The drama over the 2026 Funded Projects Plan the Madison County Board of Supervisors adopted in December, leaving out any improvements in the districts that cover the city of Madison, continues.
The supervisors approved a revised version of the plan during their Jan. 5 meeting that added four roads, some in Gluckstadt and some in Canton, but none in the city of Madison.
Gerald Steen, who represents District 3 and serves as board president, voted in favor of the 2026 Funded Projects Plan in December and the revised plan in January along with Karl M. Banks of District 4 and Paul Griffin of District 5, and Casey Brannon of District 1 and Trey Baxter of District 2 voted against it.
Madison filed suit in Madison County Circuit Court against the supervisors on Dec. 23, after the supervisors excluded two districts from the county’s 2026 Funded Projects Plan. The plan includes about 30 roads and a $1 million wastewater improvement project.
During the Jan. 5 meeting, Board Attorney Mike Espy said the action of the board during its December meeting did not violate the state’s open meeting act as some citizens have suggested.
“There are some members of the public that believe that it’s illegal for an item to be discussed in an open meeting that wasn’t put on the agenda,” he said, referring to the projects plan that was not on the Dec. 15 agenda.
“That is not true. The Mississippi Open Meetings Act does not restrict a public body to acting on only matters that have been included on the meeting agenda.”
During the meeting, Baxter asked Espy: “Are we going to vote on things that are null and void if Madison wins the lawsuit?”
Espy advised the board it would need to go into executive session to speak about the lawsuit. He also asked the supervisors not to speak about the lawsuit in public because it is pending litigation.
Brannon proclaimed that “the public was inflamed” about the supervisor’s decision in December. “Forty percent of the county had the benefits they pay into the county stolen from them,” he said.
Greg Higginbotham, Madison County administrator, said that between 2023 and 2025, county spent $69.4 million in the city limits of Madison, about $2 million in Gluckstadt, $900,000 in Flora, $900,000 in Canton, and $10 million in Ridgeland.
Brannon questioned the dollar amount the city of Madison received, saying two phases of the Reunion Parkway project are not within the city limits. Both sections were included in part of the city of Madison’s recent annexation, but Gluckstadt is appealing the annexation to the Mississippi Supreme Court.
Brannon said he would like to see a chart that shows the amount of the county dollars each district received and not just one that shows what the municipalities received. “Leaving those numbers out is doing a disservice,” he said, later referring to the numbers the county presented as “cherry picked.”
Steen said during the meeting that he hears from mayors and others asking, “When are you going to invest in our city the amounts you are investing in the city of Madison?”
The answer is we’re looking out for the county as a whole, not just one city.”
Both Ridgeland Mayor Gene McGee and Gluckstadt Mayor Walter Morrison thanked the board for its support of road projects.
“I’m here to say thank you,” McGee said. “It is very hard to make ends meet without your help.”
McGee said he could remember a time when the city of Ridgeland received little from the county. “We did not file lawsuits,” he said, going on to say the city has a “great relationship” with the county.
Morrison said he was not there to interject himself into the political discussion but to thank the board for its support over the six years Gluckstadt has been in existence.
After the January meeting, Steen later posted on the Madison County, MS Government social media page: “Mary Hawkins Butler recently filed a lawsuit alleging the city of Madison did not get their fair share of funds. I deal in facts; not frivolous lawsuits,” he said. “I would much rather see the city of Madison spend money on infrastructure instead of lawsuits that have no merit.”
The post shows a pie chart of “Madison County Spending within the Municipal Limits 2023-2025.” The chart shows the total spending between 2023-2025 for the city of Madison as $69,394,147.54, 84 percent; Ridgeland, $9,848,143.09, 12 percent; Gluckstadt $1,838,989.53, 2 percent; Flora, $842,190, 1 percent; and Canton, $893,582.17, 1 percent.
Still to be determined is the outcome of the lawsuit the city of Madison filed against the supervisors. Michael J. Bentley and Eric D. Saltaformaggio of Bradley Arant Boult Cummings, attorneys for the city of Madison, filed the case on behalf of the city of Madison. Judge Bradley Mills will preside over the case.
