A veteran teacher who would like to open a day care center in an unoccupied church building in Itta Bena needs approval from the city to proceed with her plans.
Mildred Burks, a teacher at Leflore County Elementary School, purchased the First Methodist Church building on Main Street from David Pitts, the now-deceased Greenwood antique store owner, in 2019.
Since then she’s been renovating the interior of the building, which consists of about 15 rooms.
Victor Stokes, the city’s building inspector, told the Board of Aldermen during its meeting Tuesday that the building is in a residential area and that Burks will need approval from the city’s zoning commission to see whether the area that includes the building can be rezoned for business usage.
The board took no action.
Burks said Wednesday that she wants to open a day care center to help mothers who can’t work because they have to take care of their children. She said that she is well-known in town and that if she is allowed to open the facility, she will seek funding from the state and grants to help parents pay for the child care.
In other business:
- Cheri Caradine, a community health director with the Mississippi State Department of Health, told the board about the department’s Mayor’s Health Council initiative.
The aim of the council is to create healthy cities by investing in sidewalks, farmers’ markets and other outdoor venues, Caradine said: “The goal is to do whatever it takes to get people healthy.”
Caradine said she would like Itta Bena to consider adopting the initiative. The immediate next step would be for Mayor Reginald Freeman to approve it since it would be run through his office.
Freeman was absent from Tuesday’s meeting.
- Shannon Bowden, a speech and mass communication instructor at Mississippi Valley State University, informed the board about the unveiling of a Mississippi Freedom Trail historical marker at 11 a.m. Feb. 24.
The marker is in front of Hopewell Missionary Baptist Church, 210 Douglas St., which was a voter registration site during the civil rights movement.
The unveiling will be held in front of the church. The board granted Bowden permission to use the Brazil Center if it rains.
The marker is one of three in Itta Bena recognizing the city’s role in the movement. One is by the former downtown jailhouse, which held incarcerated civil rights activists. Another is along the turnoff on Mississippi 7 South, by Leflore County High School, the route taken by participants in James Meredith’s 1966 March Against Fear on their way to Belzoni. The march began in Memphis and concluded in Jackson.
The marker project was funded by a $24,500 grant from the Mississippi Delta National Heritage Area and carried out by Bowden and a group of MVSU mass communication students, who conducted the research for the information on the markers and produced a documentary.
- City Clerk Barbara App-lon told the board that the mayor had spoken with more than 25 accounting firms about conducting audits for the city for the fiscal years of 2017 through 2020.
Applon said the mayor has not found anyone willing to do the audit because many firms either are backlogged with work or don’t have enough staff. The city is trying to catch up on its financial audits in order to make it eligible for grant applications.
- Contact Gerard Edic at 581-7239 or gedic@gwcommonwealth.com.
