By Georgia E. Frye / staff writer
May 24, 2007 11:39 pm
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Vicksburg attorney Delbert Hosemann has hopes of becoming the state’s next Secretary of State, and if elected he plans to enact voter reform that would include a voter identification bill and more training for poll workers.
Hosemann — campaigning in Meridian on Thursday — said he believes that until the state has a comprehensive voter identification plan, the state will continue to have disenfranchised voters.
“There will be people who think their votes are being stolen and they won’t go vote anymore,” Hosemann said. “One of the reasons you can’t get half of the registered voters to the polls is they believe that there is voter election fraud in the state.”
The most important thing the Secretary of State can do, Hosemann said, is to champion a comprehensive voter reform package. It includes a voter identification plan, more training for poll workers and an investigatory arm of the Secretary of State’s office that would investigate and work to punish those who commit voter fraud in the state.
Hosemann, a Republican, is seeking the Secretary of State’s office. He will meet Republican candidates Gene Sills, Jeffrey Rupp and Mike Lott in the Aug. 7 primary. The winner will face the winner of the Democratic primary, also set for Aug. 7. Candidates for the Democratic seat are Jabari A. Toins, John O. Windsor and Robert H. “Rob” Smith.
Hosemann also believes there is work that needs to be done to ensure that the state’s 16th section lands are ethically managed to provide better funds for the state’s schools.
“The Secretary of State has general supervision under the statute of all these lands and as part of that general supervision, I want to review all of the leases,” Hosemann said. “There is no place where these leases are published.”
Sixteenth Section land is land in each county that is owned by the local school districts. The lands are divided into nine general categories including: forest, agriculture, industrial, commercial land, farm land, residential land, recreational land and others. The lands, held in a trust, generated more than $51 million in 2005.
Hosemann said that while the lands are under the control of the local school districts, they fall under the supervision of the Secretary of State’s office. Within the first 90 days of taking office, Hosemann said he would provide a public list of the leases.
“I would publish the amount paid for it, the number of acres, who’s leasing it and from what entity,” he said. “Sixteenth Section land is a sacred trust for our children and I don’t know that we’re getting the maximum dollar for it.”
There are about 642,000 acres of 16th Section land in the state.
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