Project Momentum

Project Momentum Report
October 2024
Table of Contents
1. Executive Summary................................................................................................................................... 4
2. Overview of Project Momentum ............................................................................................................ 4
3. Key Themes................................................................................................................................................ 6
4. Agency-wide Efforts ................................................................................................................................. 7
4.1 Goals of a successful procurement function ............................................................................. 7
4.2 Context on procurement in the State of Mississippi ................................................................ 8
4.3 Consolidate purchasing and make better use of contracts ....................................................10
4.3.1 Consolidate purchasing ..........................................................................................................10
4.3.2 Make better use of contracts .................................................................................................14
4.3.3 Recommendations ..................................................................................................................15
4.4 Streamline processes and policies to make procurements quick and effective ..................16
4.4.1 Case Study: Emergency Contracts........................................................................................17
4.5 Manage demand to only buy what is needed...........................................................................19
4.5.1 Case Study: Travel, Fuel, and Vehicles ................................................................................20
4.5.2 Case Study: Insurance.............................................................................................................20
4.6 Recommendations ......................................................................................................................21
4.6.1 Moving Toward Centralized Procurement .........................................................................21
5. Agency-specific efforts ........................................................................................................................... 23
5.1 Child Protection Services (CPS) ................................................................................................23
5.1.1 Background and Context .......................................................................................................23
5.2 Department of Finance and Administration ...........................................................................25
5.3 Mississippi Department of Human Services ...........................................................................28
5.4 Mississippi Division of Medicaid ..............................................................................................32
5.5 Mississippi Department of Public Safety .................................................................................37
5.6 Mississippi Department of Corrections ...................................................................................39
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5.7 Mississippi Department of Revenue (DOR) ...........................................................................40
5.8 Mississippi Development Authority (MDA) ...........................................................................42
5.9 Mississippi Department of Education (MDE)........................................................................45
5.10 Mississippi Department of Employment Security (MDES) .................................................53
5.11 Mississippi Emergency Management Agency (MEMA) ........................................................54
5.12 Mississippi Department of Environmental Quality (MDEQ) ..............................................56
5.13 Mississippi Department of Wildlife Fisheries and Parks (MDWFP) ...................................57
List of Exhibits
Exhibit 1: Project Momentum focuses on 13 Mississippi state agencies .................................................. 5
Exhibit 2: Breakdown of state spend on goods and services ...................................................................... 8
Exhibit 3: Agency staff pain points – consolidation ...................................................................................10
Exhibit 4: Public rates for Dell hardware can be lower than those negotiated by Mississippi .............12
Exhibit 5: Case study on Engineering Services and Repair .......................................................................13
Exhibit 6: Spending more on Fast Enterprises than comparable states ..................................................14
Exhibit 7: Case study on Media, PR, and Communications ......................................................................15
Exhibit 8: Agency staff pain points – procurement ....................................................................................16
Exhibit 9: Case study for Emergency Contracts .........................................................................................18
Exhibit 10: Agency staff pain points – procurement..................................................................................19
Exhibit 11: Case study on Travel, Fuel, and Vehicles ................................................................................20
Exhibit 12: Case study on Insurance.............................................................................................................21
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Exhibit 13: Rising insurance premiums ........................................................................................................26

Exhibit 14: Self-Insurance provides a balanced model ..............................................................................26
Exhibit 15: State-leased buildings that exceed DFA’s space allocation: 50%+* ....................................28
Exhibit 16: Mississippi long-term care services vs. peers ..........................................................................34
Exhibit 17: Moving to a single PBM model .................................................................................................36
Exhibit 18: Vehicle inspection team ratios...................................................................................................38
Exhibit 19: Mississippi re-incarceration rate compared to other states ...................................................40
Exhibit 20: Losses from Mississippi’s investment in motion picture incentives ....................................43
Exhibit 21: Mississippi math and reading achievement .............................................................................46
Exhibit 22: Mississippi instruction spending ...............................................................................................46
Exhibit 23: State share of 2022-2023 school year procurement spend ....................................................47
Exhibit 24: School district state spend on “shareable” clerical and administrative staff for 2022-2023
........................................................................................................................................................48
Exhibit 25: State regional resource and services consortia ........................................................................48
Exhibit 26: Energy and utility spend .............................................................................................................49
Exhibit 27: State spending for insurance ......................................................................................................50
Exhibit 28: Breakdown of teacher unit spend versus number of students (by individual school
program) .......................................................................................................................................51
Exhibit 29: Total number of billion-dollar disasters in Mississippi ..........................................................55
Exhibit 30: FY23 MDEQ salaries – state share ..........................................................................................56
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1. Executive Summary
Project Momentum, initiated by State Auditor Shad White, is the product of an interagency effort to
drive taxpayer savings through complex analyses of Mississippi state agencies. These analyses
identified opportunities for the Government to become more efficient while delivering similar or
improved taxpayer service. So far, Project Momentum has identified 31 agency-specific and
several other cross-agency opportunities that could result in over $335M in fiscal savings for
Mississippi taxpayers. Project Momentum initiatives achieve savings through various mechanisms,
including procurement, digitization, and changes to service design. These immediate run-rate savings
can help fund strategic investments Mississippi needs to further save taxpayers money.
2. Overview of Project Momentum

Context
Over the past few years, state Government work in Mississippi has become increasingly complex,
with the COVID-19 pandemic and other factors forcing changes to Federal and state regulations. At
the same time, the state’s workforce – those responsible for delivering these critical activities – has
shrunk substantially. Since 2018, the number of state employees has decreased by 11%—meaning
fewer people do more work.
At the same time, residents’ expectations of Government have grown. The COVID-19 pandemic
changed how Mississippians interact with businesses and their employers and families. Many
residents now work remotely or conduct normal transactions digitally. However, our state
Government has been slow to adopt digital / remote services that would provide faster, better
services to taxpayers. Thus, the change in what residents need requires updating how our state
Government operates. In the future, Mississippi residents may rely increasingly on digital
transactions (versus paper-based) and remote interactions (versus in-person). Together with
Mississippi Government’s increasing responsibilities and shrinking staff, residents’ changing needs
further underscore the need to rethink how Government accesses, engages, and serves its
constituents.
Furthermore, proactive steps that enable the state to operate more efficiently serve to strengthen the
state’s fiscal resilience and ensure long-term sustainability of its essential services. As we retreat from
the revenue peaks seen during the COVID-19 pandemic, Mississippi must be better positioned to
withstand economic uncertainty and sustain a high level of quality with fewer resources.
Project Momentum is a roadmap to improving Mississippi Government’s efficiency by eliminating
unneeded services, expanding the capabilities of state employees, and capitalizing on our state’s
progress by providing clear value to taxpayers.
Project Momentum goals and scope
Project Momentum focused on 13 large state agencies with a collective spend of more than $5B.
These agencies were selected based on the size of their budgets and level of interaction with
Mississippi residents. Only state general and special funds were considered in-scope for this effort to
ensure maximum return for Mississippi’s taxpayers. An overview of those agencies in scope is
below.
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Exhibit 1: Project Momentum focuses on 13 Mississippi state agencies

Agency State General & Special Funds FY23 ($M)
Education (MDE) 3,006
Medicaid (DOM) 1,167
Corrections (DOC) 406
Public Safety (DPS) 174
Revenue (DOR) 158
Finance and Administration (DFA) 1 137
Child Protection Services (CPS) 2 117
Environmental Quality (MDEQ) 77
Human Services (DHS) 75
Wildlife, Fisheries & Parks (WFP) 54
Mississippi Development Authority (MDA) 26
Emergency Management Agency (MEMA) 23
Employment Security (MDES) 5
Total 5,425
Source: Mississippi Transparency
Project Momentum’s goal was to identify initiatives that would save taxpayer dollars while
maintaining current levels of service to residents, or improve service delivery with no net financial
impact. Savings were estimated based on run-rate and annual projections—meaning that efforts that
would only result in one-time reductions were discarded. However, strategic approaches requiring
one-time investments – either financial or via state legislative efforts – were considered. These
parameters were put in place to ensure that the recommendations from this effort would comprise
the most transformational ideas while still being sustainable.
State Auditor Shad White led a dedicated team that embarked on a comprehensive analysis of state
operations. The team worked closely with the leadership and staff of the 13 agencies to understand
customer needs and legislative requirements while benchmarking many other U.S. states’ practices.
Project Momentum identified 31 agency-specific initiatives across the 13 agencies. These initiatives
ranged from tactical changes that agency staff can pursue unilaterally, to strategic approaches that set
long-term goals. The initiatives include cross-agency recommendations, such as procurement
process updates or consolidation of the state’s real estate footprint, in addition to efforts specific to
one agency’s target customers, such as improvements to the state’s long-term care service offering
for Medicaid recipients. If implemented, these initiatives would save $229-$338M annually, or 4%-
6% of the responsive agencies’ current budgets.
Key themes are summarized in the following section.
1 Includes funds for Bureau of Buildings

2 Estimated expenses for division when part of DHS
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3. Key Themes
The following four themes summarize the opportunities that Project Momentum identified.
1. Operate Government More Like a Business
State Government leaders recognize that they can learn a great deal from businesses’ efficiency,
innovation, and dynamism. However, too many parts of Government fall short of this ideal. The
state should continue to adopt best business practices from the public and private sectors – chief
among them investing in programs that deliver higher return on investment (ROI) and reduce or
eliminate activities that result in lower ROI. This means that the state must:
1) Adopt a more strategic approach to spending.
2) Focus more on customer service.
3) Ruthlessly eliminate or alter failing programs.
State agencies should continuously re-evaluate their portfolios to ensure that services directly benefit
Mississippi residents and businesses. Often, governments add programs without re-evaluating if
existing ones are still achieving their intended outcomes. For example, the state has owned golf
courses for years, yet they are barely used by Mississippi residents. This has resulted in lost taxpayer
dollars annually. These resources could be better used elsewhere.
State services should either be reformed or eliminated if they cease to meet their intended purpose,
or if the public no longer wants or needs them. In many instances, this requires close analysis of data
and a focus on implementing the appropriate best practices to help inform agency activities.
The state must serve its taxpayers with a customer focus – serving residents the same way that
businesses seek to understand their clients’ needs and provide the relevant services.
2. Focus on Prevention and Readiness
Recent catastrophic events underscore that preventing or avoiding problems is cheaper than fixing
them after they occur. This applies to everything from natural disaster management to investing in
preventative healthcare, to reducing the number of children who end up in the foster system. In
each case, preparedness, prevention, and mitigation can reduce the cost of future recovery. For
example, investing in programs that enable at-risk families to keep their children in their homes can
reduce the number of expensive foster care placements. Even as CPS has faced challenges in
keeping up with the level of need, Mississippi has continued to spend a much smaller share of its
funds on prevention than other states.
Proactive planning requires Government actions to shift to preventative ones (as opposed to the
day-to-day “firefighting” that many agencies are used to). Agencies must take a longer-term mindset,
given that many preventative measures take time to show measurable results.
3. Use Data and Technology to Complement state Efforts
Despite active cooperation from all 13 state agencies covered by this report, in too many cases,
Government leaders did not have access to essential data about their operations. In some instances,
agency leaders could not tell us how their organizations were structured or even how much various
programs cost. Despite their best efforts, state leaders did not have the data and technology to
enable their decision-making—similar to running a business without access to payroll data.
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Investing in technology and data is required to streamline state operations and enable Mississippi to
provide efficient, effective services for its residents.
Mississippi can follow the example of other states by integrating new tools and technology across
agencies. For example, CPS agencies in other states have streamlined eligibility verification processes
because they have switched to new digital tools and automation. In Mississippi, we have seen that
existing technology can hinder agency operations, especially if tools are outdated or not aligned with
established staff processes. It is critical that the systems and technology deployed be fit for purpose
and that staff workflows be designed to take advantage of the benefits these tools unlock.
4. Get More from Goods and Services Purchased
The state is a massive organization. It spends billions of taxpayer dollars annually on a wide range of
goods and services. As a major purchaser, the state should be getting the best possible pricing and
value from its spending. The state should purchase only what it needs and buy goods and services in
the same way a business or household does – with an eye toward quality and maximum value for
money spent. Mississippi falls far short of this, receiving poor pricing or bad deals from its vendors.
For example, Mississippi has a contract to purchase Dell computers. Still, it pays a higher price than
individual consumers could find from Dell’s consumer website. At the same time, several agencies
across the Government are purchasing identical goods — from janitorial services to software
products — but paying different prices. These examples point to a simple fact: Mississippi taxpayers
are getting a worse deal for the products and services they purchase than residents in other states.
There are opportunities for agencies to address this challenge, such as:
• Coordinate and plan purchases better, using buying power to obtain bulk discounts.
• Ensure that agencies are buying only the goods and services needed.
• Ensure that after goods or services are purchased, agencies get what they paid for.
4. Agency-wide Efforts
Procurement is among the biggest challenges that all agencies face. To address it, Project
Momentum identified opportunities to improve procurement processes across all state agencies
(versus individual changes in each agency) in a coordinated manner. These opportunities can
maximize the impact of the recommendations.
4.1 Goals of a successful procurement function

