Welcome...

Reflecting back, it was essential that state government make a number of significant changes when I first took office in January 2004.

The state budget was in terrible shape with an enormous shortfall, and we had about $3 million of unallocated monies in our Rainy Day Fund; lawsuit abuse had created a health care crisis in our state, and every small business in Mississippi was one lawsuit away from bankruptcy; despite a surging drug epidemic, the drug enforcement budget had been cut by almost 40 percent; and though the national recession had been over for more than two years, the need for job creation was first on the minds of nearly every voter.

While it took two-plus years, we got our budget back to where the state spent no more than it received in annual revenue, and we quit raiding balances in special funds. We replenished the Rainy Day Fund to its statutory limit of $375 million and created other reserves to cover potential federal liability. And we did it without raising anybody’s taxes.

Despite the worst recession in generations and a steep drop in revenue, we’ve kept our budget balanced by cutting spending and without depleting all our reserves. The budget we recently adopted for FY 2012 has some $200 million left in reserves for FY 2013.

In my first year, we passed the most comprehensive tort reform law in the country, and it worked. Medical liability premiums have declined by 61 percent, and the number of medical liability cases filed against Mississippi physicians fell 90 percent within one year of the law’s going into effect.

Tort reform also has been a major factor in economic growth and job creation.

Starting that first year, we implemented significant, successful changes to spur the creation of more, higher paying jobs for our people. We reorganized the Development Authority and began the Momentum Mississippi campaign. The results of the Mississippi Development Authority are striking. The MDA has supported businesses that created 64,666 jobs in this state.

We created our new Department of Employment Security and expanded it to take over workforce development and job training. We established the State Workforce Investment Board, and the Workforce Enhancement Training or WET Fund came into existence through a diversion of the unemployment insurance tax, a tax we also cut by 25 percent that same year.

Now, every year, the WET fund puts about $20 million into workforce development and skills training at our 15 community colleges, which do a great job. A study of graduates of WET fund financed programs show they make $4,300 more per year than before that training, and our improved, skilled workforce has been a reason companies like Toyota, GE Aviation, PACCAR, Severstal and a long list of very high-tech energy companies have come to Mississippi.

Coupled with workforce quality, the State has focused on attracting advanced manufacturing with advanced materials. We’ve targeted aerospace, automotive and energy, as well as service sectors. We’ve also beefed up our efforts to help existing businesses.

The results include a 27-percent increase in personal per capita income despite the recession. This is the 15th highest increase in the country over this six-year period.

In law enforcement, we have fought the scourge of illegal narcotics with a vengeance. In 2005 we passed laws to reduce the production and use of crystal methamphetamine. When the criminals learned how to get around those laws, we made the necessary changes, and they are working. In the first six months of this fiscal year – July 1 to December 31, 2010 – 68 percent fewer meth labs have been reported; meth arrests are down 62 percent; and the number of drug-endangered children has fallen 76 percent.

To keep law enforcement where we want it, we passed sufficient appropriations to hold a troopers’ school this calendar year. This, coupled with other changes in the structure of the Department of Public Safety, will mean that many more state troopers will be on the road protecting us.

Finally, I am proud that Mississippi cast the highest percentage of its vote of any state in favor of the Defense of Marriage Act, defining marriage as a union between one man and one woman; and that in 2004, my first year, after we worked together to enact comprehensive pro-life legislation, Americans United for Life, a national right-to-life organization, named Mississippi "the safest state in America for an unborn child."

This year the Division of Medicaid will run a surplus of $40-50 million. To my knowledge, this is the first division of its kind in the country to have had such a substantial reduction in spending. Congratulations to Governor Barbour and the Division of Medicaid for making this happen, and at the same time insuring that Medicaid services are provided to those most in need, but only to those most in need.  When I took office, Medicaid costs were skyrocketing. System controls were so weak, that the last year before I entered office, Medicaid spent $79 million of state funds and didn’t even enter the cost on its books. Many of you will remember the Special Session called by Governor Barbour for the Legislature to clean up that mess. The federal authorities reported last year that Mississippi’s Medicaid error rate is 3.47 percent, the fourth lowest in the country. The national error rate is more than twice as high.

We started this past session by funding a loan for Stion, a cutting-edge, low-cost manufacturer of thin film solar panels, which will build these panels in Hattiesburg, investing $500 million and employing 1,000 people within six years.