In the lawsuit, the city of Madison requests that “the Court enter an order reversing the county’s decision, rendering a judgement in the City’s favor, and instructing the Madison County Board of Supervisors to vacate its decision adopting the FY 2026 Funded Projects Plan.
The city of Madison also requests that “the Court stay or temporarily enjoin the expenditure of any funds appropriated by the FY 2026 Funded Projects Plan if necessary to preserve the status quo pending resolution of the appeal” and requests all costs to which it is entitled.
The notice of appeal provided this reason for the appeal: “On December 15, 2025, a sharply divided Board of Supervisors voted 3-2 to approve a Fiscal Year 2026 Madison County Funded Projects Plan (the “FY 2026 Funded Projects Plan”) that appropriates over $600,000 of taxpayer dollars for road, wastewater, sewer, and other projects. The FY 2026 Funded Projects Plan was not on the agenda, had not been shared with all supervisors prior to the meeting, and failed to account for the road-improvement needs of a significant percentage of the County’s citizens. The City of Madison and its citizens were excluded entirely, as none of the funded road projects are within the City’s municipal boundaries.”
The appeal goes on to state that the county’s adoption of the 2026 Funded Projects Plan violates Mississippi law because it is “an arbitrary and capricious appropriation of county funds that was prepared in secret without input from all supervisors, rather than being developed and considered pursuant to established policies, procedures, and timelines for adopting the County’s annual funded road plan” and that the plan “fails to consider the needs of over 40 percent of the County’s citizens and lacks the evidentiary support required for a comprehensive county road plan and an appropriation of county funds.”
The appeal alleges that “the deliberations and decisions leading to the development and approval of the Plan by three supervisors (over the objections of two supervisors) were conducted in secret meetings prior to the December 15, 2025 board meeting, which violated the Open Meetings Act” and “violates state laws governing the adoption and implementation of county road plans.”
The city of Madison asked that the following items be included in the record on appeal: the Madison County Comprehensive Plan (2019), the 2026 Unfunded County Road Plan, the 2026 Funded Projects Plan, any presentations, memorandum, notes or other records related to the 2026 Unfunded County Road Plan and the 2026 Funded Projects Plan; all policies, rules, procedures or guidance related to the operations of the Madison County Road Department, the Madison county engineer, the Madison County administrator and the development, proposal and adoption of the annual county road plan or projects plan; relevant materials from the Dec. 15, 2025 meeting of the supervisors; including the agenda, minutes, presentations presented or created during the meeting, an audio-visual recording of the meeting, transcripts of the meeting or any portion of the meting and legal notices sent, published or posted for the meeting.
The city of Madison also requested all communication between any supervisor and the County Road Department, the county engineer, the county administrator, the county attorney related to the 2026 Unfunded County Road Plan and the 2027 Funded Projects Plan.
Also requested was all relevant materials from any meetings involving one or more supervisors and any Madison County employee, contractor or agent during which either the 2026 Unfunded County Road Plan or the 2026 Funded Projects Plan were discussed, including the agendas, minutes, presentation, an audio-visual recording of the meeting, transcripts or the meeting or portions of it and any and all legal notices sent, published or posted for the meetings.
By state law, every county must have a road plan in place by the first meeting in February.
In 2025, Madison County Engineer Tim Bryan presented the unfunded road project list to the supervisors during their Feb. 3 meeting, and the supervisors voted to approve the funded road plan during their March 3 meeting.
While a road can be on the unfunded plan and not have any work done on it, the opposite can’t be done. A road must be listed on the unfunded road plan for the work to be funded.
In 2025, the road maintenance projects were in the cities of Canton, Flora, Gluckstadt, Madison and Ridgeland. The process requires each city to enter into an interlocal agreement with the county, have the work done, pay the contractor who does the work and then be reimbursed by the county after providing the bills and proof of payment, Bryan said.
In recent years, the supervisors have funded “$5 plus million” annually in road maintenance, Steen said in 2025.