Procurement underpins operations for almost every Mississippi agency. Across Mississippi,
agencies that participated in Project Momentum emphasized that procurement takes up significant
time and energy. The tension between the importance of procurement and the challenges agencies
face lead to situations in which taxpayers do not get the best value for their dollar.
Successful procurement operations should perform three key functions:
• Consolidate purchasing and make better use of contracts. Successful procurement
operations across states or companies ensure that all departments work together to purchase in
bulk to get the best deals and quality. In addition, these organization effectively negotiate and
use contracts to ensure best value.
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• Streamline processes and policies to make procurements quick and effective. Agencies
need to be able to quickly acquire the goods and services they need – especially as needs
change – and in a way that reduces the burden on staff. In addition, policies should be
designed to ensure that the state is getting the best deals and pricing.
• Manage demand to buy only what is needed. Agencies should carefully plan and time
purchases to acquire only what is needed, and at the right time – especially for goods and
services that have fluctuating prices. In addition, there should be an effort to share and use
resources across the state as much as possible (without buying new goods every time).
A close review of Mississippi’s procurement processes, data, and contracts suggests that the
state has an opportunity to save taxpayers between $80M and $150M across spending
categories. Of these categories, ~$35M to ~$70M would come from direct state spend, with the
remaining savings in school district spend (the portion funded by the state). This is based on
benefits seen in other public-sector organizations that have reformed their procurement processes.
4.2 Context on procurement in the State of Mississippi

The State of Mississippi directly purchases ~$550M of goods and services annually. In addition,
school districts spend an estimated $620M using state funds for purchases.
Exhibit 2: Breakdown of state spend on goods and services
Spending Category* FY23 Spend ($)
State Spend Fees & Services 82M

Building Construction, Management & Furniture 76M
Information Technology (IT) 67M
Pollution Control & Social Services 34M
Equipment, Engineering and Repair 28M
Travel, Vehicles, & Fuel 27M
Utilities 21M
Insurance 19M
Office Supplies, Uniforms and Postal Services 15M
Employee Training & Contract Training 12M
Media, PR & Communications 5M
Legal Services 4M
Other 160M
State Agency Total $551M
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Spending Category* FY23 Spend ($)
School District Buildings & Building Improvement 199M

Spend 3 General Supplies 135M
Professional Services, Educational Services and Fees 112M
Information Technology 72M
Equipment, Cleaning and Maintenance Services (excluding 60M
transportation)
Construction & Architects 49M
School District Total $627M
Statewide Statewide Spend Total $1,127M
* This excludes certain direct transfers (e.g., Medicaid) and categories related to Corrections (including private
prisons and prison healthcare) due to historic lack of suppliers.
For the most part, each agency manages its procurement independently. Often, several agencies are
involved in the procurement, depending on the types of goods and services being purchased.
Specifically, the following entities are involved in this process:
1. Department of Finance & Administration (DFA): Sets procurement policies and
regulations for other agencies. DFA also collects bids for certain statewide contracts
(primarily commodities usable by all agencies as part of the pre-approved vendor list) and
provides additional ad-hoc support, as requested, to agencies going through the procurement
process. DFA ensures compliance with procurement regulations, including reviewing bids.
2. Public Procurement Review Board (PPRB): Responsible for reviewing Requests for
Proposal (RFP) over a certain threshold (e.g., for professional and personnel contracts with a
value greater than $75K, commodities contracts with a value greater than $500K). Agencies
must submit information a month prior to the PPRB’s meetings, when the Board reviews
each RFP for consideration. In addition, the PPRB approves final selected bids.
3. Department of IT Services (ITS): Responsible for managing the end-to-end process for
technology-related procurements to ensure compliance with state requirements (e.g.,
cybersecurity) and use staff experts who understand the subject matter. May use contractor
support for contract reviews.
4. Individual agencies: The agency leading the procurement manages the end-to-end process,
from determining a need, creating and issuing an RFP, and selecting the winning bid, for
most goods and services.
Agencies can use pre-approved vendor lists for widely used goods and services. However, agencies
must plan and purchase independently (excluding technology procurements managed by ITS) for
unique needs. The actual procurement process involves several different steps:
• Agencies determine the need for a given good or service and decide if a new contract will be
needed (i.e., if they cannot use an existing state contract).
• Agencies draft an RFP that articulates the requirements.
3 This amount reflects estimated State share of funding, and excludes local revenue sources.
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• Agencies obtain PPRB approval to move forward with the RFP.

• Agencies publish and advertise RFPs, per appropriate guidelines.
• Agencies collect vendor bids and conduct a reverse auction (where the lowest-price bid is
selected among eligible vendors) for vendors that meet the requirements.
Most agencies engaged in Project Momentum reported that procurement is among the biggest
challenges in their day-to-day operations. In addition to individual agency issues, staff have
expressed concerns about the procurement process. Staff pain points span from complaints about
the inflexibility of procurement rules, to challenges in becoming experts in both the process and the
different product and service categories (e.g., understanding the nuances of building services or
advertising / marketing services).
At a high level, improving procurement outcomes – better pricing and quality of goods and services
– will require a concerted effort to review contracts and make the procurement process more
efficient. The state can implement improvements in the current structure (i.e., where procurement is
managed individually by agencies and DFA primarily plays a policy-making role). Looking to the
long term, the state should explore using a more centralized operating model that empowers DFA to
act as a central procurement agency. This would ensure that these reforms are uniformly
implemented, maximizing value from purchases.
The following sections explain the key pain points – and corroborating case studies – standing
between Mississippi and a high-functioning procurement system. Each section concludes with a set
of recommendations for the state.
4.3 Consolidate purchasing and make better use of contracts

Procurement in the State of Mississippi is managed independently by each agency, with DFA
primarily playing a compliance role. This has led to multiple challenges, as shown below.
Exhibit 3: Agency staff pain points – consolidation

Pain points Quotes from agency staff
Agencies often utilize different vendors • “We needed to get a new building security contract – the
or contracts for similar products & vendors and rates from the pre-approved list were so high
services that we went out and procured a better deal for ourselves.”
• “I couldn’t tell you the number of different copier contracts that
we have.”
Lack of systematic state-wide • “We don’t have any visibility or data into how school districts
coordination (incl. with external are using state contracts.”
entities such as schools) on • “It’s up to us to proactively coordinate with other agencies to
procurement identify opportunities to share or collaborate on certain
contracts.”
4.3.1 Consolidate purchasing

After reviewing contracts, the Project Momentum team found multiple instances in which agencies
purchase the same product from different vendors at different prices. Instead, agencies should
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consolidate their purchasing so that the state has one vendor for any given product, for all agencies,
with the lowest negotiated price and highest quality.
4.3.1.1 Case Study: IT

Dell provides common hardware and software for agencies. However, for some products, such as
monitors, the state-negotiated price is
~10% higher than the prices listed on
Dell.com. This is an unacceptable situation
that further highlights the fact that the state
does not consistently get the best deal for
taxpayers. In addition, some products are
priced ~50% higher than comparable
products (e.g., monitors with similar
resolution) – an unacceptable markup,
especially given that these products are
available through the Federal General
Services Administration’s (GSA) Advantage
program (where the Federal Government
negotiates contracts that state and local
governments can use).
Over the years, agencies have purchased
Microsoft Office licenses at different
prices (up to 10% higher in some
scenarios), despite having the same feature set. In addition, the current structure, in which agencies
are required to solicit quotes from multiple suppliers, prevents the state from creating a bulk
purchase agreement with one supplier to get the highest possible discounts.
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Exhibit 4: Public rates for Dell hardware can be lower than those negotiated by Mississippi 4
4.3.1.2 Case Study: Engineering Services and Repair

The “fragmented” approach to procurement leads to scenarios in which Mississippi purchases goods
and services from many suppliers – without consolidating spending to get bulk discounts. A notable
example is the Engineering Services and Repair category, where Mississippi has significantly more
suppliers than Arkansas (Exhibit 5).
Consequently, Mississippi has a much smaller share of spending in the top set of suppliers. Some
50% of Arkansas’ spend is across its top 16 suppliers, whereas the top 50% of Mississippi’s spend is
spread across 52 suppliers. This fragmentation, or lack of consolidation, drives higher costs by
reducing bulk discounts and introduces inefficiencies in the procurement process.
4 Rates through GSA Advantage allow State entities to purchase items using GSA contracts 2. Sizing range based on moving to
public rates (low end) or GSA comparable product rates (high end) and weighing savings by quantity purchased in Dell PO
from active contract 3. Pro Fit Mouse and Keyboard
https://www.gsaadvantage.gov/advantage/ws/catalog/product_detail?gsin=11000056246915 4.Samsung 85" Smart TV -
https://www.gsaadvantage.gov/advantage/ws/catalog/product_detail?gsin=11000097915541 5.Dell 24" monitor
https://www.gsaadvantage.gov/advantage/ws/catalog/product_detail?gsin=11000100712790 6. Key Laptop Backpack
https://www.gsaadvantage.gov/advantage/ws/catalog/product_detail?gsin=11000077710819 Note: Excludes 2 items where
public market rates from other vendors could not be identified Source: Dell.com, GSA Advantage, Mississippi Transparency
Dell Purchase Order Contract
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Exhibit 5: Case study on Engineering Services and Repair
Source: Mississippi Transparency – includes state funding sources (General + Special) for in-scope agencies,
Arkansas Transparency – including all fund sources for comparable agencies.
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4.3.1.3 Case Study: Schools

Schools spend more than $600M of state funds on a variety of goods and services. In this highly
fragmented process, each school manages its own procurement – and consequently, schools may not
get the best value. In addition, schools use state contracts for certain goods and services, which, as
outlined in this report, do not always provide the best value.
Please refer to Section 5.9 for details on the Mississippi Department of Education’s (MDE)
procurement spending and potential reform recommendations.
4.3.2 Make better use of contracts

In many instances, other comparable states get better deals than Mississippi. The state is not
negotiating contracts effectively or using and enforcing new contract provisions to ensure that it gets
the best deal possible.
4.3.2.1 Case Study: IT

The Mississippi Department of Revenue purchases two key products from Fast Enterprises.
However, two other states with larger populations and tax bases (Arkansas and Utah) purchase the
same two major features, yet spend $2M - $4M less than Mississippi. 5 This difference demonstrates
that Mississippi’s processes do not ensure that the state always gets the best value.
Exhibit 6: Spending more on Fast Enterprises than comparable states
5 GenTax, FastDS-VS 2. State Tax Collections (incl. taxes, fees, licenses, intergovernmental revenue, and insurance trust
revenue from US Census Bureau & Tax Foundation Source: Utah Transparency Contract Data for “Fast Enterprises”
(https://transparent.utah.gov/vendet.php), Arkansas Transparency Contract Data (https://transparency.arkansas.gov/),
Mississippi Transparency, https://www.fastenterprises.com/about/,
https://tax.utah.gov/commission/reports/fy22report.pdf, https://www.lbo.ms.gov/pdfs/fy23_bulletin.pdf,
https://www.dfa.arkansas.gov/images/uploads/budgetOffice/fy23_Annual_gr_forecast.pdf, Johns Hopkins University
Director
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4.3.2.2 Case Study: Media & Public Relations

The state relies on vendors to provide advertising services, but these services are often overpriced.
For example, a state agency spent $3.2M on an advertising services contract and was authorized to
spend up to $7.5M. The contract allows the vendor to charge $90 per hour in addition to a 10%
commission for traditional media advertising purchases. Meanwhile, a Florida vendor providing
comparable services to a state agency offered a lower, less-complex pricing model, charging a flat fee
of 8.5% without additional charges for content creation.
Exhibit 7: Case study on Media, PR, and Communications
4.3.3 Recommendations
There are several opportunities to improve coordination across state entities, as listed below.
• Share state contracts: Mississippi should allow agencies to share state contracts
(“piggybacking”) to reduce the time spent on running new procurements and compel
collaboration among agencies to ensure that they can get the best possible deal pre-negotiated
by another state agency.
• Add DFA review to improve state coordination: Each agency runs its own procurement.
Early in the process of writing an RFP, each agency should notify DFA to quickly ensure that
no other agencies either (i) already have a similar contract that can be used, or (ii) are not going
to start a similar procurement in the near term. This will help allow coordination across
agencies without moving to a fully centralized model.
• Improve procurement coordination between schools: Schools should work jointly to
procure goods and services to obtain better pricing, and seek the best possible value on deals
(as opposed to biasing toward local suppliers in all situations). See the MDE section for
additional detail.
• Increased the use of state and Federal cooperative agreements: Before releasing an RFP,
agencies should check cooperative agreements across several major sources (e.g., Texas, GSA
Advantage Platform) to assess whether ready-to-use alternatives with good value are already
available. While agencies already have statutory authority, not all agencies systematically use
this option in their procurements. The state should consider requiring agencies to attest to
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having checked commonly available cooperative agreements before starting the procurement
process.
Other opportunities to get better pricing and contract terms for the state include:
• Conduct targeted reviews of contracts for renegotiation opportunities: The state should
consider establishing a centralized team that reviews key contracts across high-spend
categories. This team would identify savings opportunities (e.g., contracts with less-favorable
pricing than other states, categories with high-cost growth or fragmented supplier base) where
the state can renegotiate contracts or identify alternatives.
• Revise pre-approved vendor lists if / when more favorable contracts are signed:
Currently, DFA maintains a set of contracts with pre-approved vendors who provide different
services (all priced within 25%) that other state agencies can use without needing to go
through another procurement. However, there are situations when agencies receive better
deals than what is on the pre-approved vendor list by running their own procurements. In
these situations, the state should revise the pre-approved vendor list to include the new
vendor. In addition, as mentioned above, agencies should try to use contracts issued by other
agencies with better deals.
• Use innovative contract terms to improve leverage: State should include contract terms
that incentivize vendors to provide the services (and pricing) they promised at the outset.
Contract terms should be tied to Key Performance Indicators (KPIs) and outcomes.
4.4 Streamline processes and policies to make procurements quick and effective
Mississippi’s procurement policies and processes are broken, with procurements taking a significant
amount of time and draining staff resources. In some instances, such as for IT, procurements take
so long that goods are obsolete by the time they have been procured. Agency leaders across the state
reported that procurement was one of their top priorities for improvements and reforms.
Exhibit 8: Agency staff pain points – procurement

