Legislative Update 37

November 17, 2008

Dear Friends,

Last Wednesday, Representatives John Read, Michael Janus, Steve Palazzo, Senator David Baria and I addressed a group of nearly 200 students at MGCCC’s Jeff Davis campus. The subject of our discussion was Community College funding. The students and faculty were great hosts and asked a lot of thoughtful questions.

This forum gave all of us a chance to consider the budget limitations facing our State during this difficult financial time. It will be important that we all remember how tight our budget is as we move through the upcoming legislative session.

To better understand these budget challenges, please take a look at Governor Barbour’s November 12 press release here. You will notice that the Governor has ordered spending cuts totaling $41.9 million for Fiscal Year 2009. To facilitate this reduction, the Governor has asked state agencies to reduce their budgets by two percent (2%).

While these budget constraints will lead to hard choices in the months ahead, I applaud Governor Barbour for making clear that his requested revisions will not affect funding for such priorities as the Mississippi Adequate Education Program (MAEP), Medicaid, public health, and certain social services.

Select Committee on Supreme Court Appointed Judges

I have been asked to serve on a select committee that will be conducting hearing regarding the way we select our Supreme Court justices. We will be discussing laws relating to this issue in order to prepare for upcoming legislative sessions. Our first hearing will be on November 24, 2008 at 9:00 a.m. at the Capitol.

I am not aware of any proposed legislation on this subject and am not inclined to change our current system. Nonetheless, these conversations should be interesting. I invite you to contact me with your thoughts on this subject.

How to Contact Me

If you have any questions or concerns, I invite you to call me on my cell phone at 228-326-7649 or e-mail me at bjones@house.ms.gov. Please feel free to forward this report to folks in our district and let me know if I need to add someone to my list.

I will also be posting my updates and House related news on my campaign website at www.electbrandonjones.com.

Thank you for the opportunity to serve.

Brandon