CLARKSDALE - Draw a line around a multi-state region dogged by generations of systemic poverty, expand the boundaries to pick up some crucial political support, create a new government bureaucracy, sprinkle it with a handful of federal dollars, and demand fast results.
So it was that a skeptical Congress and a reluctant President Bush created the Delta Regional Authority two years ago.
It's now Pete Johnson's baby.
But if the Clarksdale attorney and former state auditor is overwhelmed by the job, he's not showing it. In a speech last week to Clarksdale Rotarians and in a subsequent phone interview, the Delta Regional Authority's federal co-chairman was candid about his frustrations, passionate about the agency's mission and equal parts optimistic and pragmatic about its chances of success.
"I'm not unrealistic about what I'm up against," Johnson said. "Every day when I come to work, I don't know who's going to be raising Cain and who isn't. I go to Washington frequently asking for support, and many (congressional) members look at me with a jaundiced eye.
"It's a great challenge. It's also the opportunity of a lifetime - the chance to change the lives of people for generations to come. I could not pass that up."
No regrets?
"None whatsoever. When I go into some of these communities and see some of the people whose lives we have a chance to change, it breaks my heart. It's what gets me out of bed every day."
Johnson's immediate task is to sort through piles of funding applications from communities throughout the agency's 240-county coverage area - and identify a handful to share in a small pie of grant money. Suffice it to say that demand exceeds supply.
In Mississippi alone, some 260 applications were submitted requesting a total of $72 million; just $4.1 million is allocated for Mississippi. Arkansas communities submitted 157 applications seeking $56.5 million; $4.1 million will be distributed.
Not surprisingly, a bloody political battle is brewing between Johnson and governors of the eight states. The recent federal farm bill gave Johnson one vote and the governors one collective vote on funding decisions. Each has effective veto power over the other.
And Johnson says he's not afraid to use his - if that's what it takes to keep the Clarksdale-based agency from becoming a "slush fund" for re-election-minded governors.
"I'm going to be rejecting a bunch of applications," he said. "It's going to be brutal. Obviously, in some of these instances the money stands to go into the hands of people whose projects don't meet congressional intent. It's not going to be a pretty sight.
"It's kind of like when I was auditor. I would tell people, 'I'm a nice guy, and I'm easy to get along with. But do not test me. Please don't put me in a position where I've got to flex my muscle.'"
Johnson's staff devised a scoring system that aims to gauge which projects will do the most good for the most people in the neediest communities. Areas of focus are health care, education, housing and transportation. Any application that doesn't garner at least 65 of an available 100 points is automatically tossed.
Lost amid the mad scramble for dollars, Johnson believes, is recognition of the authority's most beneficial role: coordinator of existing resources.
"Everybody's focusing on the grants portion of our authority," he said. "We clearly need more money for infrastructure projects, but we need to use our existing dollars more wisely too. That's what Congress said in the law that created us, but you've got people in the states who don't care what the Congress thinks. It's my job to say, 'You better, or you are not going to get any money.' "
Johnson recognizes that the region's needs far exceed what the federal government - even one sold on the agency's mission - could ever appropriate. Some needs, in fact, can't be fixed monetarily.
He talks frankly about the need for improved race relations, a subject that some would suggest is none of the government's business - or at least out of its control. Like a "meddling" country preacher, though, Johnson doesn't hesitate to use his new-found pulpit to urge Deltans - especially those of his own generation - to do better.
Johnson refuses to placate those in Congress and elsewhere demanding an immediate impact by the fledgling agency.
"I think our challenge is to prepare people not to expect immediate results in terms of a turnaround in the economy of this region," he said. "It took us decades to get here, and it's going to take us a long time to get out of it. The important signal is whether we are investing dollars provided for us in this region in a way that will produce those long-term results and effect that turnaround.
"If we are making wise investments in the region, then I think we can say we're successful."