Procurement rules are highly complex “Vendors have told us that we are one of the hardest states to
& inflexible do business with, and many of them choose not to bid for
contracts.”
Small technical / clerical mistakes “There was 1 entry in a 500-page document that wasn’t properly
require “re-procurement” significantly redacted and the entire 18-month process had to start over.”
extend timelines
Inefficient protest measures “All the vendors now know that they can just protest a contract,
and force our hand into providing an emergency contract.”
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4.4.1 Case Study: Emergency Contracts

Emergency contracts were designed to be used during unforeseen emergencies (e.g., natural disaster
or other crises), when the state must quickly procure goods and services. During such emergencies,
time is of the essence – and agencies have neither the time nor the resources available to manage a
full procurement process. In recent years, agencies have used emergency contracts at much higher
rates than before. This is due in part to slow state procurement processes and to the growing
number of private-sector contract protests.
The slow procurement process (in some situations, 18+ months) has led to multiple instances in
which contracts are close to expiry – but the state has not yet signed a replacement contract. Thus,
to ensure continuity of services, the state must issue an emergency contract to extend the existing
one (or award a contract to a new vendor). In both scenarios, vendors charge a premium in the
emergency bid, wasting taxpayer funds without providing the state with additional quality or service.
Moreover, vendors can easily file a protest when they fail to win a bid. In many of these instances,
the state cannot issue a contract to the intended awardee until the protest dispute has been resolved
(unless using a special provision that allows the state to award the contract after 90 days if essential).
Sometimes, this process takes up to 1 year while procurement officials conduct internal reviews (first
through an agency appeal, then through an optional PPRB appeal that vendors can file). The court
system assesses the protest if the vendor chooses to file a suit (including the time for vendors to
sanitize their bids of confidential materials when the protesting vendor requests to view other bids).
During the protest period, the state must use emergency contracts while the full bid process is on
hold, pending the protest outcome.
Emergency contracts, slow processes, and protests have led to a remarkable 428% surge in
the overall value of emergency contracts. Emergency contracts now constitute more than 30% of
all active state-funded contracts (by value).
Long procurement timelines and a low bar to file protests have driven a sharp increase in emergency
contracts (representing 30%+ 6 of state-funded contracts), as shown below.
6Assumes “other” contract categories are competitive.

Represents contract value (i.e. allowable spend today) vs. actual invoiced spend.
Note: “Other” contract categories worth $588M – including “Approval Request,” “Below Statutory Comp,” “Procurement
Request,” “Quotes,” and other non-categorized items. Excludes statutory exemptions and inter-governmental contracts.
Source: Mississippi Transparency
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Exhibit 9: Case study for Emergency Contracts
The state can implement varying degrees of the following procurement policies to ensure that
smoother processes are in place:
• Delegate authority for some procurements to DFA oversight staff versus PPRB: Raising
the threshold for all procurements or for those in a given category (e.g., commonly needed
services, such as building services) to require approval from the PPRB (as opposed to by DFA
oversight staff) could reduce the ~1.5 months spent awaiting Board approval (as the Board
meets monthly). This could save time for the RFP approval process and the final bid selection.
As a starting point, the state can investigate indexing the procurement thresholds to inflation,
as has been proposed in other states.
• Ensure sufficient staffing level for ITS: The structure of ITS (which manages the end-to-
end procurement process for IT vendors) is effective in leveraging the scale of the state and
ensuring that IT experts are assigned to management procurements. However, agencies have
reported that procurement timelines have stretched significantly. The state should revisit
staffing levels for ITS to ensure that the agency has the necessary resources to complete IT
procurements in a timely manner. In addition, the state should hold ITS accountable to
procurement timelines (or provide timely updates to agencies on the status of their
procurement) to better serve agencies.
• Eliminate or streamline requirements for “blinded” proposal submission: Currently,
vendors must submit a blinded portion of their RFP response. In other words, the proposal
response must not contain identifying information. Blinded proposals aim to maintain equity
in the proposal review process. In practice, this burns a lot of staff time, as:
o Agency staff must manually review every word in all proposal bids (which can reach
thousands of pages) to ensure that they have been effectively blinded. This can take 2-
3 weeks for some procurements.
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o DFA oversight staff must review proposal submissions after a bid is selected to
confirm that they were effectively blinded. This can also take 2-3 weeks.
o In some instances, if a proposal was not adequately blinded, the procurement must
restart. Some companies report that they do not bid on Mississippi RFPs because of
the added burden of blinding their proposal submission. This requirement potentially
limits the state’s access to high-quality bids. Adjusting the technical requirements for
blinded proposals (e.g., removing the requirement, providing recourse process,
increasing thresholds for procurements requiring blinded proposals) could save staff
time and increase the number of firms competing for contract opportunities.
• Remove PPRB appeal from the protest process: Companies that protest bids currently
have the option to follow a three-step process: (i) protest to the agency managing the
procurement, (ii) protest to the PPRB, and (iii) file a suit. The protest process takes significant
time and hikes up taxpayer cost by increasing reliance on emergency contracts. The state
should consider removing the option to appeal to the PPRB (which requires representation
from the Attorney General’s office), as most vendors willing to move past the appeal to the
agency may be likely to file suit regardless of the outcome.
• Reform the option to view competitive proposals during a protest: Currently, companies
filing protests can request other bidders’ proposals. In these scenarios, companies can redact
confidential information in their bids – adding months to the protest process. Eliminating the
option for companies to view other competing bids or identifying options to expedite the
process to redact competitive information (e.g., limiting the time given to companies to redact
their proposals) could reduce the time of protest processes.
Some of these procurement-related recommendations are currently being implemented by the

state.
4.5 Manage demand to only buy what is needed

Many state agencies have continued to increase their purchases without looking closely at the assets
and services other agencies have in place. In these situations, increased sharing could reduce new
purchasing. In addition, procurement staff are focused on individual agencies (versus categories) and
cannot be strategic about when to purchase services, reduce prices, and get the best deals.
Exhibit 10: Agency staff pain points – procurement

Lack of holistic monitoring and cost • “There are times where we’re not collecting the data or
controls on category spend – incl. information we need to make sure the vendors are driving the
insufficient post-award monitoring on outcomes we need.”
category / contract spend to ensure • “We’re so busy trying to stay afloat going through procurement
outcomes are achieved (e.g., through – [staff member] was working till 11 PM every night – that we
KPIs) just don’t have time to try to be super strategic about our
purchases.”
Lack of understanding of industry • “I feel like we’ve all had to become experts in procurement.”
offerings and the complicated • “It’s sometimes a struggle to keep up with all of the needs and
procurement processes manage all of the different contracts.”
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4.5.1 Case Study: Travel, Fuel, and Vehicles

Mississippi spends $25M on travel, vehicles, and fuel – significantly more (by $3M - $10M) than
comparable states such as Louisiana, Iowa, and Arkansas. In fact, Mississippi’s travel, vehicle, and
fuel spending has grown at an annual growth rate that exceeds the rate of inflation – and now stands
at between +12% and +23% since 2015. Specifically, agency spending on new vehicles has surged
dramatically, increasing sevenfold between Q3 2021 and Q3 2023, as car prices increased at a high
rate. Despite being a predictable category (e.g., vehicle purchases can be planned for the next few
years), state agencies increased their use of emergency contracts for new vehicles. This illustrates an
opportunity to better plan for purchases.
Exhibit 11: Case study on Travel, Fuel, and Vehicles
4.5.2 Case Study: Insurance

Mississippi purchases more property insurance than many other states do, and private property
insurance covers all claims. In several other states, private insurance only protects against
catastrophic damage. Mississippi also pays significantly more for property insurance than other
comparable states. For example, Mississippi spends approximately 14% more on state property
insurance than Florida, even though Florida has considerably more properties. Despite having three
times as many property locations (~21K compared to Mississippi’s ~7K), Florida’s insurance
expenditure remains at $12.2M. At the same time, Mississippi allocates $13.8M for insurance
coverage. Please see the DFA section for additional information on property insurance spending.
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Exhibit 12: Case study on Insurance

Florida Mississippi
# of property locations 20,719 6,655
Property insurance agency premiums (i.e., annual $12.2M 7 $13.8M
funding budgeted by the state)
Premium per property location $588 $2,073
4.6 Recommendations
Improving demand management requires supporting staff to have the resources and training to
better know what they need and better understand the items they are procuring. Recommendations
include:
• Increase the use of Requests for Information (RFIs) and Requests for Quotes (RFQs):
Posting additional RFIs and RFQs (with a significantly shorter timeframe than RFPs) enables
agency staff to develop a better understanding of market dynamics and vendor offerings. This
can help agencies determine if the offered services meet agency needs and write more
prescriptive solicitations in future procurements to ensure they receive the best offers.
• Improve staff training and skillsets: Given that each agency has its own procurement staff
(usually a small team), staff are required to complete procurements across a range of categories
(e.g., building services, advisory services). This limits the staff’s ability to specialize in
categories. In addition, agency procurement staff have a heavy workload, as they manage the
various requests for each agency. The level of workload limits staff’s time for upskilling and
gaining procurement expertise. The state should provide procurement staff with additional
training and revisit compensation levels to ensure that appropriately skilled staff are in place
for successful procurements. This will play a vital role in ensuring staff purchase the necessary
goods and services.
• DFA to partner with agencies to improve use of existing state resources and inventory:
In addition to DFA checking on pre-existing contracts that agencies can use, the agency
should inventory state assets and existing services to identify opportunities for increased
sharing and avoid buying new items that the state already has.
4.6.1 Moving Toward Centralized Procurement

Adopting the recommendations outlined above will help individual agencies improve their
procurement outcomes. However, the lack of standardization and uniformity across agencies makes
it difficult to achieve the full potential in the absence of a centralized procurement function. In other
states that have improved their procurement models, building a central procurement function has
helped to drive a variety of benefits, such as:
• Agencies are able to think strategically about timing (e.g., purchase when prices are low).
7Source: https://myfloridacfo.com/docs-sf/risk-management-libraries/risk-documents/annual-reports/risk-mgmt-
annual-report-2022---final.pdf?sfvrsn=59248690_2, Mississippi Transparency for spend data, Department of Finance
and Administration for Property Data
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• Agency personnel can better navigate market offerings by maintaining market research and
category expertise. Personnel also have opportunities to increase their expertise.
In practical terms, in categories (or agencies) that are a part of a centralized procurement model, the
centralized model manages the RFP process, conducts category research and reviews, and manages
procurement technology and processes. Individual agencies (those for whom the goods or services
are being procured) can focus on providing relevant subject matter expertise.
Building a centralized function requires considering the following key characteristics:
• Strategy & role: The central entity should become a strategic partner for agency employees
who procure goods and services by supporting them throughout the procurement life cycle –
beyond merely providing support on compliance questions. The focus should be on increased
speed, transparency, and value delivery while meeting regulatory requirements.
• Stakeholder management: Procurement staff should actively manage their relationships with
core stakeholders through frequent and timely check-ins to understand needs ahead of time
and ensure that expectations are continuously aligned and managed.
• Organizational & personnel: The central organization should assign the right talent and
optimize the organizational structure by assigning personnel with the requisite procurement
and category expertise. This can better serve agency needs and accelerate procurement
timelines.
• Process and regulation: Processes should be streamlined to reduce the procurement cycle
time, eliminate duplication of assignments to multiple individuals who lack clearly delineated
responsibilities, and create a better work environment in which procurement staff can focus
on value-additive tasks to find and source deals (vs. process-oriented tasks that feel like “check
the box” activities).
• Technology: Build and manage the right technology functionality and governance model to
drive more efficient operations, rather than slow them down. In addition, keep information in
a centralized location and enable easier access to data to track and measure performance.
Moving to a centralized procurement model can be achieved in phases, eliminating the need to
implement a major transition simultaneously. As a starting point, the state can centralize
procurement for certain high-priority individual categories (e.g. building services) enabling agencies
to begin realizing immediate savings. Moreover, such a move would provide an opportunity to
document lessons learned and overcome challenges (e.g., with the new process) before the state
moves to a fully centralized model. The State of Mississippi has started moving in this direction: IT
is currently centrally procured by ITS, and DFA is expected to play a larger role in procurement for
certain personnel and professional services contracts in 2024.
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5. Agency-specific efforts
The following sections contain specific initiatives identified in each of the 13 state agencies.
5.1 Child Protection Services (CPS)

