Mississippi's Infrastructure: Driving on the surface of the moon may soon be smoother

For several years now, transportation officials have opined that Mississippi needs a fuel tax increase to cover the rising costs of maintaining our highways and roads. Dick Hall even talked about it on the campaign trail, and he was still reelected, so this should be no surprise to anyone.

A legislative/business task force has started meetings to figure out where to make up approximately $500 million of what is currently budgeted to what the state really needs. Of course, and also unsurprisingly, Republicans have immediately hung their anti-tax banner. Economic development and a strong, maintained infrastructure that includes roads and bridges are clearly linked. It's bad enough that we're trying to recruit business with one of the worst education systems in America, but we want to add crumbling roads and falling bridges? Even the U.S. Chamber of Commerce sees this as a priority for economic development.

But, there is an alternative, proposed by Sen. Hob Bryan, and reported on Geoff Pender's blog:

“For people who say government just needs to live within its means … needs to cut back just like families have had to cut back and say that cutting taxes is an ends to itself … We have too many roads to maintain. We need to admit we’ve overbuilt. It’s government out of control! We need to determine which roads we are going to abandon … See which paved roads we’re going to let go back to gravel. Let’s right-size our highway system and live within our means. I hope people who campaigned on that will now come forward and vote to do that.”

Mississippi is a mostly rural state, and while there are many gravel roads out here, these conservative legislators are going to have to face the fact that more revenue must be generated to maintain our roads, or, they can volunteer the roads and bridges their constituents use for shut down.

Geoff also has a more complete review of the task force meeting with specific proposals here.

A summary of what happened in the Senate redistricting skirmish today, and what it may mean

This morning, Sen. Hob Bryan (D - Amory) offered a new resolution containing the Burton Senate map, and moved that the Senate consider the resolution as a "committee of the whole."  By acting as a committee of the whole, the resolution would not be sent to committee, where the Burton map had been unsuccessful before.  It takes a 2/3rd's vote to go into a committee of the whole.

Sen. Billy Hewes (R-Biloxi) made an effort to prevent such a vote, and the Senate was hastily adjourned for a brief period, during which Republican senators met in Lt. Gov. Phil Bryant's office to figure out how to proceed. Sen. Bryan's maneuver apparently caught GOP senators and Lt. Gov. Bryant by surprise, and they needed to caucus to figure out their plan.

Upon returning, Sen. Bryan resumed his speech in favor of going into a committee of the whole by affirming the need to keep the Burton plan out of the hands of Lt. Gov. Bryant, who double-referred the Burton plan earlier in an effort to kill it.  Sen. Bryan said that never before in our state's history had a redistricting plan been double-referred.

Next, Sen. Bryan spoke of the Legislature's duty to complete redistricting, and he cited what an unnamed GOP senator had said.  Referring to the House's refusal to go to conference on the matter, this unnamed GOP senator allegedly said that the public would now blame the House, and that the Senate could "wash its hands of it."  Bryan reminded the floor of the origin of that phrase, and how history has treated that person.  (He was speaking of course, of Pontius Pilate.)

After the speech, the vote was held, and the motion to enter the committee of the whole failed, with 25 nays and 23 yeas.  Sens. Briggs Hopson (R-Vicksburg) and Terry Burton (R-Newton) voted in favor of entering the committee of the whole.

So here's what all of this may mean:

First, the Senate Republicans had the opportunity to send a plan back over to the full House, which would give their Republican brethren in the House the opportunity to address their concerns over the House map on the floor.  In effect, this would have restarted the legislative process that has died.  That means the Senate GOP can no longer "wash their hands" of the redistricting process.

Second, Sen. Bryan either knew of some possibility for compromise on the House side or wanted to at least leave the door open for some.  Hewes and Bryant slammed that door.

Third, the number of nay votes was interesting, and that's all I'll say about that.

