Tuition and fees at Mississippi’s 15 community and junior colleges will rise by 13 percent this fall, with the average annual price exceeding $3,000 for the first time as schools try to offset state budget cuts. That’s bad news for students like Temeria Payton of Canton, who is studying liberal arts and foreign languages at Holmes Community College in Ridgeland. ...

Mississippi lawmakers met in special session Monday and set the final pieces of the state budget for the year that begins July 1. Most of the $6 billion budget was approved before the regular session ended in late March, but then disputes between the House and Senate killed proposals to fund the attorney general’s office and the Department of Transportation. ...

By JACK WEATHERLY The Mississippi Forestry Commission will eliminate 75 positions July 1 – two-thirds of which are firefighting jobs – due to a $2.67 million, or 16 percent, cut in its budget. The reduction is because of the state’s drop in revenue, which has forced government cuts across the board. State Forester Charlie Morgan said in a release that “preserving ...

By BOBBY HARRISON / Daily Journal The Mississippi Department of Transportation will not have to suspend contracts, costing taxpayers “tens of millions of dollars,” if the Legislature passes a budget for the agency early in the planned June 5 special session. MDOT officials originally had said that if no budget was approved for the agency by May 15 that they ...

One of my many anonymous critics on a local blog zapped me last week over my column “A Peek behind Legislative Leaders’ Rhetoric.” In particular, he/she said I lack “a coherent alternate plan” of my own.   Well, I never guessed it might be a columnist’s job to propose a whole budget plan. But, an avid reader could find elements of ...

Most Mississippi government agencies will be banned from buying vehicles for a year, as a way to save money in a tight budget. The vehicle moratorium is in House Bill 938 . Republican Gov. Phil Bryant signed the bill April 6, and it becomes law July 1. A few exceptions will be allowed. The Department of Child Protective Services, which ...

Mississippi House and Senate leaders publicly bickered but failed to agree on a transportation spending plan before a Monday night deadline, likely forcing the governor to call lawmakers back for a special session before the budget year begins July 1. Republicans control both chambers, so the fight does not pit one party against another. Instead, it is an argument that ...

The Mississippi legislature inched toward a budget Sunday, after a contentious process the day before. Most major bills have yet to be hammered out in conference. The bills, known as “dummy bills” because they don’t have real dollar amounts attached to them, will theoretically be finalized by the time the legislature reconvenes Monday. It isn’t clear whether this means that ...

Mississippi lawmakers are turning their attention to one of their biggest jobs this session — deciding how to spend taxpayers’ money. They will plug some holes in the budget for the year that ends June 30. And, they will set new spending levels for fiscal 2018, which begins July 1. The deadline to agree on budgets is in late March. ...

Mississippi lawmakers could spend part of their 2017 session revising a change they made to the state budget in 2016. The Budget Transparency and Simplification Act was intended to streamline spending by wiping out the practice of some state government agencies paying others for things such as rent and technology services. It was also supposed to move all “special funds,” ...