The Mississippi Department of Child Protection Services strives to keep Mississippi’s children safely
in their own families and communities. The Department’s core mission is to protect children,
support families, and encourage lasting family connections.
Project Momentum identified two opportunities for a total cost savings of $6M at CPS:
Initiatives Estimated size of opportunity

Increase funding and capacity of preventative programs $4M
Automate some eligibility verification processes $2M
5.1.1 Background and Context

In 2016, CPS began separating from the Department of Human Services (DHS) to form a single
entity to serve as the state’s lead child welfare agency. The split was formalized in 2023, and after
some initial operational issues in implementing the split (e.g., difficulties with payroll systems), the
agency is now positioned to move forward with a new structure.
CPS currently operates under a Federal Consent Decree Settlement that sets guidelines around
staffing and caseload levels. As a result, Project Momentum did not research any initiatives that
would impact caseworker staffing or cases.
CPS operates with an annual state budget of $117M. To fulfill its goals, it deploys funds across
several categories:
• Salaries & Wages ($48M): Staff to run programs and operations.
• Commodities & Contractual Services ($29M): External services procured to support
operations and programs.
• Subsidies, Loans, and Grants ($40M): Additional funds provided to external entities.
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1. Increase funding and capacity of preventative programs
Investing in preventative measures protects children by keeping them out of harmful environments
and saves funds that would otherwise be directed into the foster care system. However, compared to
other states, CPS spends a much smaller share of state funds on preventative services (3% in
Mississippi vs. 16% nationally).
CPS administers prevention services operated Key Lifetime Savings
by external vendors to preemptively address • Foster care payments: ~ $5M
family issues and keep children safely at home. • Lifetime spend on social services: ~$16M
Research shows an 84% success rate in keeping (not including in overall savings figure)
children out of foster care for the 2 years • Unlock case worker time: Unsized
following participation in these programs. • Increased contract for prevention services
However, Mississippi’s programs have a approved through the Family First
waitlist of 42 to 60 children per month, Prevention Services Clearinghouse (e.g.,
underscoring the importance of expanding additional funding, additional vendors):
prevention services approved through the ~$1M in additional vendor payments
Family First Prevention Services clearinghouse.
The state currently spends ~$6M annually on
its in-CIRCLE prevention services program. Investing an additional $1M per year into
prevention services meant to serve those on the waitlist could result in a net savings of $4M to
the state by keeping children out of foster care. Costs of foster care average ~$9.4K annually per
child, excluding the additional long-term costs associated with child placement. Increasing funding
for preventative services is critical to improve outcomes for children and reduce overall cost to the
state.
Note: CPS applied for and expects increased Federal funding for preventative measures through the
2018 Family First Prevention Services Act.
2. Digitize eligibility verification processes
The primary role of CPS case workers is to engage with and provide support to children and families
in need. However, CPS estimates that ~13% of case workers’ time is spent on various administrative
tasks related to eligibility verification. In many states, CPS agencies use software tools to automate
eligibility and reduce the amount of time spent on paperwork.
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By investing in these tools, CPS could significantly reduce the time spent on eligibility
verification, freeing ~$2M worth of staff time. This time could be better spent engaging with and
improving outcomes for children. Digitization can
also enable CPS to provide targeted prevention and
Integrated Data Systems Simplify
support services. For example, in Pennsylvania,
Data Management for Staff
Alleghany County deploys a tool that utilizes available
state data to identify eligible families who are not Alabama implemented FACTS – the
accessing support services. This provides an easier Family, Adult, and Child Tracking System –
path to access than traditional referral pathways that to unify 29 legacy systems and improve
may require visits to county offices. usability by allowing staff to use mobile
solutions.
3. Coordinate healthcare facility licensure
Different agencies manage healthcare facility licensure Georgia implemented the mCase solution
for disparate facilities. For example, CPS manages that is slated for Statewide deployment –
therapeutic group homes for foster children, while integrating with the child welfare system.
DOH regulates hospitals. Over the long-term, there is These examples show the opportunity to
an opportunity to better coordinate facility licensure unify systems.
by centralizing or sharing data across agencies.
5.2 Department of Finance and Administration

Mississippi’s DFA serves as the central financial authority for the state government. It offers a range
of financial and support services to ensure the efficient function of state agencies.
Project Momentum identified opportunities to improve the state’s real estate and physical
assets portfolio through four initiatives worth $19M - $24M:

Re-evaluate insurance on state properties $10M
Upgrade inefficient buildings $4M - $6M
Eliminate unnecessary owned buildings and reduce $5M - $7M
unnecessary leased spaces
Replace state owned aircrafts by outsourcing travel to charter $0.3M - $1.3M
and commercial alternatives

DFA operates with an annual budget of $135M (including state funds building construction),
allotted to four main areas:
• Property Management ($84M) – To manage state facilities (including rental and owned
facilities) and fund building construction for Mississippi entities (majority of expenditure).
• Insurance ($19M) – For all state employees, facilities, and tort claims
• IT Services / Mississippi Management & Reporting System ($18M): To manage IT
systems (i.e., MAGIC), which provide payroll, HR, and procurement systems across agencies.
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• Support Service ($14M): Variety of financial and operational services to other agencies (e.g.,
Budget, Procurement, Internal Audit, Surplus Property, Financial Management, state Air
Transport, Travel).
5.2.2 Recommendations Exhibit 13: Rising insurance premiums

1. Move to a hybrid insurance model
Property and liability insurance markets
have been in turmoil across the region.
Property insurance prices are increasing as
insurers exit markets. Mississippi has not
been insulated from this trend, as the state’s
total spending on property insurance grew a
substantial 22% between FY22 and FY23
(Exhibit 13).
Mississippi could save $10M annually by
adopting a hybrid insurance model. This
model is not new to Mississippi – the state
currently uses this approach for workers’
compensation claims. In this model,
Mississippi leverages a self-insurance fund
to pay claims across property, workers’
compensation, general liability, and related
items. In addition, the state purchases
reinsurance or excess insurance to protect
from catastrophic risk such as natural
disasters. Premiums are typically lower, as the state relies on private insurers (only in disasters) and
potential support from the Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA).
Exhibit 14: Self-Insurance provides a balanced model 8

Florida Mississippi
Number of Property Locations 20,719 6,655
Property Insurance $12.2M 1
$13.8M
Agency Premiums (i.e., annual funding budgeted by the state)
Premium per property location $588 $2073
Est. annual MS savings per property (using Florida benchmark) $1,485
Estimated annual Mississippi savings ~$9.8M
Mississippi will need to take several actions to implement this hybrid model (sometimes referred to
as “captive insurance”):
8 Source: https://myfloridacfo.com/docs-sf/risk-management-libraries/risk-documents/annual-reports/risk-mgmt-annual-
report-2022---final.pdf?sfvrsn=59248690_2, Mississippi Transparency for spend data, Department of Finance and

Administration for Property Data
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October 2024
1. Expand the existing workers’ compensation trust (or stand up a separate property
insurance trust fund) using the state surplus to
help kick-start the fund.
2. Hire a third-party administrator to manage Mississippi Can Adopt
claims (as is done for the Mississippi Workers’ Florida’s Balanced Model
Compensation Trust).
Though the State of Mississippi has
3. Purchase sufficient excess insurance / re-
just one-third the number of
insurance to protect against catastrophic risk.
property locations as the State of
4. Appropriate the requisite annual premium in Florida (~20K locations vs. ~6K
the trust fund based on the state’s claim history. locations), Mississippi spends
Striking the balance between external and in-house risk almost $2M more on property
management can help Mississippi obtain the best rates insurance per year than Florida
and save taxpayer dollars while maintaining sufficient ($13.8M vs. $12.2M).
levels of protection. To reach these savings, DFA is now If Mississippi could reduce its
reevaluating how state-owned buildings are insured. property insurance spend per
2. Upgrade inefficient buildings location to Florida’s level, it could
save almost $10M a year.
Utility prices have increased substantially in recent years,
resulting in a combined energy and utility expenditure of
$21M across in-scope agencies. Meanwhile, new energy-
efficient technology and infrastructure have been developed. This is an opportunity for Mississippi
to invest to reduce its long-term energy spend.
The state can save $4M to $6M in utility expenses by investing in energy-efficient
improvements, such as enhanced insulation and HVAC upgrades. Notably, the Federal
Government has continued to expand funding to enable state and local jurisdictions to fund
investments in energy-efficient infrastructure.
There are several paths to funding energy-efficient improvements, including:
• Develop public-private partnerships with utility companies to share the investment cost (and
eventual cost savings).
• Raise low-interest financing for energy-efficient infrastructure.
• Use state capital funds for upfront investments in capital upgrades.
DFA has used a small portion of existing maintenance appropriations over the years to enable
targeted energy-saving upgrades. However, more (and systematic) funding could drive meaningful
long-term savings.
3. Eliminate unnecessary owned buildings and minimize unnecessary leased spaces
Historically, the state has had a significant (in some instances, excessive) amount of office space per
employee. While a Board has been appointed to address this challenge and approve leases going
forward, this Board will only review leases when they are up for renewal. Some leases stretch into
the 2030s – which means it could take up to another decade to see savings for taxpayers. This
presents a critical challenge, as more than half of state-leased buildings exceed DFA’s maximum
space allocation of 250 sqft per person, as shown in Exhibit 15. This standard already exceeds
Federal and private-sector standards by 20% to 40%.
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Exhibit 15: State-leased buildings that exceed DFA’s space allocation: 50%+*
* Note: Each point represents a single building. The different colors represent different agencies.
Uniformly mandating the use of DFA’s space standards for all agency office space could
save an estimated $4M. In addition, the state could go further and adopt the GSAs’ standards of
200 sqft per person, and subsequently consolidate agencies into a smaller set of leases or spaces.
This could save Mississippi up to ~$6M. It would also further reduce utilities spending in state-
owned buildings by an additional ~$1M due to the smaller footprint.
4. Fly commercial or charter for official state trips
Mississippi’s Office of Air Transport Services owns and operates a 1993 Beechcraft King Air 350
for government official use on state trips. The aircraft presents a burden to the state, costing an
estimated $1M in annual maintenance fees alone. In addition, DFA is responsible for employing and
determining a salary for a pilot as well as operating expenses (e.g., fuel, cleaning, insurance),
estimated at an additional ~$0.3M, though this estimate is highly variable depending on the number
of trips taken. This presents the state with a substantial recurring cost, when cheaper and better
alternatives exist.
Approximately 37% of U.S. states (and D.C.) have foregone state-owned aircrafts for official
travel and instead deploy commercial and/or chartered alternatives. Mississippi can achieve
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additional cost efficiencies by selling its state-owned and operated plane via outsourced alternatives,
including chartered and/or commercial flying.
The state can recoup $300K to $1.3M in maintenance and operating cost savings annually,
with the added benefit of reduced liability and increased travel flexibility:
• Moving to chartered private flights as needed. Costs associated would be approximately
$500K yearly based on 25 to 50 trips, at roughly 2-3 hours per trip and would grant state
officials greater travel flexibly and limited liability for the state.
• Moving official state travel to commercial flying on an as-needed basis. Costs associated are
approximated at $50-400K annually (variable by fare class and number of passengers), based
on an average of 25 to 50 round trips per annum. Further, the state would enjoy limited
liability; however, travel destinations would be restricted to established airports.
Many states use a combination of these alternatives to maximize flexibility and minimize costs
associated with official state trips. In addition to significant cost savings, doing so alleviates
departmental burdens while freeing up funds to be reallocated towards other impactful state
initiatives.
5.3 Mississippi Department of Human Services

DHS serves hundreds of thousands of residents annually, providing benefits and services to help
Mississippians gain economic security, develop skills to enter the workforce, and maintain safe and
healthy home environments.
Project Momentum identified two overarching opportunities to streamline eligibility
processes and reduce administrative spend in DHS offices. These initiatives make up $5M -
$9M in potential savings:

Streamline eligibility verification, e.g., implement simplified $4M – $6M
reporting, share verification data, move to paperless operations
Consolidate county office administration $1M - $3M

