The fate of just under 450 acres of disputed county-owned farmland has been decided.
The Sunflower County Board of Supervisors voted this past Monday during a special called meeting to award the $38,100 per year four-year lease bid to Dodd Brothers II.
The Dodd bid was the only official one delivered to the county on the advertised date last month, but the county did entertain, for several weeks, the notion of conveying the property at the old county penal farm to Bishop Willie B. Knighten’s nonprofit organization.
Knighten made an official pitch to the board last week, floating a mix of pork and produce production on the land, which has been farmed by Skipper Dodd and his family farm for the past 14 years.
The county has leased the land to private farmers for decades.
At issue for Knighten was the fact that he did not bid on the property as advertised this go-round. Instead, he asked the county to treat his proposal as an economic development project and asked for a 99-year lease for $1.
The debate over the legality of such a lease held up the process for weeks, as Board Attorney Johnny McWilliams told the supervisors repeatedly that he believed it would be illegal and unconstitutional.
It took less than five minutes on Monday for the board to vote and award the bid to Dodd.
“I think we’ve discussed this enough already, so can I get a motion from someone?” District 5 Supervisor and Board President Gloria Dickerson asked.
District 1 Supervisor Glenn Donald made the motion, his third in as many meetings, to award the bid to Dodd.
District 3 Supervisor Sherry Gaston seconded the motion.
Donald, Gaston and Dickerson voted yes.
District 2 Supervisor Riley Rice voted no.
District 4 Supervisor Anthony Clark was not present.
“The reason why we addressed the issue with Elder Knighten, he came here in September, and he’s a taxpaying citizen,” Rice said after the vote. “We just decided that we would address the issue. The vote has been made, and now it’s time to move on…We analyzed it. We looked at the business plan, and everybody made their decision as to what they wanted to do, and now, it’s over.”
