Rep. Jason White (R-48) considers himself a “newby” in elective office, but also said his record of working with others has brought the kind of success that led to his reelection against challenger Dana Gwin in the republican primary.
“You just never know, but fortunately, we have a record to stand on,” he said. “It was simply about my record of working with people in city and county government. He seemed to take issue with that, though I consider it a positive.”
White admitted to having few tangible accomplishments in his first term, when new legislators rarely have enough power to push their own agendas forward.
In his second, most recent term, however, he said he feels he was able to deliver not just at the state level, but to the local communities he represents.
White noted a number of items he is proud of earlier this week.
“We got $1 million for the (Native American) museum,” he said. “We’ve had a setback, but we’re getting our feet back under us on that,” he said referring to the collapse of the old Leonard’s building that was set to become the museum building.
Asked if the delay could jeopardize the Legislature funding of the project, White said that because work has been underway, he expects the funding to remain in place. He also noted that additional funding will likely be needed from both private and public entities to see the project through.
White also touted efforts to upgrade the Kosciusko court square area with some state funding.
“I’m excited about the court square paving project. That will be a major step forward in our court square area,” he said.
White said the upcoming state lottery will put the first $80 million collected each year into repairing and replacing bridges and roads across the state.
“I consider these things local victories and I make no apologies for asking to obtain these funds,” said White, noting that he garnered similar funding for Leake County, which he also serves.
But the state representative said that he has no plans to rest on his laurels. He has items that were not passed in prior sessions that he still wants to see happen, as well as some new efforts on his agenda.
White said he endorses a move away from a state income tax, preferring a user-based tax system.
“People like the idea of ‘I will pay taxes when I consume things,’” he said.
The state representative also noted that the legislature passed an effort to collect online sales tax and put a portion of the monies collected into the hands of cities and counties.
“We just wanted to level the playing field,” he said. “As we have changed shopping habits, cities have been forced to work with budgets that aren’t growing.”
The pass-through of some of the collected online sales taxes is an effort to help alleviate that problem, he said.
“That is $1 million new dollars with the only restriction being that they spend it on infrastructure,” White said of the new revenue received by Attala County and its various cities. “The least any city receives is $10,000. That is real money for them to do infrastructure work.”
One of the items White wants to revisit is the effort to pass legislation freeing A- and B-rated schools from much of the red tape and paperwork required by the Mississippi Department of Education.
“A and B schools need to come out from under MDE,” he said. “There need to be some safeguards in place, but we’ve gotten so far away from focusing on teaching in the classroom.”
White and others endorsing the plan believe high-rated schools should not have to submit all the documentation low-rated schools so. Instead, as long as they maintain their ratings as demonstrated by the normal student testing procedures, they should be able to run the schools as they wish. Poorer rated schools, however, would need to be monitored more closely, as all schools are now.
White believes the change would allow productive schools to focus on education and give low-rated schools something a goal.
The state representative also wants to see a greater focus on technical education and helping non-college bound students get onto positive career paths.
“We need to identify these people and give them a way to pursue a career path right out of high school,” he said. “We have jobs in this state just looking for people.”
White said dual credit courses in the trades in partnership with community colleges is one potential effort.
“We do dual credit for college, why not for other things like career and technical training?” he asked. “We want to make that available to high school students as early as tenth grade.”
One popular campaign that White is not entirely behind is the pressure to significantly increase teacher pay.
“I’m not saying teachers make as much as they should, but we have made progress. I think we’re headed in the right direction, though we’re not to the southeastern average yet,” he said, noting that teacher pay in Mississippi has been raised a minimum of $8,000 per teacher over the past eight years. That is something many other professionals cannot say about their compensation, he said.
“I think we’re headed in the right direction. Improving our K-12 and our career/tech is maybe our path out of last place,” he said.