DHS operates with an annual state budget of $75M. To fulfill its goals, it deploys funds across six
main services:
• ($21.4M) Food Assistance: administer SNAP / TANF benefits.
• ($17M) Support Services: provide HR and other administrative services to DHS divisions.
• ($14.4M) Youth Services: administer probation, aftercare services and institutional programs
for juveniles.
• ($11.8M) Child Support Enforcement: establish and enforce support obligations and collect
and distribute support payments.
• ($7.7M) Early Child Care & Development: assess children’s and youth’s needs and make
recommendations to Governor and Legislature.
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• ($3M) Aging & Adult Services: provide senior centers, transportation, meal delivery, and other
assistance services to the elderly and vulnerable adults.
Of the agencies in scope, DHS employs the second-highest number of personnel, with almost 2,000
staff members across various functions. In the past few years, DHS has experienced a variety of
challenges that range from staffing shortages to inefficiencies in service delivery. These challenges
have increased the burden on administrative staff and risk impacting the quality of services that
beneficiaries receive. Several initiatives can be implemented to improve efficiency and enable the
Agency to better achieve its core mission.
1. Introduce simplified reporting for SNAP benefits eligibility
Since a legislative change in 2018, Mississippi has required change reporting for SNAP eligibility
verification, which requires all households to report any change in income > $125 within 10 days of
the change. Simplified reporting, alternatively, only requires households to report changes outside
of the normal 6-month recertification period if it impacts eligibility (>130% Federal Poverty
Level). Mississippi is the only state in the country that does not allow simplified reporting for any
beneficiaries.
Adopting simplified reporting results in the same
level of benefits delivered while reducing burden Simplified Reporting
on staff, and it would save the state ~$1.9M A 2019 Manhattan Strategy Group
annually in administrative costs. report showed that simplified
Since implementing change reporting, DHS has seen reporting reduces administration
increasing payment error rates, often due to clerical expense by ~7% per case.
error in case processing rather than improper benefits
delivery. The average payment error rate from 2011-
2018 was 2.3%. After change reporting, the payment error rates increased to 6.57% in 2019 and
7.79% in 2022.
States with a payment error rate higher than the Federal threshold of 6% for 2 consecutive years are
liable to incur Federal fines. In 2019, the average state penalty was $3.2M. Should Mississippi
continue to see payment error rates at this level, it may be liable for future Federal penalty.
If policymakers do convert to a simplified reporting system, the resulting savings should be invested
in tools to check whether beneficiaries are accurately reporting their income. This could come in the
form of increased funding for compliance officers, investigators, or data analytics (e.g., data sharing
across government agencies to identify discrepancies in what the beneficiaries report) to identify
beneficiaries who are defrauding the system. This investment in eligibility checks will, in turn,
generate increased savings for taxpayers.
2. Consolidate County Director roles
DHS operates 82 offices across the state as a result of a statutory requirement to have an office and
County Director in each county. There are several challenges with the current county office model:
• The volume of cases per office varies significantly, with the top 9 offices by volume serving
more than 75% of beneficiaries.
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• County offices are highly understaffed due to recruitment and retention challenges.
• In many counties, social services agencies operate out of different locations despite serving
overlapping populations, meaning Mississippi residents travel to multiple sites to enroll in or
receive benefits.
• There remain fixed operational and administrative costs for each office regardless of case
volume seen, resulting in outsized administrative spend in low-volume offices.
Given the low volume of cases seen in ~90% of offices, there is opportunity to consolidate County
Directors to oversee multiple office sites. DHS can save $1.6M annually in salary expenses by
having County Directors manage two offices rather than one.
Furthermore, DHS should consider consolidating county office locations with other divisions or
agencies that provide benefits to overlapping populations (e.g., DOM, CPS). In some counties,
agencies operate from the same location, although it is not standard practice across Mississippi. A
shared-location model would result in further cost savings and an enhanced experience for
beneficiaries.
3. Share document verification data between DHS and DOM
An increasing number of states have integrated SNAP eligibility systems and / or staff with
Medicaid eligibility, given the volume of beneficiaries eligible for both benefits. This has eliminated
redundant document verification across agencies, streamlined processes for eligibility determination,
and enabled more consistent coverage for beneficiaries. In states like Louisiana, agencies have seen
efficiency by sharing specific documentation data across SNAP and Medicaid without fully
integrating eligibility systems or staff.
We estimate that the state could save $1.2M-$2.3M in administrative expenses by sharing
document verification data. On average, 60% of SNAP clients are enrolled in Medicaid.
Therefore, data sharing across agencies could impact more than 230K SNAP cases in Mississippi.
4. Digitize documents
DHS’s processes for intake and case management are paper-based and highly manual. Payment error
rates have increased in recent years (SNAP: ~8% in 2022), largely due to clerical / processing errors.
Other states and organizations have seen a 3%-5% savings in administrative spend by moving to a
paperless system. We estimate that DHS can save $400-$600K in administrative expenses by
digitizing eligibility and case management. In addition to time saved, other benefits not
factored into the savings estimate include:
• Improved data security
• More efficient use of physical office space
• Reduced rate of clerical error
• Enablement of future digital enhancement and data sharing
5. Streamline reporting requirements

DHS staff produces status and impact reports on various initiatives and programs throughout the
year. In addition to being time-consuming, these reports often overlap in content, yet require minor
distinctions based on the audience or specific reporting mandate. The process for completing these
reports, some of which are required monthly, has become overly burdensome on DHS staff.
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Streamlining reporting requirements to reduce redundant content would free up staff hours
for higher-value activities. Efficiency in this process, whether through revised requirements,
report consolidation, or utilization of digital tools (e.g., GenAI), will allow staff to spend more time
serving Mississippi residents.
5.4 Mississippi Division of Medicaid

DOM provides access to quality health coverage for the state’s most vulnerable residents, including
children, low-income families, pregnant women, the elderly, and the disabled.
Project Momentum identified opportunities to increase options for low-cost, high-quality
services while streamlining indirect spend to enhance efficiency and better serve Medicaid recipients
through four initiatives worth $45M - $55M:

Provide more long-term care at home $32 - $39M
Carve out Medicaid pharmacy benefit $9M
Automate eligibility / enrollment process $3M - $6M
Implement analytics for monitoring fraud, abuse, and overuse $1M
in programs

DOM operates with an annual budget of $1.2B operating across four main areas, including:
• (1,032M) Medical services: Contract, negotiate, oversee, and pay for Medicaid Fee-For-
Service (FFS), MississippiCAN, Children’s Health Insurance Program (CHIP), and premium
assistance.
• (10M) Other Health Support Programs: Contract, negotiate, oversee, and pay for Long-
Term Care (LTC), Home and Community Based Services (HCBS), Non-Emergency
Transportation (NET) services, and school-based health programs.
• (25M) Eligibility Enrollment: Determine eligibility and manage enrollment across
Medicaid offerings.
• (101M) Disproportionate Share Hospital (DSH) / Clawback: Make DSH payments and
clawback payments.
Serving more than 25% of Mississippi residents, DOM has been challenged by soaring enrollment,
particularly with the unwinding of the Medicaid continuous enrollment provision, coupled with
under-staffed and over-burdened administrative and eligibility functions. It is more critical than ever
that DOM implement more efficient, cost-saving initiatives to ensure enhanced benefits and services
delivery. Controlling spend in high-cost areas and program administration (e.g., long-term
institutional care, pharmacy benefit administration) will enable DOM to serve Mississippi’s most
vulnerable citizens more effectively.
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1. Provide more home and community-based long-term care
The State of Mississippi spends more than $1.5B on long-term care services annually, providing
institutional care and home and community-based services (HCBS) to aging and disabled
beneficiaries. Mississippi spends an outsized amount on institutional care versus HCBS, given the
higher cost of institutional care (on average, institutional care costs ~$53K per capita while HCBS
costs ~$21K per capita).
Mississippi treats fewer long-term care patients in home / community settings than its peers. Peer
states treat an average of 66% of long-term care patients in home- and community-based settings,
compared to 56% in Mississippi.
The state should pursue efforts to provide more home- and community-based care for key reasons:
• Beneficiary Preferences and Quality of Life. Most individuals prefer to receive care in their
homes or communities. Providing services that enable people to age or receive care in a setting
of their choice promotes individual autonomy, dignity, and independence. Moreover, patient
surveys indicate that 70%-75% of adults prefer to receive care in their homes and
communities, rather than enter institutions.
• Cost-Effectiveness. Home- and community-based services are more cost-effective than
institutional care, reducing long-term care expenses.
• Quality / Outcomes: Data suggests HCBS outcomes are on par with institutional care, and
high-quality HCBS care produces better outcomes than high-quality institutional care.
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Exhibit 16: Mississippi long-term care services vs. peers 9
•Mississippi stands to capture an estimated savings of $32M-$39M over 5-10 years with
ongoing efforts to rebalance long-term care and provide a greater proportion of services
through HCBS, versus institutional care. Investment in infrastructure and resources to support
HCBS capacity increase will be necessary to support this shift over time.
Key investments needed to facilitate this shift may include:
1. Attract and retain a stable workforce for HCBS via increased home health aide
compensation, building pipeline of personnel, and licensing institutional workers as home
health aides.
2. Scale down institutional capacity by “buying back” institutional beds with one-time
payment and repurposing institutions as HCBS providers.
3. Develop the appropriate infrastructure to support aging-in-place by investing in housing
and accessible transportation for beneficiaries.
4. Establish person-centered planning and coordination to ensure that patients are placed
in settings best suited for their condition.
Increased capacity for home and community-based care will result in fewer patients placed in
institutional settings over time, leading to long-term cost savings.
2. Move to a single Pharmacy Benefit Management (PBM) model
Historically, many states have incorporated pharmacy benefit management into Medicaid managed
care contracts, allowing PBMs within each contract to manage claims processing, price negotiation,
drug formulary management, and more. However, states do not have visibility into drug pricing
9Source: Distribution of FFS Medicaid Spending on Long Term Care, Medicaid Enrollees Using Institutional LTSS, Medicaid
Enrollees Using HCBS, CMS HCBS Quality Metrics, How Medicaid Home and Community-Based Services and Supports Can
Chart Pathways to Independence, LTSS for Older Adults: A Review of HCBS vs. Institutional Care, AARP 2018 Home and
Community Preferences National Survey
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negotiation between PBMs and suppliers. Therefore, it is difficult for states to assess the value, or
lack thereof, in working with PBMs. The Office of the state Auditor previously investigated a PBM,
which resulted in the PBM repaying $55 million back to the state, so converting to a single PBM
may make those assessments and monitoring easier.
Moving to a single PBM model could save the state ~$9M in total pharmacy spend by
reducing administrative costs and increasing oversight on drug pricing.
The primary benefits of moving to a single PBM model include:
• Reduced complexity in administration by consolidating under a single entity.
• Improved price negotiation with manufacturers and pharmacies, leading to cost savings.
• Enhanced coordination of care between medical and pharmacy services.
• More consistent policies and formularies across the Medicaid program, ensuring equitable
access to medications and reducing confusion among beneficiaries and providers.
• Uniform prior authorization processes, making it easier for providers to navigate and
ensuring consistent criteria for medication approvals.
States that moved to a single PBM model (e.g., West Virgina, Kentucky, California, Ohio) have seen
an average administrative savings of 3.5% and average pharmacy claims savings of 16.5%.
During this analysis, DOM began considering this model and estimated potential administrative
savings of $3.2M. Based on peer benchmarks, we estimate an additional ~$6M in savings can come
from increased pricing oversight (e.g., drug costs, claims management, rebate management). DOM
has now acted upon this recommendation. 10
Exhibit 17 shows this estimate in more detail.
10 Excluding ND in savings rate for pharmacy claims given they did not take previous steps to control PBM spending. Source:
KFF, FY22/23 Medicaid Budget Survey, KFF FY20 Medicaid Budget Survey, Medicaid Gross Spending and Rebates for
Drugs by Delivery System MACPAC, Kentucky PBM Report on Medicaid Pharmacy Pricing, Ohio SPBM information;
Analysis of the Medi-Cal Budget 2020-21, State Pharmacy Benefit Manager Legislation, AB 913 Pharmacy Benefit Managers,
Ohio Requires Pass Through Payment Model, Medical Services Budget – House Bill 1012 Tradition and Expansion North
Dakota, Pharmacy Savings Report, West Virginia Medicaid, Prohibitions of Spread Pricing in Medicaid Contracts
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Exhibit 17: Moving to a single PBM model
3. Automate eligibility and enrollment workflows

DOM’s eligibility verification process is mostly manual and paper-based, resulting in significant staff
burden and longer processing times for beneficiaries, among other challenges. Currently, staff must
visit multiple interfaces to conduct verification checks and print out case files, with an additional two
to three manual reviews of eligibility determination. This results in an inefficient, time-intensive
process for both staff and beneficiaries.
Moving to a paperless case management system would streamline intake process and enable further
technological enhancements in eligibility verification. Automating eligibility and enrollment
processes could save the state $3M-$6M by eliminating manual data input and multiple
manual reviews in eligibility workflows. Other benefits include more efficient and secure storage
of eligibility documentation, increased speed to determination, and lower staff turnover due to
improved experience / reduced overtime.
Key steps are required to support move to digital eligibility verification process:
1. Move to a paperless case management and document verification system, both of which are
currently manual.
2. Increase integration with eligibility documentation interfaces to automatically pull relevant
eligibility data into case files.
3. Update rules-based checks to reach an accurate eligibility determination without needing a
manual process, freeing up time for staff to focus on complex beneficiary situations.
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4. Enhance Fraud, Waste, and Abuse (FWA) detection and recovery

A national Payment Error Rate Measurement (PERM)
report projected overpayments identification for Mississippi AI-enabled detection software
at 0.8%, ranking 8th among the 12 states analyzed in the could yield a savings of ~$1M
report. However, Mississippi reported overpayment Higher amounts of fraud, waste, and
projected at 0.15 – 5 times less than the national PERM abuse overpayments could be
reported. Mississippi can enhance detection and save ~1M recouped. Current program integrity
annually by enhancing fraud detection and increasing workforce would grow proportionally
rate of improper payment recovery. To support increased to increase in detected fraud (5x), but
recouperation, target three areas: total personnel need can be decreased
• Modeling and Advanced Analytics: Implement AI- by ~50%.
enabled FWA detection software (outlier analysis,
supervised and unsupervised learning) to enable faster and more accurate decision making.
• Technologies: Integrate data / systems for monitoring and implement visualization of end-
to-end pipeline.
• Processes, resources, and governance: Establish a robust decision-making process,
implement clear decision governance, and support change management and internal trainings.
5.5 Mississippi Department of Public Safety

