It's Friday October 30, 2026 and in this morning's issue we're covering: Former school administrator challenges think tank founder for SC superintendent, State sued over Mass. rental assistance program’s paused third year, KC’s temporary ‘World Cup’ jail to become permanent solution as city scraps plans for new building, Atrium, State Health Plan strike a deal after public fight, Rural communities push back on school consolidation efforts, New records show how ADM’s safety lapses injured several employees in 2023 explosion, After 65 years, Freedom Riders finally complete their journey to New Orleans.

Media outlets and others featured: South Carolina Daily Gazette, CommonWealth Beacon, The Beacon, North Carolina Health News, Mississippi Today, Investigate Midwest, Verite News.

Former school administrator challenges think tank founder for SC superintendent

While the incumbent superintendent hopes to keep expanding taxpayer-funded vouchers, her Democratic opponent wants to pause the program.

By Skylar Laird (South Carolina Daily Gazette) Published: October 29, 2026

COLUMBIA — Voters’ choice to run the state’s Department of Education could determine agency support for a taxpayer-funded education voucher program over the next four years.

Democrat Sylvia Wright is challenging Republican Ellen Weaver for the position overseeing policy for the state’s 72 public school districts. While both want to continue improving students’ test scores, they differ in their opinions of a program giving students funds for education-related expenses, including private school tuition.

Weaver, who’s seeking a second term, previously led Palmetto Promise Institute, a conservative education-focused think tank she co-founded in 2013 with her former boss, U.S. Sen. Jim DeMint, after he left office.

Wright most recently worked as a district coordinator for Dorchester 4, where she oversaw curriculum, reviewed testing data and helped train teachers. She resigned last fall to focus full-time on her campaign.

The last time voters chose a Democrat as state superintendent was in 2006, when Jim Rex won with fewer than 500 votes.

Still, Wright said she’s optimistic, pointing to polls showing significant support for Democratic candidates even in traditionally safe Republican areas during the midterm.

“This is a unique election cycle,” Wright said.

The job is also getting less attention this round. In 2022, the superintendent’s race was the most crowded field on South Carolina’s primary ballots, with six Republicans and three Democrats competing to replace retiring Superintendent Molly Spearman. Four years later, Weaver had no GOP opposition, and Wright became the Democratic nominee in June by defeating the party’s last nominee for the job.

Education Scholarship Trust Fund program

The place where Wright and Weaver vary most starkly is on whether to support the Education Scholarship Trust Fund, which provides money to pay for children’s K-12 educational needs, including private school tuition.

No money is sent directly to parents. Rather, quarterly installments are deposited into online accounts controlled by parents, who direct where the dollars go.

Since the program is written into state law and uses taxpayer dollars, the Department of Education must award scholarships to at least 15,000 students, no matter who wins.

By law, the scholarship amount adjusts yearly based on per-student funding to public schools. This year, that calculation provided roughly $7,600 each to parents earning up to 500% of the federal poverty limit.

Providing less would require a Legislature-approved change in state law.

The state superintendent can ask for more money through the agency’s annual budgeting process to open up more slots in the program. The decision of whether to fund those spaces is ultimately up to legislators.

Weaver has long advocated for a broader program, including as head of Palmetto Promise Institute, the state’s leading proponent of school choice legislation since she launched it. The think tank wants the K-12 scholarships to be “universal,” which means available to all parents.

K-12 scholarships through federal tax credits start in January. Nonprofits will oversee spending.

A federal tax credit program set to start in January could end up dwarfing the state’s numbers, without oversight by the state’s K-12 agency.

In an emailed statement to the SC Daily Gazette, Weaver said she wants to enroll more students in the state’s program. This year, roughly 20,000 families applied for 15,000 slots, leaving thousands of students on the waitlist, she said. She asked legislators to expand enrollment to 20,000 students this year, but the state budget kept the cap at 15,000.

“My commitment is to continue to implement the law faithfully, strengthen accountability and program operations, preserve meaningful flexibility for eligible families, and work with lawmakers to responsibly expand access,” Weaver said.

Wright wouldn’t ask legislators for more slots, she said. She has concerns about how the program has worked so far.

Officials have no idea how well students who used the money to pay for private school are performing, she said.

Schools submitted inconsistent and incomplete data for the program’s first year, making it impossible to analyze or give legislators results as required by law, according to an Education Oversight Committee report. A report on the second year’s results is expected in December.

Questions over whether homeschooled students should receive state funds also rankled legislators this year.

When legislators passed the law, both in its original form in 2023 and to reinstate funding for private school tuition in 2025, senators made it clear they didn’t want the money going toward homeschooling. That came at the request of homeschooling parents, who worried about government oversight.

Yet, the Department of Education awarded roughly 1,000 students money for homeschooling expenses, Weaver told senators earlier this year. Since the program excludes students homeschooled under the three methods allowed under state law, the education department essentially created a fourth option in which the agency oversees learning.

