Never do I feel more alive, at the top of my game, than while travelling. A plethora of stimuli — new impressions — provides endless opportunity to compare and contrast exotic otherness against that known.
Preeminent during my recent sojourn was observing successful cities elsewhere.
Jackson, notwithstanding its assets and charms, is a struggling city. Let’s be honest: Central to twelve-step programs is recognizing problems, ending denial and codependence enabling dysfunction.
If having a high homicide rate per capita, streets which could destroy a lunar lander, and a water system routinely issuing boil water notices define a successful city, you can conclude that life has improved over the past four years ago and champion the status quo.
If the trajectory of Jackson is concerning, it is half past time to coalesce around a candidate offering strategies for success superior to those of the putative leader charting our course presently, prior to next Spring’s municipal elections.
I penned a piece in Spring 2021 castigating the Mayor of Jackson — notwithstanding the fact that only an eleventh hour write-in candidacy could derail reelection at that late date — because I was confident that another term would perpetuate what has not worked, sending the city deeper into the depths of despair.
Why advocate against fait accompli? Jackson’s municipal water system failed during the freeze of February 2021. The Mayor’s response was that citizens should expect subsequent collapses.
A leader should be forthright but, admitting inadequacies, he or she should proclaim “This is the problem and here is how I intend to fix it.” Our Mayor — “Bless his heart” — can be described in three words, ones well-known to anybody remembering Mad Magazine’s mascot Alfred E. Neuman, “WHAT ME WORRY?”
Far from Bill Clinton’s ability to feel one’s pain, the Mayor seems to prefer schadenfreude.
Pondering the pathos in Jackson during my trip abroad, I initially assessed that there is no vision. That impression was incorrect. The problem is not a lack of vision. Vision abounds: the wrong vision.
Instead of encouraging economic development, reducing crime, and repairing insufficient infrastructure, the Mayor appears to prefer cronyism.
If most readers were Mayor — especially desiring reelection — they would offer a vision to improve the city and benefit all citizens.
Our Mayor — “Bless his heart” — prioritizes fighting the City Council over contracts. Mon Dieu! The reasonable, prudent politician would sweet talk the City Council members — representing districts closer to the electorate — rather than apparently attempting to direct contracts to cronies, combatively.
Most tragically — one could write a contemporary political novel not unlike Robert Penn Warren’s “All the King’s Men” (1946), fictionally recounting Huey Long’s Louisiana; Harnett Kane’s “Louisiana Hayride: The American Rehearsal for Dictatorship 1928-1940” (1941) examined the topic in nonfiction, earlier — the Mayor was recorded emphasizing race: relishing a city of African Americans, by African Americans, and for African Americans.
The Mayor’s vision for Jackson is identical to that causing our contemporary conundrum: The Citizens Council and Sovereignty Commission sought a city of one race, by one race, and for one race during the 1950’s and 1960’s; into the 1970’s. History documents what blinkered misconception that a coterie of citizens can be advantaged at the expense of others catalyzes.
My friends believe in a multiracial city that — borrowing from President Kennedy’s economic emphasis — “lifts all boats”.
There was no point in fighting the Civil Rights Movement if Dr. King’s vision “I have a dream that my four little children will one day live in a nation where they will not be judged by the color of their skin but by the content of their character” resulted in the opposite of that for which Dr. King gave his life.
Should a city defined by race rather than success for all stakeholders be your lodestar, four more years should be your rallying cry. Should you seek something stellar, now is the time to select and support an individual advancing a viable vision for Jackson’s future.
Jay Wiener is a Northsider
