Dancing with fire: Danny Blackman comes back from brink to find place as fire performer, exotic cat caretaker

A “flow zone” is a mental state where nothing matters except what you’re doing right then.

“Every breath and movement is in sync and you’re just dancing,” Danny Blackman explained. “You feel everything you’re doing, and it just feels right.”

Leigh Mall auctioned for $3.5 million

A winning bid of $3.5 million purchased Leigh Mall through an online auction that ended Thursday afternoon.

Monday Profile: Lifelong ballet dancer, teacher ‘still on that stage’

After Dolan Shoemaker’s first ballet performance as a student at the Mississippi University for Women, his father’s feedback was succinct.

EMCC president links financial woes to drops in enrollment

If all 15 community colleges in Mississippi were offered as a public company on the open stock market, no one would want to invest.

Lowndes supes OK $919K in new radios for rural firefighters

Lowndes County supervisors have agreed to purchase $919,000 in two-way radios for all current rural firefighters and chiefs.

County may ink new deal with health clinic

Lowndes County will likely approve a new agreement with a local Baptist Medical Group Clinic to resume providing free medical care for its employees.

Meanwhile, Columbus Light and Water employees, which had used the clinic at no cost since it opened in 2017, have been left out of the equation.

Board to review 15 applicants for LCSD superintendent

Fifteen applicants met Lowndes County School District’s minimum requirements for its ongoing superintendent search, according to information the Mississippi School Boards Association provided the school board Monday during a two-hour executive session at Central Office.

Spears: ‘Fire is continuing to grow’ at CMSD

At Columbus Municipal School District, board president Jason Spears said “the fire is continuing to grow.”

Community volunteerism and parent involvement are up, teacher turnover is slowing and campuses are safer than they were a year ago, according to school officials.

CMSD to host stakeholders meeting Tuesday

Columbus Municipal School District leaders will host a stakeholders meeting at 6 p.m. Tuesday in Cook Elementary School Auditorium.

Columbus native helps save life in Pearl classroom

The first time Greg Jones performed CPR in a real emergency, it wasn’t enough.

Jones was on leave from military duty and he and two volunteer firefighters — one of whom was Jones’ brother — were trying to help an unresponsive woman in New Hope. She didn’t make it.

Property tax rates go down for Lowndes, LCSD

Property tax rates are dropping for Lowndes County and its school district after the tax assessor’s office changed the way it will tax a local power plant.

Tax assessor investigating gas storage company for under-reporting assets

Records Lowndes County Tax Assessor/Collector Greg Andrews has obtained regarding Caledonia Energy Partners appear to indicate the company has under-reported its assets to the county for as many as 13 years.

Siblings get taste of business with summerlong lemonade stand

Armando and Julia Dunand’s first lemonade stand in June might have made a profit if it hadn’t been for all the overhead.

Their mom, Lisa Dunand, bought a crate of 75 lemons to fuel her children’s effort on Golden Triangle Lemonade Day. That proved too many for one day of sales.

Starkville secures Little Egg Bowl with 45-17 thumping of Oxford

STARKVILLE — Scrambling back into his own end zone, Oxford senior quarterback John Meagher unloaded a desperation toss into the hands of a leaping Jaylan Ware of Starkville.

Leigh Mall to be auctioned in October; starting bid $1.5M

The 300,000-plus square foot Leigh Mall, which sits on about 30 acres, is scheduled to be sold in a private auction in October.

Starkville uses big fourth quarter to keep Little Egg

STARKVILLE– The Yellowjackets scored three touchdowns in the fourth quarter Friday night to stave off Oxford, 45-17, and keep the Little Egg Bowl trophy at home.

Lowndes deputy injured during chase down Highway 45

A Columbus woman is facing several felony charges after she led narcotics officers on a high-speed chase Monday and injured an officer when she rammed her vehicle into a Lowndes County sheriff’s deputy’s patrol unit.

Monday Profile: Former sharecropper chips away at life in Columbus

On Seventh Avenue North in Columbus, a brown door swinging open from a brick building reads “Must Be 21.”

Inside this converted pool hall — as evidenced by the lone pool table placed in the middle of the room — Ellis B. Lane sits in a rolling chair and uses a crowbar to scrape blue paint from the concrete floor.

LCSD stakeholders meeting reveals pro-, anti-Wright divide

Technically, stakeholders were asked not to endorse or denounce specific candidates for Lowndes County School District superintendent Thursday evening during a board-hosted public forum at central office. Instead, the board asked for patrons to offer what qualities they wanted to see in the district’s chief executive.

Where the characters are: Columbus Writers’ Group keeps going, growing

It’s 6 p.m. on the second Tuesday of the month. Jeanette Basson is in her usual place.

Sitting at a table in the Rosenzweig Arts Center gallery, her friends start to filter in and take their places, each clutching papers representing their creative efforts over the last 30 days.