JACKSON, Miss. (WJTV) – House and Senate leaders remain at odds on a final tax change bill, and threats to delay spreading out some 1.8 billion in American Rescue Plan Act (ARPA) funding have raised serious concerns.
House members say the treat to delay dispersal of the ARPA funding is simply a negotiation tactic by House Speaker Philip Gunn.
Still, Lieutenant Governor Delbert Hosemann voiced his concerns in a news conference yesterday.
He’s worried that the tax cut stalemate could put critical funding for Mississippi at risk.
Time is ticking for the legislature to act on 1.8 billion dollars in American rescue plan funding. Mississippi is one of just four states that have yet to spend that money in full.
The federal funds are provided to states in in response to healthcare and economic impacts from covid-19. The money is much needed, statewide.
“We don’t hear folks clamoring for an income tax cut in Mississippi. The speaker taking the position that he wants to withhold any sort of expenditure until he gets what he wants, which is an income tax cut is absolutely shameful and I don’t know how much the people of the state are willing to put up with that,” says, Democratic Senator John Horhn.
Over in the house, Representative lee yancey sits on the ways and means committee.
Speaker Gunn’s office issued a rebuttal to Hosemann’s comments, calling his claims of a legislative gridlock over tax cut debates… a “hypocrisy.”
Hosemann says the first talks with the house about spending ARPA money were last October.
The legislature has two more weeks left in the 2022 session, and House and Senate Conferees have yet to be assigned, for a long list of bills that are slated to be negotiated.