DPS enforces Mississippi state laws, with a particular focus on patrolling highways to enforce traffic
laws, conducting investigations and regulating vehicles, and issuing drivers licenses. In 2021, per new
legislation, DPS absorbed the Mississippi Department of Transportation’s (DOT) commercial
trucking enforcement division.
Project Momentum identified opportunities to improve internal operational efficiency
through four initiatives totaling $7M - $10M:

Eliminate duplicative inspection teams $6M - $7M
Increase digital services (internally) $1M
Increase digital services (externally) $2M

DPS operates with an annual state budget of $174.4M. To fulfill its goals, it distributes funds across
three main services:
• ($149.3M) Law Enforcement: Oversee state’s Highway Patrol, Bureaus of Investigation &
Narcotics, Homeland Security, and forensic laboratories.
• ($19.8M) Driver Service Bureau: Administer the division responsible for issuing drivers
licenses, identification documents, and firearm permits.
• ($5.3M) Law Enforcement Training: Provide professional law enforcement training to
state, county, and municipal police agencies.
DPS has opportunity to reduce spending in two key areas: administrative personnel and the Driver
Service Bureau. DPS spends ~$7.6M on administrative personnel, who have limited access to digital
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tools for internal processes. This reduces their productivity. The Department’s expenditures for its
Driver Service Bureau reached nearly $20M in FY23, a significant cost that can be reduced by
increasing residents’ use of online services.
1. Reduce DPS commercial vehicle inspection activities
DPS has experienced organizational and operational challenges since absorbing Capitol Police and
DOT’s commercial vehicle inspection team. DPS previously operated its own commercial vehicle
inspection team, and in this move, absorbed 200+ full-time employees from DOT’s team. Though
the aim was to drive “economies of scale” with the absorption from DOT, the new commercial
vehicle team remains a stand-alone division.
Compared to peer states, Mississippi has an oversized commercial vehicle inspection team
(Exhibit 18). DPS should reduce the size of its commercial inspection team to match those
of other states – which could drive $6M - $7M in savings.
Exhibit 18: Vehicle inspection team ratios
2. Increase use of internal digital tools

Most internal processes in DPS are executed manually, without relying on digital tools – mainly
because of employee reluctance to adopt these tools. Given the recent expansion of the agency’s
responsibilities and absorption of Capitol Police and DOT teams, the over-reliance on paper-based
and manual processes has limited integration and the agency’s ability to operate efficiently.
DPS should widely adopt and utilize digital tools to execute internal administrative processes. In
comparable scenarios, this leads to an estimated 15% gain in productivity, suggesting that
DPS could capture ~$1M in savings by increasing the use of digital tools. To ensure
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successful implementation of digital solutions, staff will need proper training and effective
encouragement to adopt these tools in their daily workflows.
3. Increase usage of online driver services tools
DPS faces ongoing challenges with high staff turnover, Slow move toward service
particularly for personnel in the Driver Service Bureau. modernization
Additionally, while DPS has an online portal that provides Currently, DPS processes ~800K
basic driver services, attempts to modernize user-facing transactions annually through
services (e.g., self-service kiosks) have been unsuccessful. three main channels:
Enhancing online access to driver services can improve the
staff experience and ease of access for Mississippi residents. • Online (50% of transactions)
• In-person (40%)
While comparable agencies in other states have started using • Mail (10%)
online tools, DPS spends far more on in-person services
(~$9M) than online-based services (<$900K). If Mississippi
increased usage of its online platform by 10%, the state could capture ~$2M in savings while
maintaining a high level of customer service. Savings captured through increased online usage
could enable the Department to invest further in additional digital service offerings.
Executing this transition will require increasing awareness that digital services are available (e.g.,
increasing advertising, providing information on digital services to in-person customers). In addition,
taking a customer-focused approach to identifying and addressing user pain points with the online
service will help increase utilization over time.
5.6 Mississippi Department of Corrections

DOC aims to enhance public safety by providing safe and secure facilities, effective supervision, and
rehabilitative services for those entering the corrections system.
Project Momentum identified opportunities to invest in prevention programs worth
$3M - $5M:

Improve and expand inmate programming aimed at reducing $3M - $5M
recidivism

DOC contends with overcrowded facilities and a high recidivism (repeat offending) rate. As of Fall
2023, capacity rates at DOC’s state and regional facilities have routinely stood above 90%. Capacity
rates at private prisons that partner with DOC generally exceed 95%. As of November 2023, there
were 21,311 inmates in DOC custody.
1. Improve and expand inmate programming aimed at reducing recidivism

The recidivism rate in Mississippi (35%), though about average in the nation, significantly exceeds
that of several peer states. North Carolina (19% lower), South Carolina (18% lower), and Georgia
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(10% lower) have implemented critical programming proven to reduce recidivism rates. If
Mississippi expands existing programs and adopts evidence-based programs, as implemented in
other states, it could reduce the number of reoffenders by 60-140 individuals, saving taxpayers
$3M-$5M annually in operational costs.
Exhibit 19: Mississippi re-incarceration rate compared to other states
A recent legislative report showed that technical

Case studies:
violations by offenders under community
Effective recidivism programming in other states
supervision (i.e., probation and parole)
contribute to a meaningful increase in the North Carolina (19.3% reduction)
prison population. Critically, over 90% of those • Individualized case management
whose parole was revoked went to prison for • Improved probation and parole officer training
technical violations, not for committing a new • Introduction of local reentry councils
crime.
Mississippi should consider implementing South Carolina (17.9% reduction)
evidence-based initiatives, such as • Enhanced mental health programming
individualized case planning and mental health • Individual risk assessment
programming, which have reduced recidivism in • Improved parole and probation officer training
peer states.
Georgia (10% reduction)
Taxpayers foot the bill for every inmate sent to • Increased use of transitional centers
prison, underscoring the importance of • Authorization of parole officer sanctions
investing in data-driven prevention efforts to
reduce the number of re-offenders. This is both
financially prudent and drives broader societal benefits by reducing overall crime.
5.7 Mississippi Department of Revenue (DOR)

DOR operates a budget of ~$158M and is responsible for administering and enforcing tax laws and
regulations within the state.
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Project Momentum identified two opportunities to streamline DOR processes and capture a
total savings of $2.7M:
Further digitize filings $2.7M

DOR allocates state funds across three primary areas:
• Tax Collection ($138M): Administer and enforce Mississippi’s tax laws and regulations. Issue
refunds for homestead exemptions.
• Alcoholic Beverages Control ($11M): Regulate the import, storage, and sales of alcoholic
beverages across the state. Regulate cannabis dispensaries.
• Property and Motor Vehicle Services ($9M): Administer property and motor vehicle
registration services (e.g., titles, license plates).
While DOR has experienced recent successes in expanding digital services for collecting and
administering the state’s tax revenues, a significant portion (40%) of small businesses still file paper
tax returns, generating excess cost associated with mailing and processing documents. The
Department can achieve significant savings by streamlining administrative processes in revenue
collection and alcohol warehouse management.
1. Process Paper Documents for Small Businesses Tax Filings

Mississippi has a high rate of electronic tax filings (in line with the national average of 90%), but
40% of small businesses (75K+) still file via mail / paper. DOR’s requirement for businesses to file
W-2s and other documents electronically does not apply to small businesses. Further, DOR
processes
The implications of processing paper documents include:
• DOR, an already lean organization, invests in talent and equipment to manually process and
digitize paper documents.
• DOR could save an estimated $800K annually by requiring the minority of entities that still file
via paper to file tax documentation electronically. DOR could save an additional $700K by
further digitizing monthly tax notices and sending them electronically.
• DOR could save an estimated $1.2M annually by further digitizing both the vehicle
registration and lien process(es).
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5.8 Mississippi Development Authority (MDA)

MDA provides business development assistance via business incentives and site selection support.
Additionally, MDA is also home to the state tourism office, Office of Energy, Community
Incentives, Disaster Recovery, and the state film office. MDA also aids small- to mid-sized
businesses to become competitive in national and global economies.
Project Momentum identified opportunities to improve the impact of MDA’s investments
through two initiatives worth $4M - $9M:

Eliminate programs with low ROI $3M - $8M
Close underutilized Welcome Centers $0.6M

To fulfill its goals, MDA operates with an annual state budget of $25.4M and distributes the funds
across five main categories:
• ($10.4M) Support Services: provide HR and other administrative services to DHS divisions.
• ($6.0M) Tourism: promote Mississippi to tourists to generate economic growth.
• ($2.2M) Community Services: enhance community development via public infrastructure
funding.
• (2.1M) Global Business: attract international business to the state and promote exporting
goods.
• (2.1M) Welcome Centers: create space for tourists to learn more about Mississippi.
In the past few years, MDA has seen a significant increase in the number of economic development
incentives offered. These range from loans and grants to tax credits. However, there is no clear
process for measuring efficacy or ROI for these incentives. MDA must implement a data collection
and incentive evaluation process to that ensure taxpayer funds are being utilized effectively.
1. Modernize the Mississippi Motion Picture Motion Picture Incentive Programs Are
Incentive Program Not Paying Off
The Mississippi Motion Picture Incentive Program In 2015, a Joint Legislative Committee on
provides cash rebates to incentivize film Performance Evaluation and Expenditure
production in the state. While there is limited Review (PEER) study done on 10 states
available data to evaluate the efficacy of this revealed that for every dollar invested, ROI
incentive, the University Research Center found ranged 0.07-0.49. For every dollar
that the program operated at a net loss of over Mississippi invested in film incentives, the
$1M in FY2019. Moreover, the same study found State gained only 0.49 cents, indicating a
that most of the jobs created by these film projects clear loss of 0.51 cents per every dollar
have been short-term. invested. Since then, 3 out of 10 states in the
Eliminating this program would result in study have ended their programs.
estimated annual savings of $3.6M (based on
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average investment since 2017), freeing funds to invest in other programs that provide tangible value
to Mississippi residents. Expenditures for this program are expected to reach $6.9M in 2023,
demonstrating increased savings potential by eliminating this program. 11
Alternatively, if the program is not eliminated, the state can consider increasing the minimum
qualifying spend for eligibility or other, similar limitations on eligibility. Mississippi has the second-
lowest minimum spend requirement ($50K) compared to peer states. By increasing the minimum to
match Alabama or Georgia at $500K, the number of projects eligible between 2017-2022 would
have decreased by 46%, yet local spend would have decreased by only 8%. The state could also
reimagine the program to incentivize companies to establish permanent production studios instead
of intermittent local production. These alternatives would, at a minimum, reduce the administrative
burden on MDA staff.
Exhibit 20: Losses from Mississippi’s investment in motion picture incentives
2. Implement formal process for ongoing evaluation of incentives

Currently, there is no formal process for tracking efficacy or ROI for MDA incentives. As a result,
the return on specific incentives to state tax revenue or other intended policy outcomes is unclear.
The Mississippi Tourism Rebate Program is an example of an incentive with unclear outcomes.
Since 2013, MDA has paid $32M for the Tourism Rebate Program to develop tourism-oriented
projects across four main industries: hotel / conference, Retail, Sports / Entertainment, and
Restaurant. Given the 15-year maximum of each onboarded project, MDA remains liable for $454M
in incentives over 15 years.
11 Source: Joint Legislative Committee on Performance Evaluation and Expenditure Review (PEER); FY22 Mississippi
Incentives Report
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Moreover, Mississippi program terms are more generous than peer states. For example, tourism
rebate programs in peer states allow eligible projects to receive up to 25% of development
costs over a 10-year term. In the 2020 Tax Expenditures report, the University Research Center
concluded that “many, if not most, of the projects that have qualified for this incentive have not
drawn much spending by out-of-state customers,” rendering unclear whether the tourism rebate
program achieved its intended goal.
The Mississippi Tourism Rebate Program is just one example of incentives with unclear outcomes.
To help inform decision-making around which incentives to sustain, MDA can improve its
evaluation process:
• Clearly articulate incentive outcomes and intended plan / metrics to evaluate ROI.
Invest in data collection to ensure data-driven decision-making on key incentive programs.
• Examine incentive structure to provide incentives over time, based on performance /
achievement of intended outcomes. The majority offer up-front incentives with clawback
provisions that are often difficult to enforce.
• Consolidate incentives where there are similar or overlapping intended outcomes. A
2020 Tax Expenditure report highlighted the Existing Industry Withholding Rebate Program,
Mississippi Major Economic Impact Authority Withholding Rebate Program, and Jobs
Advantage Incentive, as an opportunity to consolidate into one incentive, given their
similarities.
3. Consider closing Welcome Centers
MDA operates 13 welcome centers statewide, where visitors can learn more about Mississippi’s
history, topography, and recreational activities. On average, each center costs $150K per year to
operate. Staffing challenges make it difficult for many centers to maintain daily operations.
Between 2019 and 2023, four welcome centers (Delma, Adams, Warren, and Woodville) saw an
average year-over-year decline in visitation rates ranging from -9% to -36%, while other centers have
largely seen visitation rates increase since the pandemic. These four centers also cumulatively
represent less than 10% of total annual visitors to Mississippi’s Welcome Centers. Closing these
four Welcome Centers would result in an estimated savings of $600K to the state.
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5.9 Mississippi Department of Education (MDE)

