Board gives input on constables’ vehicles

Falando Marion, constable for the southern district of Marshall County, asked the board of supervisors about particulars regarding the possible receipt of donated vehicles from DeSoto County.

Kent Smith, who had researched the proposal, said vehicles can be donated from agency to agency but not from an agency to an individual.

There is also a question about compensation, Smith said.

“Constables are compensated with mileage and fees, which preclude providing a vehicle,” he said.

In other words, the county could not accept constable vehicles from DeSoto County, then give them to the constables for their private use.

“We can equip your vehicles with sirens, blue lights, decals, but constables have to provide the car,” he said.

Smith said if the constables could get DeSoto County to sell them the vehicles, then the free vehicle would not be on the county’s inventory and would pass muster with the auditors.

“We should provide him with his equipment, but no vehicle,” Smith advised supervisors. “So he can see if he can buy it in his own name.”

“You can get their approval to sell them to you, but the board of supervisors can’t buy them for the constables. Their county attorney would have to see if they can sell them to you.

“The board of supervisors is not anti-constable. Anything we can do to help, we want to.”

District 4 supervisor George Zinn III noted that if the vehicle was titled to Marshall County, the insurance would have to be purchased by the county.

“The only way to transfer it for $1 is government entity to government entity,” Smith said. “Maybe DeSoto County can find a way to convey the vehicle ‘to his office’ and convey it to him. I am trying to find a way that they get the vehicle in their names.”

District 1 supervisor Charles Terry said the county would have no responsibility to pay for anything.

“It can’t flow through our name,” Smith said. “It was an issue back when Con - gressman Thompson was a supervisor.”

Marion wants the constables’ vehicles marked so people know who they are when they drive up to a residence or other location.

He suggested magnetic signs that could be taken off the constable’s private vehicles when they were not acting in their capacity as constables.

County administrator Larry Hall said magnetic signs would not work because someone could take the sign and impersonate a constable.

Following that discussion, bids were opened on janitorial service for the new Work force Center at Chickasaw Trail Industrial Park.

ABM bid $20,100 a year. The company would clean the carpets three times a year, wash the windows inside and out, among other things.

L&S Janitorial Services had insurance included in its bid proposal but ABM did not show proof of insurance. Specifications required the contractor to have $1 million in insurance.

L&S Janitorial Services’ bid of $21,840 was accepted.

Circuit clerk Monet Autry reported to the board. She said absentee voting for the party primaries began Monday, Jan. 27. The election is March 10. Seventeen-year-olds will be allowed to vote if they will be 18 before the general election and if they register by February 10.

Autry recommended the board raise juror pay to meet those pay scales of other counties. Marshall pays jurors $25 a day while some other counties pay $40 a day, she said.

Seated jurors are paid $40 a day for jury duty plus mileage, she said.

“Forty dollars is cheap,” said District 5 supervisor Ronnie Joe Bennett.

Hugh Hollowell, county emergency management director, reported six or seven homes were damaged by a storm that blew through the county recently. He asked for a local proclamation in case funds become available from the Mississippi Emer gency Management Agency.

Total damages in an area have to meet a threshold before the state can ask for a presidential declaration of a disaster, he said.

“We just do this in case we become eligible,” he said. “I don’t think there will be anything. Better to be safe than sorry.”

Hollowell also asked to add Lafayette and Benton counties to Marshall County’s mutual aid agreement so all counties adjoining Marshall within the state would be included.

Barton Volunteer Fire Department requested money for repair of one of its fire trucks, equipment owned by the county.

The board of supervisors approved spending up to as much as $6,000 for the total repair bill.