Andy Frame believes the Legislature can do something about blighted structures in Jackson and across the state.
“There are solutions that we could implement in Mississippi that are not radical,” he said.
The Mississippi secretary of state’s office provided two suggestions last year during a meeting of the House Select Committee on Capital and Metro Revitalization, said Frame, executive director at Revitalize Mississippi, a nonprofit that works to clean up vacant, abandoned and dilapidated properties since 2016.
The Legislature could provide funds so the secretary of state’s office could reimburse counties and cities as it once did for the costs of cleaning up state-owned property, Frame said. That work has not been funded since 2016.
The city owns about 900 abandoned, dilapidated and vacant buildings, while the state of Mississippi owns 1,900 of them in the city of Jackson, according to the secretary of state’s office.
“That’s an easy thing,” Frame said. “I view it as a Mississippi pride thing. If we as a state own property, then we should maintain that property.”
The secretary of state’s office also suggested reducing the time period in the tax sale system and that could be helpful, Frame said. “I would say that’s a good idea,” he said.
When a property owner fails to pay their real property tax bill in Mississippi, the county/municipality will have a public auction to sell a lien on the property for the overdue amount. The reason for such a sale is for the county/municipality to collect the needed revenue so it can function and meet budgets.
Someone who buys property at a tax
sale receives a tax deed but that does not give the holder of the deed the right to maintain the property or do anything to it, Frame said. Holding a tax deed allows an individual to earn interest should the property owner come forward and decide to pay what is due.
Many investors, especially those out-of-state investors, who buy tax deeds have little interest in the property but are playing the odds and hoping to make money from them, Frame said.
“They don’t care where the property is,” he said. “They’re not going to maintain it. They’re just hoping the owner redeems the taxes and pays them interest. They’re going to get paid back on some property and not on others.”
After three years, the person who holds the tax deed can either choose to own the property or not. If the person who holds the tax deed decides to let the property go, it then becomes one of the secretary of state’s tax-foreclosed properties, yet the secretary of state has no statutory authority or budgetary authority to clean up any property.
Rep. Shanda Yates, an Independent who represents District 64, which includes Hinds and Madison counties, would like for the Legislature to make changes to the tax sale system and how counties and cities are reimbursed for the cleaning of tax-forfeited properties.
Across the state, there are tax-forfeited properties that need to be maintained, said Yates, who with Rep. Clay Mansell, a Republican who represents District 56 (Hinds and Madison counties), served as co-chair of the House Select Committee on Capital and Metro Revitalization.
“That’s a problem not just in Jackson or Hinds County but all across the state,” she said.
The city of Jackson plans to ask the Legislature for $2 million for commercial blight elimination and $240,000 for residential blight elimination during the 2025 session.
The city’s legislative agenda also includes this policy changes it would like to see happen: The establishment of a land bank that would allow select foreclosed property to go to the city of Jackson or a subsidiary of the city before being under state control.
Land banks are useful for various reasons, especially when it comes to cleaning up property titles so that the ownership of a piece of property is clear, Frame said.
Properties that come out of the secretary of state’s tax-forfeited properties require a title confirmation suit, which is a case from a Chancery Court judge in the county where the property is located, Frame said. A title confirmation suit can be costly and take several months or longer, he said.
Without a title confirmation suit, it can be difficult to get a loan on one of the state’s tax-forfeited properties that someone wants to acquire, he said.
Frame would like for the House Select Committee on Capital and Metro Revitalization to continue to meet and build off what members have learned.
