman's pilot would deputize residents to document derelict properties. The city already has a list. What it lacks is anyone with the money and staff to clear it.
Hinds Supervisor Tony Smith has taken his fight to the Mississippi Supreme Court, throwing the scheduled July 14 do-over election into doubt.
ATU Local 1208 authorized a mid-July walkout in a 32-to-6 vote. Behind the wage dispute sits a $23 million city shortfall and a contractor's plan to cut routes, end Saturday service and pivot to microtransit.
Jackson's bus drivers have authorized a mid-July walkout that could strand roughly a thousand daily riders, even as the city wrestles with a $23 million shortfall.
Judge Jordan held the final pretrial conference June 16, then a separate in-chambers session the same day. By the end of it, the defendants had a bigger strike sheet, a tighter deadline stack, and an order to start drafting anonymous-jury instructions.
A contentious plan to rezone 230 acres of northwest Jackson for a data center heads toward a June 24 Planning Board vote, with a citywide public hearing set for June 22.
When the federal corruption trial of Jody Owens, Chokwe Antar Lumumba, and Aaron Banks opens July 13, the courtroom is open to the public. No ticket, no press pass. A reader's guide to getting in.
A city that begged the federal government for drinking water in 2022 is being courted to host the thirstiest machines in America.
A plain-language guide to the federal bribery trial of DA Jody Owens, former Mayor Chokwe Antar Lumumba, and former Councilman Aaron Banks. The arguments, the witnesses, and what to listen for in opening statements.
The corruption case has been quieter on the docket than in the headlines. The last two weeks changed that. Twenty-eight days from trial, the pretrial motions are picking up.
The decade-long legal fight over who controls Jackson's airport goes to trial today before U.S. District Judge Carlton Reeves.
A rezoning brawl over 230 acres in northwest Jackson has the protests and the deadline. But a separate developer's off-grid gas plant — the project state regulators just declined to touch — may set the precedent that lasts.
After months arguing that pretrial publicity had poisoned the local jury pool, federal prosecutors told the court last week they are satisfied a fair jury can be seated in Jackson — quietly ending the last skirmish before the corruption trial of Jody Owens, Chokwe Antar Lumumba and Aaron Banks.
The city convened a panel at Jackson State to ask whether it wants a 230-acre data center in northwest Jackson — a question it has not answered, with a rezoning vote now days away.
A month before the July 13 trial, prosecutors withdrew their bid to move the case to Gulfport or widen the jury pool — telling the court they are satisfied a fair jury can be seated in Jackson.
Special Judge Barry Ford couldn't find the will of the voters in the boxes, so he ordered a new election between David Archie and Anthony Smith. The ballots reopen the same week the federal bribery trial begins downtown.
Warren Gary Kohlman has argued before the U.S. Supreme Court, served as general counsel to the National Basketball Players Association, and once defended a congressman caught in the FBI's ABSCAM sting. Now he is in Jackson, defending the district attorney.
A federal judge let the new Metro Jackson Water Authority seat a board and do almost nothing else, keeping the city's water and sewer systems under his own control for now.
The federal corruption case against Hinds County District Attorney Jody Owens, former Mayor Chokwe Antar Lumumba, and former Councilman Aaron Banks moved another inch toward the jury this week. The inches are starting to add up.
Three Jackson officials, three different indictments. The numbers aren't an accident.
Home prices in Jackson rose 32.4 percent over the past year, the biggest jump in the metro. Local agents say it isn't a fluke. It's the payoff for a city that finally started fixing things.
An analysis: of the three men headed to trial in Jackson's biggest corruption case, Aaron Banks has always been the quiet one — and the quiet may be calculated.
A quiet office building on Ridgewood Road is becoming luxury lofts. The developer has done this before, and the math is the reason.
An essay: for twenty years Jackson couldn't give away a downtown lot — and when investors finally arrived with a private jet and a yacht, they turned out to be the FBI.
For readers who want to understand Chokwe Antar Lumumba's case: of the three men charged, his alleged crime is the thinnest — and his defense the most purely legal.
Why the defense sees an opening: the judge denied the motion to dismiss, but kept Owens's entrapment defense alive and left the central legal question for the jury.
In barely a year, New Jersey tech founder Kumar Bhavanasi has quietly bought five of downtown's most important buildings — and he's planning to spend more than $100 million bringing them back to life.
A New Jersey firm wants to rezone 190 acres for what looks like a data center, just as the City Council weighs a moratorium — part of a boom that's made Mississippi one of the country's hottest markets.
As the Jackson corruption case heads toward trial, here's what the headlines won't tell you about how it will actually unfold.
An updated chronology of United States v. Owens — from the FBI's 2022 tip through the July 13 trial date, with the jury and venue fight in focus.
How Mississippi already mastered the gerrymander everyone's suddenly talking about.