MAXINE W. RAMSAY: Leave Pascagoula's residents, river alone

The Jackson County Board of Supervisors has allowed the Singing River Hospital System retirees' pension to be in peril.

By spending thousands of taxpayers' dollars on legal fees with no apparent solution, it appears the board continues to support the inept former and present hospital administration. Now, the board is attempting to shove the idea of damming the Pascagoula River down the throats of taxpayers.

The board has spent thousands of dollars in legal fees and in lobbying efforts to dam the Pascagoula to enrich a select few. Even though Jeff Bellweber claims the dams will protect the river's flow and water level, the Pascagoula River has incurred droughts and floods for thousands of years and, like the Mississippi, keeps on meandering along. Why try to fool Mother Nature?

Industry has not asked for any additional water. Therefore, why attempt to fix something that is not broken?

The many comments made opposing the damming at the board's meetings and at the Vancleave and Hurley forums should have opened the eyes of the supervisors on the public's wishes. But the supervisors continue to support this unnecessary potential destruction of the Pascagoula River, even though the scientific community has offered the many effects damming will cause.

Will the Jackson County Board of Supervisors continue to operate behind closed doors and disregard the voters?

MAXINE W. RAMSAY

Ocean Springs

This story was originally published November 27, 2015 at 10:26 AM with the headline "MAXINE W. RAMSAY: Leave Pascagoula's residents, river alone ."