District 4 Supervisor Leroy Brooks had choice words for a citizen demanding the board remove the Lowndes County appointees on the East Mississippi Community College board of trustees.
Private citizen Boomer Brown addressed the board of supervisors during its regular meeting Wednesday after he said he attended two EMCC board meetings. He claimed the Lowndes County-appointed members, who were present at the supervisors meeting, acted “childish” and Lowndes County deserved better. After Brown read his speech, Brooks quickly introduced himself to Brown and proceeded to tell Brown how he was “out of order.”
“Your request is out of order,” Brooks said. “I’m insulted by the fact that you would walk in here. I don’t deal with these gentlemen that much, but to come in here and tarnish their character, I think you’re completely out of order. … If (EMCC President Scott) Alsobrooks wanted to say something, he should have come. I’m pissed off. I think you’re completely out of order. We should have stopped you from the beginning.”
In Brown’s speech, he said Lowndes County board members left an EMCC meeting during a “staged walk-out” over a dispute between the former EMCC Board Chairman Jimmie Moore and an EMCC employee. During a “make up” meeting, Brown said those board members did not show up at all.
“There’s a lot of hidden agendas and just flat out ugliness going on at the EMCC board right now,” said Brown, who is the son of the late Sen. Terry Brown. “Our members are right in the thick of it.”
EMCC’s board of trustees is comprised of two members from each of the counties EMCC serves: Lowndes, Lauderdale, Oktibbeha, Clay, Noxubee and Kemper. Those board members are appointed by the board of supervisors. Defending the Lowndes County appointees Lance Walters and Greg Stewart, Brooks continued speaking to Brown in an impassioned tone and simply said arguments and disagreements are a part of the business world.
“People disagree, hell me and Harry tore up 13 boardrooms on plenty of occasions,” Brooks said. “People kill people in Mexico every day and they still locate business there. I’m insulted you would come in here. You should have handled things differently.”
When Brown asked how he should have handled his concerns, Brooks said Brown should have approached each board member individually rather than in a public setting. Brooks added that everything Brown said was hearsay. Brown quickly chirped back simply saying it was “fact.”
“Fact is, we should cut the discussion off,” Brooks said. “… I think you are out of order.”
Although Brooks tried to stop further conversation, Supervisors President Harry Sanders defended Walters and Stewart.
“We have two (EMCC) board members and they give us feedback,” Sanders said. “All of a sudden, I get financial documents. Never had that before. I think our two board members are doing a very good job. The biggest problem we have is the football program. All of a sudden, new budget comes out where they cut the football program and everybody goes crazy. … They’ve been accused of something and they should defend themselves.”
Walters approached the podium and briefly addressed Brown’s concerns.
“I think it’s important for everybody to express their concerns,” Walters said. “I joined last April. In that time, I’ve never missed a monthly meeting. The meeting that was held the other day was not on our normal schedule. … I was not able to attend. From what I understand, business did get done.
“It is true that the current situation we have with the football team as well as some of the other items on the budget are at a point of contention,” he continued. “EMCC has been losing money. One of the things that was clearly apparent when I joined last year is that some information that the board members needed was not available so some decisions were not being made appropriately.”
Walters told The Dispatch after the meeting he was one of six members of the board who walked out of a recent board meeting, which he said was due to Chairman Moore’s behavior toward the other employee. He added the contention with the budget, which was related to Moore and the employee’s dispute, heavily involves the football program, but that is only one part of an issue at hand.
However, Walters did not further specify on the record the issues between Moore and the employee.
“(Football) was cut pretty similarly to the rest of the budget,” Walters said. “It’s real important that we don’t single out football, but we do have the highest (junior college) football budget in the state, probably in the country. I cannot stand to see the community continue to lose money. I think it’s important we address what’s going on.”
Moore could not be reached by press time.
EMCC’s next board meeting will be at the Scooba campus Monday at 7 p.m.
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