DeSoto Times Tribune
Musselwhite says Southaven fared well in legislative session
By Mark Randall
Southaven Mayor Darren Musselwhite said the city fared well in the 2026 legislative session which ended last week.
The city was able to secure $10 million towards a major sewer project, $750,000 for projects in the City’s west end district, and corrected a $2.3 million shortfall in sales tax diversions from the state. Musselwhite said the city, working with the local legislative delegation, was also able to help stop passage of a number of bills that were harmful to cities in Mississippi.
“There has been a whole lot of activity going on from a legislative standpoint our the last few months,” Musselwhite told the Board of Aldermen at its April 7 meeting. “Overall, we came out well. I thank our delegation for all their hard work.”
Musselwhite said the state appropriated $10 million to help Southaven and Horn Lake disconnect from the Memphis sewer system. Southaven and parts of the Horn Lake Creek Basin Interceptor Sewer District have until 2030 to build their own sewer lines and a treatment facility, which will involve significant expansions to the Jonson Creek wastewater Treatment plant operated by DeSoto County Regional Utility Authority (DCRUA). The project is expected to cost $260 million.
“I thank our local delegation for fighting for that to get us $10 million,” Musselwhite said. “The only problem is we have secured roughly $30 to $40 million and it’s a $260 million problem.”
Musselwhite was part of a delegation of local officials who recently traveled to Washington, D.C. to meet with lawmakers looking to secure federal help for the sewer project and reported that Senators Roger Wicker, Cindy Hyde-Smith and Rep. Trent Kelly have agreed to help seek federal assistance.
Musselwhite also reported that Southaven received $2.3 million from the state as a result of a reporting error in state sales tax diversion money. The state collects sales tax revenue and diverts it back to cities in Mississippi every month. Musselwhite said he noticed a problem in 2024 with how the Mississippi Department of Revenue and has been working with the state to fix the problem.
Musselwhite said the reporting system that tracks sales tax diversions is antiquated and left several business out in Southaven that should have been paying taxes to the city.
“At the end of the day, what I discovered was not only were we not getting proper diversion from one of our largest businesses in this city, I found 65 other businesses in the City of Southaven that we were not getting sales tax diversion from the state,” Musselwhite said. “What that means is that the state was keeping our money.”
The state was only able to go back three years, but restored $2.3 million in funding.
“So we did get that money back,” Musselwhite said.
Musselwhite said State Rep. Rodney Hall passed a measure to create a study committee which he hopes to serve on that will determine what changes need to be made to eliminate future mistakes that affect cities across the state.
“We want to bring in new software to make sure this never happens to any city in Mississippi again,” Musselwhite said.
Rep. Hall also secured $750,000 for Southaven to be used on projects for West End redevelopment projects in the city’s original downtown business district.
“We will use that money wisely,” Musselwhite said.
Lawmakers also agreed to extend the City’s tourism tax for another four years. Southaven has used that money to enhance its parks to expand tourism opportunities throughout the city, most notably by investing in the expansion of baseball and softball fields and tennis courts which host major tournaments.
“We successfully got that done again,” Musselwhite said. “I am very grateful to our DeSoto County legislators for all their hard work on that.”
Musselwhite noted that there were also several bills that did not get passed this session which were harmful to cities, including HB 2432, a bill that would have increased the amount counties charge cities to house inmates. Musselwhite called the bill unfair because residents who live in cities already pay county taxes and the measure would have unfairly placed increased prisoner costs on county taxpayers who live in the city and amounts to double taxation.
“The stance that I have always taken when this was brought to my attention is that we’re a county taxpayer in the cities. Do we also not pay for the jail?” Musselwhite said. “Is it not a fundamental government service and a fundamental benefit to the entire county when any law enforcement entity removes a criminal from the streets? So why are we having to pay a fee for the jail?”
The current law only allows cities to be charged the same daily rate as state-held prisoners. Musslewhite said the bill’s attempts to increase the fees is principally wrong because 80 percent of the population of DeSoto County live in cities and already pay county taxes.
Musselwhite said it stands to reason that the county jail already belongs to city taxpayers since they are paying the majority of the costs for the jail, and questioned why city taxpayers should be charged more to use the jail. He also questioned why the Sheriff’s Office is not charged daily for prisoners like the City police departments are if a fee is needed since everyone owns the same jail.
Musselwhite added that while he doesn’t doubt that prisoner costs have increased, he pointed out that revenues from the cities have increased dramatically more due to economic growth, and that the county should budget those increases accordingly and not make cities pick up the tab.
“If you have higher prisoner costs, that should be spread among everyone in the county,” Musselwhite said. “You shouldn’t give that burden to just the taxpayers in your cities.”
Musselwhite said he isn’t the only mayor in the state who strongly disagreed with that.
“We had other mayors who united throughout the state and got our point across and that bill was stopped,” Musselwhite said. “We will fight that again if it comes up next year. It’s wrong. It’s not fair to our taxpayers who live in cities.”
The City also fought against passage of HB 1664 which would have taken away its right to hold telecommunications companies liable for damages to private property and streets during infrastructure upgrades.
“As many of you and me will tell you that telecommunications companies have destroyed their properties and left them,” Musselwhite said. “I can assure you when that happens, that lands on my desk.”
Musselwhite said the bill would have taken away a lot of authority from cities to hold those companies accountable for damaging power lines and other utility lines.
“It’s a major problem,” Musselwhite said. “Along with the rest of the mayors and the Mississippi Municipal League, we fought that and got some amendments done to a satisfactory level. That was a victory as well.”
Musselwhite said they were also able to kill a bill that would have put a cap on the taxable value of local economic development projects at $2 billion. Revenue on any project exceeding $2 billion would go back to the state.
“So when we celebrate a big economic development - and y’all know in 2026 we announced the largest economic development in Mississippi and in Southaven - well, this bill would remove that money from your school system and take it back to the state,” Musselwhite said. “That’s the most socialistic piece of legislation in the history of the Republican Party. We fought that and were successful. But you can bet it will come up again.”
Lastly, a bill that would have required a mandatory referendum by citizens who are being annexed was also killed during the legislative session. Musselwhite said the current system where all annexations are reviewed by a judge is working just fine and offers protection to affected residents.
“You have a court system that considers all of the facts of an annexation,” Musselwhite said. “Every annexation request is not granted. The cities have to show they have the ability to improve the services to the people being annexed or else the annexation is denied. So the system is working great right now. So that was a bad bill and the bill was killed this session.”
Musselwhite lamented that one bill that was not passed would have mandated auto registration for proof of school residency. DeSoto County has had an issue with people enrolling their children in area schools that don’t live in the county or pay school taxes. He said unfortunately the bill, which was advocated by Alderman Charlie Hoots, fell by the wayside during the debate over school choice in Mississippi.
“Everyone is welcome here, but you should fairly pay taxes like everyone else and truly live in DeSoto County if you are going to go to DeSoto County schools,” Musselwhite said. We’ll try to get that approved next session.”
Overall, Musselwhite said the legislative session produced “some very interesting pieces of legislation that was floating around” - and not all of them were good for cities in Mississippi - which they were able to stop from becoming law.
“So we joined hands with some of the other cities throughout the state and came together and fought some of this bad legislation,” Musselwhite said. “We were very successful in this.”