The MDE’s mission is to ensure that all Mississippi students have an effective education and are
prepared for their futures. While MDE’s primary role is to fund and license schools, it has increased
its scope and now provides coaching services to schools. Through directed investment in teachers’
salaries and instructional services, MDE has helped improve educational outcomes across the state.
Project Momentum identified opportunities to ensure dollars reach students through five
initiatives worth $92M - $135M:

Support schools in getting better value in procurement $44M - $82M
Centralize school property insurance $23M
Consolidate school district back-office functions $14M
Invest in energy efficiency upgrades to reduce utilities spend $9M - $14M
Consolidate CTE programs with low attendance to focus on $2M
priority programs

The state plays three primary roles in Education under the purview of MDE and the state Board of
Education:
• ($2,812M) School District Funding & Support: Provides money to school districts to fund
a portion of their operations. Most funds subject to this review were appropriated using the
now-replaced Mississippi Adequate Education Program (MAEP) formula, which used multiple
factors, primarily school attendance, to determine allocated funds. Districts had the flexibility
to use these funds as they saw fit.
• ($89M) Career & Technical Education: Provides funding to schools (and some post-
secondary institutions such as community colleges) for vocational programs (with 60+
programs offered across 14 areas). MDE is responsible for approving individual programs at
school districts but provides ~$27M in funding to the Mississippi Community College Board
to support vocational programs at community colleges.
• ($105M) MDE Programs & Administration: Gives financial support to targeted programs
to improve learning outcomes (e.g., teacher coaches), and has personnel to conduct oversight
and regulatory functions for schools (e.g., teacher licensure).
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Exhibit 21: Mississippi math and reading achievement 12
Legislative reforms that increased teacher salaries and spending on instructional services (e.g.,
teacher coaches) helped support this transformation. However, Mississippi schools spend less on
instruction (~58%) than the national average. If Mississippi schools reached the national average, it
would mean more than $200M additional dollars to support student instruction, underscoring the
importance of driving greater efficiency in school operations.
Exhibit 22: Mississippi instruction spending 13
Mississippi’s method of funding schools presents challenges like the fact that districts can spend a
large share of funds on non-instructional purposes by using the state portion for teacher pay and no
scrutiny or caps exist on growth in administrative or support costs.
12 National Assessment for Educational Progress, Census Bureau
13 U.S. Census School Data: Elementary and secondary spend (%) on instruction.
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1. Implement procurement reforms
Mississippi schools spend a large portion of state funds – more than $600M – on acquiring essential
goods and services. Schools across the state procure goods and services in accordance with their
school board policies. This results in a variety of badly coordinated procurement methods between
schools or with MDE.
Because of this decentralized structure, it is difficult for districts to collectively purchase goods and
services, resulting in limited ability to obtain bulk discounts. Moreover, districts often leverage state
contracts as a starting point for procurement. However, as shown in Section 4.2, those contracts do
not always have best-value pricing.
Exhibit 23: State share of 2022-2023 school year procurement spend
Systematically instituting procurement reforms could yield annual savings to school districts
ranging from $44M – $82M (based on savings generated after improving purchasing processes for
other public-sector agencies).
There are several mechanisms by which school districts across the state can work together more
effectively to obtain better pricing and terms for their purchases:
• Collect data on the usage of state contracts by district to support the state’s negotiations
with vendors (i.e., to request bulk discounts) and allow MDE to reach out to districts to
encourage the use of state contracts.
• Provide additional support (e.g., staff, funding) to Regional Education Service
Agencies (RESAs) such as the North Mississippi Education Consortium (NMEC), enabling
them to hire additional staff to procure goods and services for their school districts. This
would allow RESAs to obtain bulk discounts and more favorable terms than they would
working individually.
• Encourage or require usage of cooperative Mississippi contracts from other entities (e.g.,
Texas, GSA Advantage) that provide better value
• Encourage or require the adoption of standardized procurement policies and processes
policies (e.g., requiring the use of “best available bid”) to ensure that school districts are using
procurement and acquisition best practices.
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2. Support clerical staff sharing

Districts have faced ongoing difficulties in recruiting and retaining critical clerical and support staff.
As a result, many staff members are asked to manage multiple support functions, such as HR,
finance, and facilities management. These challenges contribute to large variations in spend per
student on support services.
Exhibit 24: School district state spend on “shareable” clerical and

administrative staff for 2022-2023
Enhanced sharing of support services and resources (e.g., HR, job recruiting, software) across
school districts can improve efficiency and quality of outcomes. This model enables staff to
specialize in one function and reduce repetitive tasks across districts. This would be particularly
beneficial in smaller or rural districts that lack the scale to run efficient operations. Moving to a
shared services model could save the state $14M annually.
Comparable states (including those with sizeable rural populations) have created regional consortia
for resource and services sharing:
Exhibit 25: State regional resource and services consortia
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Note: Uptake for services varies by school district (e.g., larger share of smaller rural districts may utilize shared
services).
Key mechanisms the state can take to effect this change include:
• Provide additional financial or staff resources to RESAs (similar to practices in Texas,
Ohio, and Wisconsin) to support additional shared services.
• Provide guidelines to districts for sharing staff and outline joint funding agreements.
3. Implement energy efficiency initiatives

Utility prices have risen significantly in recent years, resulting in increased school spend on energy
and utilities ($107M total). Mississippi schools spend an estimated 60% more on electricity and
natural gas per student than the rest of the U.S., despite lower overall energy prices. In addition,
there is significant variation in energy spend between schools, suggesting that aging buildings are
most in need of enhancement.
Exhibit 26: Energy and utility spend
Investing in projects such as improving insulation, installing efficient HVAC systems, and switching
to energy-efficient light bulbs can reduce long-term utilities spend. According to Federal estimates,
implementing these types of changes can save 20% to 30% in energy costs. This translates to
savings of $9M - $14M for the state. Notably, the Federal Government has continued to expand
funding to state and local jurisdictions for investment in energy-efficient infrastructure.
The state can invest in energy-efficient infrastructure in several ways:
• Establish programs to support schools in implementing energy-efficient measures (e.g.,
providing expert staff support) and applying for relevant Federal grants (including those part
of the Bipartisan Infrastructure Law).
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• Create partnerships with private utility companies to jointly cover expenses, allowing
them to share in cost savings.
• Extend low or zero-interest loans to districts for funding efficiency upgrades.
• Offering financial support or direct funding for energy-saving infrastructure projects by
utilizing Mississippi capital funds. This could be similar to the state of Ohio model, which
funded energy-efficiency programs with a “payback” period of fewer than 15 years.
4. Centralize school property insurance
Mississippi schools spend $39M in state funds on property and liability insurance – excluding
Workers’ Compensation and health insurance. Property and liability insurance rates have increased
in recent years, becoming a concern for school districts. Moreover, property and liability insurance
expenditures vary wildly across districts (even when accounting for proximity to the coast).
Extending Mississippi’s property insurance (with a hybrid model, as outlined in the DFA
section) could save up to $23M per year and reduce the administrative burden on school
districts to purchase and manage property insurance.
Exhibit 27: State spending for insurance
5. Re-evaluate and streamline Career and Technical Education Programs

Mississippi provides approximately $50M in funding for staff to teach more than 60 Career and
Technical Education (CTE) programs across 14 sectors. Of these, five sectors have been identified
by AccelerateMS as vital to the state’s economy (e.g., advanced manufacturing). These priority
sectors receive about 60% of instructional funding.
Beyond these priority areas, many schools offer a wide variety of programs, despite low student
interest. Half the spending is directed to programs that serve only 15% of students. Moreover, only
4% of students are in classes that consume 20% of the state’s instructional CTE assistance.
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The state could save $2M by merging non-priority and lower-interest programs without
affecting overall enrollment or availability of priority programs. The Department could
consider re-deploying savings to provide one-time funds for schools to start offering “priority
programs” (e.g., equipment needed for advanced manufacturing).
Exhibit 28: Breakdown of teacher unit spend versus number of students

(by individual school program)
Key actions MDE can take to drive this transition for CTE include:
• Consolidate multiple courses within the same program and offered in the same district.
• Review funding approval for programs with low uptake (e.g., fewer than 50 students in a year),
particularly where similar programs already exist in schools.
• Accelerate the funding shift from low-uptake classes to priority sectors, leveraging targeted
equipment grants.
• Increase cross-district class sharing (potentially requiring transportation support).
6. Reduce administrative workload

One key opportunity to simplify MDE’s internal administrative workload while enhancing outcomes
is to transfer School Attendance Officers (SAOs) back to districts.
The state employs SAOs who proactively visit students with poor attendance to reduce truancy.
Mississippi has limited ability to supervise these efforts, as they are mostly in the field, and their
efficacy remains unclear. Moreover, school staff have difficulty coordinating with state-hired SAOs,
as they are not accountable to district leadership.
Instead of employing SAOs directly, the state should provide funds to schools and mandate that
they hire SAOs. This would enhance engagement by fostering better oversight and collaboration
while easing the administrative load on MDE. The state should also, simultaneously, add attendance
as a consideration in the accountability model by which Mississippi measures school quality. When
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school districts have an incentive to increase attendance, their likelihood of managing SAOs
properly will increase.
7. Reforms to policies and funding formulas to ensure savings are realized
As outlined above (and as identified by other reports such as from PEER), schools can implement
several initiatives to save on operations. However, the state may need to take additional action to
ensure that schools implement these initiatives and reinvest funds to support students. Of course, all
efforts to alter funding mechanisms must promote increasing the share of spend for instruction
while remaining flexible to not unintentionally harm challenged schools (e.g., rural schools without
sufficient scale).
Mississippi can take a range of actions (based on best practices from other states) to ensure that
schools use funds for instruction – ranging from least to most state action:
1. Increase scrutiny (e.g., Illinois)
Mississippi can require additional justification from schools that show a large (or increasing) share of
expenditures dedicated to non-instructional activity. This light-touch approach highlights
overspending without requiring significant state resources or action. It is unlikely, however, to drive
transformational change without an enforcement mechanism.
2. Provide school supports (e.g., Illinois)
The state can provide support services (e.g., coaches) to districts with excessive non-instructional
spend growth to help address root causes of spending challenges. Mississippi has used a coaching
model successfully to improve instructional outcomes and could further support districts in
identifying solutions to spending challenges. However, as with the previous intervention, this lacks
an enforcement mechanism to curb expenditure growth.
3. Fund use restrictions (e.g., California)
Earmarking portions of district funding as block grants with specific uses can ensure prudent
utilization. This approach is used in California, where a share of funds is designated for specific
purposes, such as Special Education. Leftover funds not used for their designated purpose are
required to be used for high-need students. This system provides flexibility for districts while
ensuring that funds reach students rather than administration. However, this would not apply to
local funds – thus creating a loophole for districts to allocate local funding toward administration
and utilize state funds for instructional purposes.
4. Cap administrative growth (e.g., Illinois)
Some states have a more direct approach to controlling spend and implemented a cap on
administrative spending growth. For example, Illinois has a 5% cap with limited exceptions. Based
on other state models, Mississippi should consider the following steps to control administrative
spending growth:
• MDE reviews and approves school expenditure growth and offers support resources to
manage spend if helpful (as outlined above).
• If MDE does not approve, the state Board of Education can approve the school’s waiver
request to increase administrative spending.
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October 2024
• If neither request is approved, the state can reduce funding to push for more efficient
administration.
The benefit of this approach is that it caps cost growth without requiring schools to significantly
change current operations. In addition, it offers the agency flexibility to intervene and control
spending while providing exceptions if needed (e.g., challenged districts). Finally, this approach
allows state oversight of all expenditures (including those from local revenue sources), versus just
those from Mississippi sources, ensuring that students truly benefit.
However, this approach adds administrative complexity for the state and may unintentionally
penalize districts in already challenged areas. This factor will need to be carefully considered and
mitigated.
5. Cap spending (e.g., Texas proposal)
The most direct action is to cap the total funds that can be used for non-instructional purposes, as
proposed in Texas. Mississippi can mandate penalties on districts with excessive administrative
expenditures. This type of action would need to be carefully managed to ensure that it does not
create undue burden on already challenged schools, though as an enforcement mechanism this
proposal may be the most effective.
5.10 Mississippi Department of Employment Security (MDES)

MDES seeks to expand employment, improve workforce skills, and enhance productivity in
Mississippi. MDES administers the unemployment benefits program that provides payments to
Mississippians who have lost their jobs through no fault of their own. MDES also operates a
network of WIN Job Centers, matching qualified, prospective employees with employers.
Nearly all of the agency’s operating budget is Federally funded, resulting in little to no
opportunity for state savings. There are two areas where increased operating efficiency is
recommended. However, they do not directly result in cost savings to Mississippi.
1. Enhance technology / digital platforms for unemployment services delivery
Currently, processing and verifying unemployment claims is a highly manual process. Employment
verification is conducted by phone call to employers, often taking 2-4 weeks to process and verify
claims. Cases that require investigation can take even longer. Opportunities for enhancement, some
of which MDES is already considering, include:
• Enhanced technology and use of AI to shorten this process to 3 days. MDES is currently
planning and implementing enhanced technology to address this area.
• Collecting unemployment tax from employers is also a highly manual process that often
requires staff to physically go to employers to collect taxes.
• Enhanced data systems would enable employers to file / pay their taxes online, eliminating the
need for staff to go to each employer.
2. Process for oversight and evaluation of AccelerateMS workforce programming
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October 2024
MDES serves as the financial arm for AccelerateMS, an initiative created in 2021 by the Mississippi
legislature to provide workforce development training and other programs that support employment
and workforce preparedness. Since its inception, AccelerateMS has provided state funds to sub-
grantees, including:
• $5.25M to Three Rivers Planning & Development District for the implementation of
Career Coach Program in 26 counties across 40 school districts.
• $2.4M to MS Works Workforce Training to provide workforce training services (e.g., on-
the-job training [OJT], internships, customized training, and multi-company OJT grants) to
eight companies.
Given its recent start, public data on efficacy of AccelerateMS workforce programs is limited. Going
forward, it is recommended that there be a standard process for collecting data and evaluating
programming for effectiveness.
5.11 Mississippi Emergency Management Agency (MEMA)

