"No other was singled out in this way":MS Deliberately Withholds Infrastructure Money for State Use: Plaintiffs Claim

NAACP, residents sue the state

Plaintiffs claim the state of Mississippi abused its discretion in how they award millions in federal funding. image credit: Shutterstock

Jackson residents Doris Glasper and Nsombi Lambright, along with the NAACP-Jackson Branch, are  suing the state of Mississippi for what they call discriminatory attempts to withhold $34 million in American Rescue Plan Act (ARPA) funds in what looks like a ploy to redistribute the federal money to state coffers. 

Plaintiffs in the suit claim the State of Mississippi abused its discretion in how they award ARPA funds by creating a matching system that preemptively binds Jackson’s access by imposing a one-to-one match on cities as large as Jackson while allowing smaller, sometimes more affluent, bedroom communities a more generous two-to-one match. 

Following the passage of ARPA in 2021, the U.S. Department of the Treasury issued $350 billion to states from the Coronavirus State and Local Fiscal Recovery Funds (SLFRF) program. Mississippi, in particular, was allocated $1.8 billion of those funds. The City of Jackson, having suffered the consequences of decades of revenue loss tied to white flight (as well as state efforts to entice business out of the city), received $42 million in SLFRF funds directly from the federal government. 

At the time, The Treasury Department intended the money to be used to invest in water and sewer infrastructure, among other initiatives. It also instructed administrators to target funds to “communities and populations hardest hit by … crisis.” 

The very next year, Mississippi’s Republican-dominated legislature and Republican Gov. Tate Reeves signed Mississippi Senate Bill 2822 into law, which plaintiffs say limited Jackson’s ability to secure the money. 

Today 81.8% of Jackson’s population is Black, and the median family income is $43,238. More than 26% of the city’s population lives in poverty. 

The law created a scoring scheme that allots a maximum of 15 points based on a municipality’s lack of access to clean water but awards up to 24 points to projects that were already underway or could be shovel ready within six months and could be completed by Dec. 31, 2026. 

Plaintiffs in the suit also claim the State of Mississippi abused its discretion in how they award ARPA funds by creating a matching system that preemptively binds Jackson’s access by imposing a one-to-one match on cities as large as Jackson while allowing smaller, sometimes more affluent, bedroom communities a more generous two-to-one match. 

Later, Mississippi Department of Environmental Quality Executive Director Chris Wells waived all match requirements for the second round of applicants. It then barred applicants from the first round — including Jackson — from the matchless second round. 

“Consequently, Defendant Wells and (the Mississippi Municipality & County Water Infrastructure Grant Program) effectively operated two competitions — one for Jackson, and a separate one for the majority of applicants,” the suit claims. 

And while amending the grant program to waive the matching requirement for future applicants, the State of Mississippi also enacted a rule requiring funds awarded to Jackson (and only Jackson) to be held by the Mississippi Treasury in a Capital City Water/ Sewer Projects Fund. 

But S.B. 2822 provides “no clear guidance” as to what Jackson administrators must do to receive those monies, say critics. 

“No other municipality was singled out in this way or had its ARPA award withheld,” claim plaintiffs. “Three years later … Jackson continues to wait for the awarded ARPA funds and hundreds of low-income Black renters in Jackson face forced relocation due to water shutoffs.” 

Plaintiffs say harm caused by SB 2822 “is neither happenstance nor unforeseeable accident.” 

“Defendants are engaging in calculated disregard for the lives and welfare of low-income Black residents of Jackson, in violation of Title VI of the Civil Rights Act of 1964 and the Fourteenth Amendment,” the suit said. 

Even worse, the state-withheld money comes with an expiration date, courtesy of SB 2822’s companion bill: HB 1031. 

“Any funds the City of Jackson is unable to access as a result of the hurdles Defendants imposed and enforced under color of law will revert to the State’s General Fund or be returned to the U.S. Treasury,” says the suit. “…[A]ny funds appropriated to Jackson and placed in the Capital City Water/Sewer Projects Fund would revert to the State’s General Fund if not used by January 1, 2027, indicating the State’s intent to permanently deprive Jackson of its access to these funds and to deprive Jackson’s Black residents of equal access to funding.” 

Over the last few decades, the state’s white legislators have routinely refused to provide the majority-Black city of Jackson a payment in lieu of taxes or make loans available to repair the city’s aging infrastructure. The state also regularly diverts federal highway and bridge funds meant for predominantly Black Hinds County to the affluent, majority white surrounding counties of Madison and Rankin, further starving the municipality of precious infrastructure revenue. 

“To date, Jackson still has not received the $35.6 million in ARPA funds, which the defendants received over four years ago and promised Jackson almost three years ago,” say plaintiffs. 

Today 81.8% of Jackson’s population is Black, and the median family income is $43,238. More than 26% of the city’s population lives in poverty.