PEER tells Senate panel dozens of state agencies are dormant, backs repeal
JACKSON — The Legislature’s Joint Committee on Performance Evaluation and Expenditure Review (PEER) told the Senate Government Structure Committee on Wednesday that dozens of state agencies created in law are effectively dormant, including some that never became operational.
PEER Executive Director Ted Booth told senators his agency had reviewed the list of entities flagged by the Lieutenant Governor’s office and agreed with its assessment of those marked for repeal.
“What we’ve concluded is that we agree with the lieutenant governor’s office on all the ones that are coded red,” Booth said. “Those are entities that we probably could just do without.”
Among the bodies identified as dormant was the Superconducting Super Collider Commission, which PEER said was never activated.
Booth cautioned that repealing the inactive entities would not produce savings, because they currently spend nothing. He said repeal would mainly “clean up the laws of the state of Mississippi.”
The committee, chaired by Sen. Tyler McCaughn, is examining how Mississippi state government is organized.