MEMA is responsible for safeguarding Mississippi and its residents by fostering a culture of
preparedness, executing timeline responses during disasters, and quickly restoring quality of life
post-event. MEMA provides information and planning to the public and coordinates response and
recovery efforts during emergency events.
Project Momentum identified opportunity to increase investment in mitigation in an
initiative totaling $5M:

Invest in mitigation to reduce disaster spend $5M

MEMA has several key functions that make up its ~$23M in spending:
• ($10M) Recovery efforts: Manage recovery efforts, such as individual assistance
reimbursements, following a disaster event.
• ($7M) Hazard Mitigation & Preparedness: Implement damage-prevention initiatives and
design emergency plans and training programs to prepare for a disaster event.
• ($4M) Response efforts: Coordinate state’s response to any natural or man-made emergency
through the state Emergency Operations Center.
• ($3M) Administrative Services: Oversee financial and personnel affairs across all MEMA
offices and programs.
1. Invest in mitigation to reduce disaster spend
Since 2013, the number of billion-dollar natural disasters in Mississippi has increased 17% annually,
from an average of 2.5 (2010-19) to 5.6 (since 2019). In addition, approximately 1 million sqft of
state-owned properties are in poor condition, with almost half located in regions prone to flooding.
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October 2024
By increasing mitigation investment by ~$900K, Mississippi can save an estimated ~$5M in

future disaster spend. Research indicates that every dollar invested in mitigation can save $6 in
future disaster response spend.
The state should invest in several areas, including:
Reinforcing roof, windows, and doors
Wind
Strengthening interconnecting structures between foundation and building elements
Reinforcing and floodproofing building walls and foundations
Flooring
Improving landscaping and drainage
These actions will need an investment of ~$8.5M, requiring an increase in the current level of
mitigation funding ($7.6M) by ~$900K.
Total cost to
Disaster type Total sqft 14 Cost / sqft to retrofit
retrofit
Wind 1.1M $3.2 $3.5M
Flooding 496K $10 $5M
Total costs: $8.5M
Moreover, if the state moves to the proposed hybrid property insurance model, increased risk
mitigation will (i) save taxpayer funds, and (ii) enable the state to better plan for expenditures by
reducing unexpected expenses.
Exhibit 29: Total number of billion-dollar disasters in Mississippi
1 Accounts for flooding, severe storm, tropical cyclone, wildfire, winter

storm, freeze and drought events. Source: National Centers for
Environmental Information.
14 Source: Mississippi DFA
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October 2024
5.12 Mississippi Department of Environmental Quality (MDEQ)

MDEQ is committed to safeguarding and improving the quality of Mississippi’s air, land, and water
resources while advocating for responsible environmental management. The agency enforces state
and Federal regulations related to the environment (e.g., air emissions, groundwater wells) and
engages with the private sector to provide oversight (e.g., issue permits, conduct inspections). In
addition, the Department offers financial support to local jurisdictions and entities for infrastructure
improvement projects and supports environmental research.
Project Momentum identified opportunities to improve MDEQ’s business model and
efficiency through two initiatives worth $2M:

Improve permitting technology $2M

By statute, MDEQ spends funds across five key areas. Staff are organized primarily across three
major offices defined by statute - each responsible for regulating a different environmental area:
• ($44M) Pollution Control: managing permits and inspections for air and waste.
• ($2M) Land & Water: managing permits and inspections for projects that impact state water
sources (e.g., groundwater, surface water diversion).
• ($2M) Geology: overseeing permits and supports research and data efforts related to state
mining interests.
• ($6M) Support Services: providing HR, procurement, and other administrative services to
MDEQ offices.
• ($24M) Direct grants: providing additional funds directly to entities to support local
infrastructure.
MDEQ struggles to keep up with the demands of regulating an expanding industry, and staff
numbers continue to decline. MDEQ has ~339 employees today, down from ~500 employees 15
years ago. Exhibit 30 shows the state share of FY 23 MDEQ salaries.
Exhibit 30: FY23 MDEQ salaries – state share
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October 2024
This is partially driven by low salaries, which has led to significant employee turnover. Increasing
turnover has resulted in staff being over-burdened with recruiting and onboarding rather than
advancing program objectives for Mississippi residents.
1. Use CRM Digital Platform for Inspections
Across various offices, MDEQ staff handle a substantial workload, which is complicated by
fragmented digital systems. Investing in digitization can help MDEQ keep up with permit demand.
DEQ agencies in other states have achieved significant gains by digitizing key inspection and permit
processes. One peer state found that deploying a centralized, digital CRM system across permitting
types unlocked 14% higher productivity, enabling staff to spend more time on permitting activities.
Should MDEQ adopt a similar platform, it could realize approximately $2M in staff
efficiency gains, a critical opportunity considering current staffing challenges. Successful
execution of this program will require comprehensive staff training and workflow adjustments to
ensure that technology is utilized effectively.
2. Reform the Promotion Cap to Reduce Staff Turnover
Staff turnover has doubled from historical levels of approximately 10% to roughly 20% per year.
Reducing staff turnover will preserve institutional knowledge and allow management to focus on
essential tasks while improving employee productivity, motivation, and morale.
Exiting employees cite pay disparity between their jobs and roles in the Federal Government and
private sector as a key reason for leaving. The State of Mississippi can slow the talent drain by:
• Building flexibility into the promotion policy, which limits disparity in pay across titles and
prevents targeted raises.
• Obtaining a waiver from the relevant state entities to provide higher staff raises for certain
roles.
• Focusing turnover reduction efforts on employees with the highest risk of leaving.
5.13 Mississippi Department of Wildlife Fisheries and Parks (MDWFP)

MDWFP’s mission is to conserve and enhance Mississippi’s wildlife, fisheries, and parks. MDWFP
also provides quality outdoor recreation and engages the public in natural resource conservation.
Project Momentum identified opportunities to right-size the Department’s operations
through three initiatives worth $2M:

Eliminate magazine and TV station $0.7M
Reclassify CCC cabins to reduce maintenance spend $0.5M - $0.6M
Close state golf courses $0.3M - $0.6M
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October 2024

MDWFP comprises several divisions, with a total state annual budget of ~$54M, categorized into
the following:
• ($16M) Parks: Manage and maintain State parks.
• ($15M) Law Enforcement: Enforce wildlife and gaming restrictions, including in State parks.
• ($6M) Fisheries & Wildlife: Manage and maintain fisheries, hatcheries and wildlife.
• ($4M) Museum: Operate Museum of Natural Science in Jackson.
• ($14M) Support Services: Provide HR, procurement, and other administrative services for
other functions.
1. Explore alternative leasing arrangements for state golf courses
The state currently owns and leases operations of four (three operable) golf courses: Hollow,
Mallard Pointe, LeFleur’s Bluff, and Dogwoods. The lease agreements are such that lessees retain
operating revenue and cover operating costs, while the state remains responsible for capital
expenditures and receives a leasing fee.
This arrangement has been inefficient, as Mississippi estimates that annual capital expenditures could
make up 30%-50% of overall annual golf course expenses, making the state responsible for $350K-
$600K in capital expenses per year. Meanwhile, the state receives an average of $25K in annual lease
revenue, resulting in an estimated annual loss of about $325K-$575K.
MDWFP can capture $300K-$600K annually by exploring alternative arrangements for golf
courses, including renegotiating the terms of the existing lease agreements, or repurposing the
existing land into another outdoor recreational offering for constituents.
2. Evaluate Options for Classification of Recreational Cabins
The Parks Division operates nearly 200 cabins for public use, and a significant portion of its annual
budget goes toward maintenance of these cabins. Nearly one-third of these cabins are classified as
historical, given their origins as Civilian Conservation Corps (CCC) projects.
Due to the historical requirements for materials, routine maintenance costs for CCC cabins can be
three to four times those of modern cabins. Furthermore, one-time renovations for CCC cabins cost
$310K on average – almost twice the cost of renovating modern cabins at $180K. Currently, about
one-third of CCC cabins require immediate renovation. Cabin renovations are a significant driver of
occupancy and revenue, with estimated occupancy of non-renovated cabins at 40% compared to
newly renovated cabins at 90%.
MDFWP can save $2.4M on one-time renovation costs and $450K annually by maintaining
about one-third of existing CCC cabins to modern, rather than historic, standards. Further
savings can be achieved by preserving even fewer cabins to historical standards. Making cabin
maintenance more fiscally feasible will also improve public access and increase cabin rental revenue.
3. End MS Outdoors Magazine and TV Channel
MDWFP publishes MS Outdoors magazine (with physical distribution of copies across the state) and
runs a TV channel with a range of content on nature, outdoor activities, and Mississippi’s natural
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October 2024
resources, including state parks. The magazine charges its ~9K subscribers a small subscription fee,
and the TV channel brings in approximately $7K in advertising revenue. Total revenue for these
programs is nowhere near their current annual operating costs of $700K per year.
It is no longer prudent to use taxpayer funds to continue funding these programs in their
current form. Mississippi is one of the few states in the region to publish this type of content, and
related content from other sources is widely available online. Given that an increasing number of
residents access this type of content through online channels (e.g., digital publications, social media,
YouTube), the Department should consider eliminating the program in its current form and
exploring other, more cost-effective methods to engage constituents. Alternatives include:
• Online-only publication instead of printed magazine.
• Leveraging user-generated content instead of employing content writers.
• Using YouTube as a primary channel for video content, rather than television, given growing
consumer preference for digital platforms.
P a g e | 59

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Project Momentum Report

5.6.1 Background and Context .......................................................................................................39

Exhibit 13: Rising insurance premiums ........................................................................................................26

2. Overview of Project Momentum

Exhibit 1: Project Momentum focuses on 13 Mississippi state agencies

Key themes are summarized in the following section.

1 Includes funds for Bureau of Buildings

4.1 Goals of a successful procurement function

4.2 Context on procurement in the State of Mississippi

Exhibit 2: Breakdown of state spend on goods and services

Spending Category* FY23 Spend ($)

State Spend Fees & Services 82M

Spending Category* FY23 Spend ($)

School District Buildings & Building Improvement 199M

• Agencies obtain PPRB approval to move forward with the RFP.

4.3 Consolidate purchasing and make better use of contracts

Exhibit 3: Agency staff pain points – consolidation

4.3.1 Consolidate purchasing

4.3.1.1 Case Study: IT

4.3.1.2 Case Study: Engineering Services and Repair

Exhibit 5: Case study on Engineering Services and Repair

4.3.1.3 Case Study: Schools

4.3.2 Make better use of contracts

4.3.2.1 Case Study: IT

Exhibit 6: Spending more on Fast Enterprises than comparable states

4.3.2.2 Case Study: Media & Public Relations

Exhibit 7: Case study on Media, PR, and Communications

Exhibit 8: Agency staff pain points – procurement

4.4.1 Case Study: Emergency Contracts

6Assumes “other” contract categories are competitive.

Exhibit 9: Case study for Emergency Contracts

Some of these procurement-related recommendations are currently being implemented by the

4.5 Manage demand to only buy what is needed

Exhibit 10: Agency staff pain points – procurement

4.5.1 Case Study: Travel, Fuel, and Vehicles

Exhibit 11: Case study on Travel, Fuel, and Vehicles

4.5.2 Case Study: Insurance

Exhibit 12: Case study on Insurance

4.6.1 Moving Toward Centralized Procurement

5.1 Child Protection Services (CPS)

Initiatives Estimated size of opportunity

5.1.1 Background and Context

5.2 Department of Finance and Administration

Initiatives Estimated size of opportunity

5.2.1 Background and Context

5.2.2 Recommendations Exhibit 13: Rising insurance premiums

Exhibit 14: Self-Insurance provides a balanced model 8

report-2022---final.pdf?sfvrsn=59248690_2, Mississippi Transparency for spend data, Department of Finance and

5.3 Mississippi Department of Human Services

Initiatives Estimated size of opportunity

5.3.1 Background and Context

5. Streamline reporting requirements

5.4 Mississippi Division of Medicaid

Initiatives Estimated size of opportunity

5.4.1 Background and Context

Exhibit 16: Mississippi long-term care services vs. peers 9

Exhibit 17: Moving to a single PBM model

3. Automate eligibility and enrollment workflows

4. Enhance Fraud, Waste, and Abuse (FWA) detection and recovery

5.5 Mississippi Department of Public Safety