Lt. Gov. Reeves speaks at Meridian Rotary Club meeting

Lt. Governor Tate Reeves was the guest speaker at the Meridian Rotary Club meeting at Northwood Country Club today. He addressed several things going on in our state’s legislation. In the latest special session, it was decided the state will spend over one billion dollars on infrastructure over the next five years. The good news... cities and counties will have more flexibility in how money is spent.

“We believe the best decisions are made locally, and we’re going to have accountability in place. That’s one of the things that we push for. There has to be accountability measures in place to insure these entities are spending the money the way it is supposed to be spent.” -Lt. Gov. Tate Reeves

The Lt. Gov. also talked a lot about education and what he says are improvements within the state’s educational system.

“We’re seeing graduation rates improve drastically. We’re seeing third grade reading scores improving. We’re seeing fourth and eight grade math and reading improve,” says Lt. Gov. Reeves.

Lt. Governor Reeves says he wants to put more money into the classroom and less in the district’s office and that in 2014 they allowed a $125 million-dollar pay raise for teachers. He also said they are going to fight for another pay raise for teachers at the next legislative session.

“We need improved educational attainment of our citizens. We need to continue to grow our workforce and improve our workforce to be ready for the jobs of tomorrow rather than the jobs of fifty years ago. To do that, we’ve got to have improved educational outcomes.” -Lt. Gov. Reeves

When asked about running for governor, he says he’s gearing up and that they are working on it.