Clinton’s Garrett steers MML Legislative Committee

Clinton’s Alderwoman-at-Large, Ricki Garrett, serves as the 2021-22 Legislative Chair of the Mississippi Municipal League.

By Taylor McKay Hathorn

Ricki Garrett was aware of the work of the Mississippi Municipal League (MML) long before her 2017 election to the Clinton Board of Aldermen as its Alderwoman-at-Large.

“I saw the value of MML from the beginning,” Garrett reflected. She first became acquainted with the lobbying and educational group’s efforts for Mississippi towns through her own work with the Mississippi Speech-Language-Hearing Association, for which she is the Executive Director.

“I was glad to know that Clinton was a member [of the group],” Garrett said.

Garrett began attending MML’s educational opportunities during her first year as an alderwoman in 2017, but, this year, she was named the chairwoman of the group’s legislative committee, an appointment that came on the heels of her invitation to join the group, which came from the chairman of the MML’s Board of Directors, Mayor Errick Simmons of Greenville. Although the Mississippi Municipal League’s board is quite large, composed of roughly one hundred members, the legislative committee is smaller.

“There might be thirty people on it,” Garrett said of the committee she leads. “It’s made up of mayors, aldermen, and councilpeople from around the state.”

Garrett’s committee joins forces with a paid lobbyist in order to advocate for legislative action that would benefit municipalities across the state, working with both the State legislature and Mississippi’s congressional delegation. The Mississippi Municipal League’s legislative committee kicks off its duties by forming a list of legislative priorities, and Garrett says that the committee began establishing its list of concerns at its first meetings in late fall 2021 and will finalize that list later this month.

The committee already has a clear idea of its priorities for the upcoming legislative session, though, and is mindful of Mississippi’s efforts to pass some form of medical marijuana legalization legislation on the heels of the state Supreme Court striking down a 2020 voter initiative that overwhelmingly passed it.

“We want to make sure the bill that passes includes some provisions for cities to be able to have zoning regulations related to these facilities – and that their product is taxed, so that cities benefit from those sales,” Garrett said.

The group is also keeping a close eye on the 1.8 billion dollars in Federal funding that is slated to come to Mississippi later this year as part of the Biden administration’s American Rescue Plan Act.

“The state will get money, and the municipalities will get money,” Garrett said of the COVID-related stimulus package. “The Lieutenant Governor [Delbert Hosemann] wants to create a matching grant program. So, if a City comes up with a plan for how they want to use this money and they share it with the Legislature and the Legislature agrees, then the State will match the money the City has already gotten.” Given that such a measure would allow cities like Clinton to double any funds received, Garrett says she and the committee are in full support of Hosemann’s plan.

The final piece of hot-button legislation that the legislative committee is keeping a close eye on strikes close to home for Garrett, as she and Mississippi’s Speaker of the House, Philip Gunn, both hail from Clinton.

“Speaker Gunn wants to eliminate the income tax,” Garrett acknowledged. “I think MML is taking a wait-and-see approach to that, because, while Speaker Gunn has one plan for making that work, the Governor and the Lieutenant Governor have different ideas for how to make that work. We’ll see what comes out of that.”

The Mississippi Municipal League’s Executive Committee is expected to sign off on their list of legislative priorities later this month. The Mississippi state legislature began its 2022 session on January 4, 2022.
For more information about the MML, visit www.MMLonline.com.