Senators, including the Senate’s majority leader and chairman of the education committee, accused Weaver of exploiting a loophole in the law and betraying their trust. Weaver told them she was just following the law as written.

“On matters of implementation, I have always believed that the law — not political pressure — must guide the department’s decisions,” Weaver said. “Reasonable people can disagree about policy, and the General Assembly has every right to clarify or change the law. My responsibility is to administer the law as written, communicate openly, and continuously improve how we serve South Carolina families.”

The questions over whether the law was implemented correctly raised concerns for voters, Wright said.

“That lack of transparency, the dishonesty as far as the homeschoolers receiving those vouchers — people are mad about that, and not just Democrats,” Wright said.

If she were superintendent, she would make sure money went where it was supposed to go, she said. That also means making sure low-income students get priority, as legislators said they intended, she said.

Applications for the funds open in windows, with lower-income students coming ahead of their more affluent peers. Wright wants more data on how many low-income students the program is actually helping, she said.

Instead of putting more money toward vouchers, Wright said, she’d rather put those funds toward improving public schools.

“My focus is going to be more on fully funding our public schools and making them a viable option,” she said.

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Test scores and teacher retention

When it comes to improving students’ test scores and keeping teachers in classrooms, Weaver wants to stay the course, she said, pointing to improvements in both areas in recent years.

“Four years ago, I promised South Carolinians that we would raise expectations, support our teachers, strengthen our schools, and put students first,” Weaver said. “We have delivered on those promises, working shoulder to shoulder with the governor, General Assembly, and educators across our state.”

This year, more schools than ever received top scores on the state’s revamped report cards, which measure test scores, classroom surveys and student progress, following years of upward trends. At the same time, the number of schools in the lowest possible category declined.

More SC schools get top scores than ever, but education leaders say there’s still work to do

More students are reading and doing math on grade level in recent years, with both reaching their highest scores since the SC READY tests began in 2015. Just over 61% of all students tested in the spring could read on grade level, while nearly 48% could do math as expected for their grade.

Meanwhile, the number of vacant teacher positions has dropped since a record high during the 2023-24 school year. At the start of last school year in 2025, schools reported 706 open positions, the lowest number in at least five years, according to an annual survey.

“These are real results, earned through the hard work of South Carolina’s teachers, students, and families,” Weaver said.

Teachers’ advocates and state leaders credited changes in how students learn to read as a big reason for improvements in English scores. A similar program for math began this spring, with hopes of similar advancements in math.

Weaver has backed initiatives to keep teachers in classrooms. She asked for money to give certain teachers performance-based bonuses in an effort to reward student progress. And she’s supported the governor’s push to get base salaries for first-year teachers over $50,000, which legislators did this year.

If reelected, Weaver would keep building on that success, she said, without giving specifics.

“Our next chapter is about going further and faster — strengthening early literacy and math instruction, better preparing and rewarding excellent teachers, modernizing school facilities, and continuing to expand educational opportunity,” Weaver said.

Wright would want to look at other creative ways of continuing that progress if elected, she said.

Student success should start with early education, Wright said. She wants to push for universal pre-kindergarten for 4-year-olds and work more closely with First Steps, the agency overseeing state-paid preschool in private daycares.

Gov. Henry McMaster recommended legislators pay to expand eligibility for state-funded preschool to every 4-year-old in the state, but that didn’t make it into the final budget. Wright would look for other funding sources, potentially using local grant money, she said.

“There are so many issues that we’re seeing in K-12 because they’re not being addressed in the early, pre-K, birth-to-5 realm,” she said.

Along with continuing to push for higher teacher salaries, Wright would like to put in place a statewide training program for administrators. For a lot of teachers, the quality of their principals and superintendents can be a deciding factor in whether they want to continue teaching, she said.

Having a statewide training program could create more consistency in school environments, she said. Teachers who want to become administrators might also be more encouraged to stay in their local districts with more support from the state, she said.

“For me, it goes beyond just the incentives and the pay,” Wright said. “We have a leadership problem in South Carolina. As superintendent, I want to strengthen our leadership pipeline.”

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State sued over Mass. rental assistance program’s paused third year

by Jennifer Smith, CommonWealth Beacon
October 29, 2026

AS DEMAND FOR the state’s emergency shelter beds ballooned in early 2025, along with the strain on its homelessness prevention programs, the Healey administration asked lawmakers to provide funding for its rental subsidy program HomeBASE. The funds would continue to cover two years for eligible families, with the possibility of a third year.

The Legislature agreed. Then, a week before the governor signed the annual state budget into law, her housing office announced an indefinite pause on all approvals for the third year of assistance.

Families who had been planning on the additional year got a fierce shock. And two single-mothers facing imminent eviction are now suing the Executive Office of Housing and Livable Communities, which runs the program, to maintain the third year of coverage.