The national recession notwithstanding, job creation will pick up in our state this year. As evidence of that, in the first three quarters of 2010, Mississippi saw more new jobs and investment than were announced in all of 2009. Toyota and its suppliers have stepped up hiring. GE Aviation, EADS and PACCAR are adding employees, while new companies like Twin Creek Technologies in Southaven and Schulz in Tunica will be operational this year. Nissan, which had an outstanding year in 2010, is also ramping up, including introduction of its new light commercial vehicle.

I mention these things because our goal has to be to grow our economy faster than the nation as a whole, and we can do it. We have to focus on our advantages: low taxes, a friendly business climate, rational regulation, abundant natural resources and especially a first rate, affordable work force. And we’re committed to continuous improvement of that great workforce.

Our four research universities have become more effective engines of economic growth. All four have a lot to offer. Mississippi State’s Center for Advanced Vehicular Studies and Raspet Flight Center; the E-Center at Jackson State; the Polymer Institute at USM; and the Center for Manufacturing Excellence at Ole Miss are obvious resources that major and small employers find terrifically useful. And companies like SemiSouth in Starkville, FNC in Oxford and WarmKraft in Taylorsville spun off from our research universities.

Further, our community colleges have been and remain critical in the enormous and continuing improvement of skills in our workforce. Toyota said the main reason it chose Mississippi for its newest assembly plant, the most sought after economic development project in the country that year, was the quality of our workforce.

As Governor Barbour recalls, when the Vice Chairman of General Electric, one of the biggest manufacturers in the world, announced GE Aviation would locate a facility to make composite jet engine fan blades and assembles in Batesville, he said, "This is the most sophisticated manufacturing General Electric does anywhere in the world, and we’re going to do it in North Mississippi." A great tribute to our workforce!

Eighty-nine percent of our state’s kids go to public schools. To have the kind of workforce to succeed in the 21st century, we start in K-12. And our schools are getting better. Our last NAEP scores were up more than the national average, and the drop-out rate is going down. But that improvement is not enough. We need to make dual enrollment easier and more common. The students can learn more, and their parents will save money as college credits are earned while in high school. In constrained budget times we must put more resources into the classroom and reduce what is spent on administration. We must continue to focus on improving the quality of teachers coming out of our colleges of education, while simultaneously using technology more in teaching our kids. Finally, because competition is good in every sphere, we must reform our Charter School law so more children can benefit.

We passed legislation which contributed to Mississippi Power’s new $2.5 billion coal-fired plant in Kemper County; Entergy’s $500 million investment to increase output at Grand Gulf Nuclear Station by 13 percent, and SMEPA’s $500 million in upgrades. Chevron continues to invest hundreds of millions at Pascagoula, its largest refinery in the U.S.; next door to Chevron, Gulf LNG is half way finished with its $1-plus billion liquefied natural gas terminal. Denbury’s tertiary recovery projects have helped increase the state’s oil production. Bluefire has begun construction of a cellulosic ethanol plant in Fulton, and Enerkem has plans to build a waste-to-liquid transportation fuels facility in Pontotoc. Ergon and Bunge’s $100 million ethanol plant in Vicksburg is fully operational.

This year Twin Creeks’ facility in Senatobia will begin manufacturing solar panels. Stion’s operations will begin, and Soladigm’s ultra-high tech dynamic window plant in Olive Branch will be in production.

Finally, optimism is high that Kior soon will be breaking ground in Columbus for its first biocrude refinery, and Rentech has purchased a site for its coal to liquid motor fuels facility in Natchez.

These projects are generating more than $10 billion in capital investments in our state and creating thousands of jobs. Many of these projects will result in new markets and higher prices for Mississippi farm and timber products and our lignite coal.

Many will reduce energy use or reduce emissions. In fact, the Mississippi Power Kemper County plant is the first commercial scale coal-fired power plant in the U.S. with carbon capture and sequestration. Its emissions will be the equivalent of a natural gas fired facility.

Now with Republican majorities in the House and Senate, and with a Republican Governor and Lt. Governor, we must move forward to implement real changes which will move our state forward in a conservative manner to make this state the best place to live, work and raise our children.

During the 2012 Session I will periodically provide legislative updates and other information relevant to the matters being addressed by the Legislature.

 

Sincerely,

 

Mark

Rankin County - Legislative Delegation

(R-L) Sen. Dean Kirby, Rep. John Moore, Rep. Kevin McGee, Rep. Andy Gipson, Mark Baker,

Sen. Perry Lee, Sen. Lee Yancy, Rep. Ray Rogers, and Rep. Tom Weathersby.