Walthall County supervisors learned this month that further discussions and negotiations will be held over the future of the Southwest Mississippi Mental Health Complex.
Board attorney Conrad Mord said representatives of the nine-member counties of the district planned to meet in Natchez with state mental health access coordinator Bill Rosamond.
“We’re going to try to come to an amount we can agree on,” Mord said. “I hear the district may be in worse shape than we thought.”
The district has been under scrutiny for several years, both for low levels of support from some of the member counties and for shortfalls in contributions to the state retirement system, as well as other issues.
The district’s counties devised a new funding formula before this budget year started in October, which included increased allocations for operations, as well as supplemental amounts to help the district catch up on debt.
Several counties, including Adams, Jefferson and Wilkinson, balked at paying the higher price.
Mord also recommended that the board notify Smokey’s Discount Tobacco owner Dwayne Thomas that the business’s lease in the former Sunflower building will not be renewed.
“He’s months behind on his rent,” Mord said. “He’s still got a bunch of stuff in the building. The lease says it auto-renews each year unless we notify him that we’re not going to renew it.”
The term of the lease ends in March or April.
The county bought the Sunflower building for about $400,000 in 2021, with no specific purpose in mind, though a new sheriff’s department or expanded court and office space have been mentioned.
Offices will move from the courthouse to the Sunflower building when the next round of courthouse renovations gets underway.
In other business, the board:
• Heard a complaint about missing road signs on Adrian Boyd and Mount Canaan roads.
• Approved repair of the sally port door into the jail for $2,485.
• Approved purchase of a laptop for the sheriff’s department for $1,320. The laptop will run the Windows 10 operating system, replacing a machine that runs Windows 7.
• Approved renewal of a copier lease for the reappraisal office for $109 per month.
• Paid $280 in back rent to a fire department for its use as a voting precinct.
• Approved garbage credits of $345, leaving $1,200 to pay: and $864, leaving $108 to pay.