“Without that HomeBASE stabilization,” lawyers for a woman referred to as Jane Doe wrote, “[she] and her young son are at risk of eviction every month.”

HomeBASE, developed in 2011 to stabilize families in the state’s shelter system, provides case workers and financial assistance to low-income families in Massachusetts facing homelessness and determined to be emergency shelter eligible by the state. The program provides up to $30,000 in rental subsidies over two years, and lawmakers in 2023 added language to the budget line item stating that families that completed the two years and remained eligible could receive a third year of coverage of $15,000 or more.

Suffolk County Superior Court Judge Catherine Hyo-Kyung Ham on Wednesday heard from lawyers representing HomeBASE recipients Doe and Kinisha James. The plaintiffs are seeking an injunction ordering the state to provide a third year of HomeBASE stabilization services, including the $15,000 in funding.

“We’re really trying to keep these two single mothers in their homes so they’re not evicted by Thanksgiving,” said Elizabeth Alfred with Greater Boston Legal Services, which is representing Doe and James.

The state housing office asked the court to dismiss the suits.

The decision to pause the third year, according to a spokesperson for the housing office, was part of a package of Right To Shelter reforms “so we can prioritize helping the greatest number of families with the resources available. HomeBASE remains a critical tool for helping families avoid or exit shelter and secure stable housing.”

The attorney general’s office, which is representing the state, wrote that the program had a years-long funding deficiency and even with supplemental funding “is forced to prioritize how it utilizes the funds available for housing stabilization.”

It simply cannot provide the third year at current budget levels, the state claims. The housing office estimates resuming third year coverage would mean that 1,098 families who would otherwise receive first-year benefits would not be able to access HomeBASE during this fiscal year.

In filings, the state notes the HomeBASE line item specifically states that if there is a funding deficiency, there is no “enforceable right or entitlement to services” beyond the amount that the Legislature appropriated.

The plaintiffs’ attorneys said the pause amounts to a unilateral decision not to fulfill the letter of the law, and these families are hanging in the balance.

Doe and her infant son fled Doe’s abusive partner in 2021, according to court filings, experiencing homelessness for the next two years. Staying with family was largely off the table, as many of her relatives lived in subsidized housing with strict guest policies that could lead to eviction if violated.

She says she was rejected from the state’s emergency shelter program in 2022, because the shelters were too full, and was finally found eligible for the HomeBASE program in 2023.

According to the complaint, HomeBASE covers more than $1,600 of her rent, which has been raised twice and is now $2,049. When she met with a state caseworker in July 2025, Doe said she was shown paperwork that stated she was still eligible for almost $18,000 in rental assistance, but just weeks later was told that that was an error and she would have $3,000 that would expire in that coming January.

Her take-home pay is about $2,700 a month and she is engaged in “active eviction proceedings for nonpayment of rent,” the complaint states.

About one year after James and her then two-year-old, chronically ill daughter were forced to leave James’ mother’s house and became homeless, James applied for emergency assistance shelter and entered the HomeBASE diversion program. Her lease began in August 2024, with HomeBASE paying $1,800 of a $2,200 a month lease.

The rent increased and the share covered by HomeBASE decreased over time, with James’ two years of funding exhausted in December 2025. Through a combination of family help and other state rental assistance, James has been able to cobble together about $1,200 a month toward rent since then. James reached out to the housing office in May 2026 requesting an additional year, which she asserts was ignored until an email in August 2026 stating that the office had paused third year approvals for the program.

Her landlord wants to keep her, but if James cannot come up with the rent by November, she will be evicted in December.

Both women say they received no direct notice that the third year was off the table until they were in the process of seeking it.

Information on the state’s website illustrates the messaging whiplash. The dedicated HomeBASE page refers only to a “2-year” period, as does the current administration plan for the program.

But a monthly training presentation from May 2025 for administering HomeBASE, still on the state’s website, notes that “participants shall not access more than $30,000 within a 24-month period, and not more than $15,000.00 within an additional 3rd year.” The state’s housing needs assessment section on emergency housing supports states that there is “the possibility of a third year” for the funding assistance.

The case, attorneys say, is in part about how the Legislature intended the program to be funded. The third-year expansion that went into effect in fiscal year 2024 was the result of years of advocacy from housing stabilization groups.

“Many families in the Commonwealth need that third year to avoid entering homelessness,” said Laura Camara, an attorney with Greater Boston Legal Services representing James. The Legislature “made a decision, and yet it has essentially not been implemented,” said Alfred, who represents Doe.

Healey's proposed fiscal year 2026 budget asked for $57,322,001 for HomeBASE, with the budget item still including language that indicated the funds should cover a third year of assistance for some program participants. Lawmakers funded the item to the dollar, and Healey then signed the budget into law on July 4, 2025 — just days after her administration separately announced it was pausing third year coverage.