As promised, more on the Bryan speech on the Senate floor yesterday

We followed the Senate redistricting debate live yesterday via Twitter, and remarked on Sen. Hob Bryan's (D-Amory) masterful speech. The limitations of Twitter, however, prohibited us from being able to show you the district comparisons that drew laughter and gasps from the floor over the Bryant plan. Let's look at what Sen. Bryan was discussing.

The fireworks started when Sen. Bryan mentioned that he'd overheard a fellow senator on talk radio complaining about the Burton plan for the Pine Belt, and how it had split four counties with one outrageously gerrymandered district that ran from the Pearl River County line north through the western portion of Lamar County, then through part of Forrest County, next through the heart of Covington County, and finally finishing its assault on the senses by amputating the northern half of Jefferson Davis County.  The caller was angry over this district, and said that he simply couldn't support the Burton plan due to such gerrymandering.  Sen. Bryan then placed Phil Bryant's plan for the Pine Belt on the screen:

Ummm, starts at Pearl River County line, check. Western portion of Lamar County, check. Part of Forrest County, check. Up through the middle of Covington County, check. Over to the northern half of...HEY WAIT A MINUTE!!! When that picture hit the screen, laughter erupted on the Senate floor, and Lt. Gov. Bryant looked physically ill.

Sen. Bryan then went on to speak about the Burton plan's treatment of the same area.  Here's District 41 under the Burton plan.  Notice how Jefferson Davis County is whole.

Then it came time to look at Lamar County under the Bryant plan.  Aside from the oddly-drawn district above, here's what Lamar County would have looked like under the Bryant plan (notice how this district goes into Forrest County):

And here's what Lamar County looks like under the Burton plan:

So, that's what sent the Bryant plan supporters scurrying for cover yesterday, leaving only 16 to stand by Bryant as the vote came down.

Phil Bryant breaking his promise?

Bobby Harrison's got a great article up on the next step in the redistricting process.  As the Senate Legislative Redistricting Committee prepares to release the plan its been working on all year, Lt. Gov. Phil Bryant (R) is looking to unveil a competing plan.  The unprecedented move will no doubt be the source of Senate fireworks early this week.

Sen. Hob Bryan (D-Amory) is quoted in the article as saying, "No past lieutenant governor has ever done this - opposing a plan produced by his committee chair and to be working against his committee chair." For his part, Sen. Terry Burton (R-Newton) says he'll plow forward with the plan his bipartisan committee has drafted. Sen. Burton believes the committee's plan will be approved by the Department of Justice, while Bryant's will not. (The U.S. won't let Mississippi make changes to the electoral process without oversight because of Mississippi's horrid history of race relations.)

The fact that Bryant is crafting a plan that would be unfair to minorities isn't surprising. After all, he's spent the last few days expressing confusion over the federal law. The NEMS360 article says:

In an Associated Press story, Bryant, who is running for governor, was quoted as saying "So the Obama Justice Department's going to tell us how we ought to be doing things in Mississippi?"

He went on to say he "was offended by the fact that the federal government does not trust members of this Legislature to draw these lines."

I guess we shouldn't be shocked by Bryant's sudden realization that the United States of America doesn't trust Mississippians to draw their own lines. It's only been law since 1965, but Bryant's not exactly known within the GOP as the brightest bulb, so it could have slipped right by him.

Another thing that has apparently slipped by Bryant is the promise he made in 2008. Upon taking office, Bryant promised he wouldn't redistrict in a manner unfair to Democrats. In exchange for that Senate Democrats, who were then in the majority, agreed not to strip Bryant of his power. Here's what Harrison's article says:

When Bryant was elected lieutenant governor in 2007, the Senate was composed of 28 Democrats and 24 Republicans. For the commitment of the Democrats not to try to craft Senate rules to strip Bryant of many of his powers, which are derived from the Senate rules, Bryan said the new lieutenant governor pledged not to redistrict the Senate in a manner that harmed Democrats.

Bryan said he does not believe the plan proposed by the lieutenant governor honors that commitment.

Is breaking your promises any way to start a bid for Governor?