The program has been far more expensive than the initial allocation. In filings, the state said HomeBASE expenditures that year exceeded $153 million. The gaps have been filled in recent years through supplemental budgets.

“It is not that the agency has intentionally underfunded this program,” said Assistant Attorney General Matthew Burke. Rather, the third year was paused because of the surge in shelter demand, which has a trickle-down impact on the HomeBASE program.

Between 2023 and 2025, the number of HomeBASE families surged more than fivefold to about 10,000 cases, he told the court. The housing office asked for additional funding in fiscal years 2025 and 2026, which the Legislature did not fully grant, but just under $100 million of supplemental funds were approved over the two years.

The agency weighed the costs and benefits, Burke said, and understood the HomeBASE program to be a “short-term stabilization program and not a long-term financial assistance program.” The governor has to propose a balanced budget, and lawmakers were well aware of the funding shortfalls for HomeBASE, he said, adding that they could have offered up more funds if they wished.

“This case paints a vivid picture of what’s not working with our programs to keep vulnerable families in their homes,” said state Sen. Julian Cyr, the Senate chair of the Joint Committee on Housing. The devastating housing crisis is keeping costs high all over the state, he noted, meaning even affordable unit costs are spiking — and with them the need for greater state subsidy.

“Several colleagues and I worried about underfunding as it relates to [Emergency Assistance Family Shelter]," Cyr said, “but I’m all ears on what additional resources may be needed here for these programs. I’m also clear-eyed that these programs received tens of millions of dollars in funding, and we still may not be able to meet every bit of the need.”

The fiscal year 2027 budget signed this summer boosted the HomeBASE budget to about $82.3 million, but the housing office expects to spend almost $113 million on the program. Funding a third HomeBase year, according to the state’s filings, would cost as much as an additional $39.5 million.

“They knowingly submitted a budget they knew was not going to fund the program,” Camara said. They cannot now “hide behind it,” she said.

Judge Ham, who said during the hearing that she wasn’t sure how she could order the state to spend money it claims not to have, promised a decision as soon as possible. Winter is drawing nearer and the two women have exhausted their other options for family and state financial support, Camara said — “These families are scared.”

This article first appeared on CommonWealth Beacon and is republished here under a Creative Commons Attribution-NoDerivatives 4.0 International License. 

KC’s temporary ‘World Cup’ jail to become permanent solution as city scraps plans for new building

by Thomas Friestad, The Beacon
October 23, 2026

Kansas City’s latest changeup in a years long effort to build a permanent municipal jail involves a $120 million retrofit of its new, temporary modular one: the so-called World Cup jail that didn’t open for the World Cup, and still hasn’t opened.

This latest pivot on the city’s part, from an all-new $201 million permanent jail in the East Bottoms, was not born from any long-term strategic planning, community engagement or a change in needs. Rather, it’s because of money.

The move follows the recent surprise reveal to City Council members that the city’s public safety sales tax, renewed by voters in 2025, could only cover about one-quarter of the $402.6 million in total costs estimated for a jail and other large public safety projects the city has planned.

“We all live within budgets. We all have a certain amount of money we can spend,” Councilman Kevin O’Neill, who represents the 1st District at large, said during a Tuesday committee meeting. “We can’t afford a $1 million house, we buy a $300,000 house, right? My fear right now is that we are changing the scope again.”

Over the last month or so, city staff have devised a new plan to renovate and expand the city’s temporary, still unopened detention center at 7740 E. Front St. into the city’s new permanent jail. It would add 84 beds to the modular facility, expanding its total capacity from 136 to 220 beds, while building out its kitchen, laundry space, a clinic, administrative offices and visiting, intake and release areas.

The city also would have room to further grow its jail on site, as well as expand Water Services Department facilities just south, without needing to relocate its existing tow lot — an $18.4 million expenditure officials previously contemplated for a permanent jail at 7750 E. Front St. 

Eliminating the tow lot move, along with changing the jail project to a $120 million retrofit, means the city stands to save almost $100 million in project costs from the prior plan. The shift would bring the city to $145.8 million spent on new municipal detention facilities to date, also counting the $25.8 million it has spent so far on the temporary jail. 

The temporary jail got a temporary occupancy certificate in late August, but it only covers administrative offices. Council has given a January goal to start housing people charged with municipal offenses, but the city still hasn’t been able to recruit and hire enough people to staff the facility, which is essential before opening. 

The city’s Human Resources Department is working on hiring and offering retention incentives so it can better compete with five other correctional facilities in the metro area. To that end, council members agreed Thursday to increase the city's minimum starting pay for correctional officers from $19.27 to $25.40, and senior correctional officers from $20.10 to $27.35, with a retroactive effective date of Sunday, Oct. 18.

Officials and some community stakeholders have long raised what they say is a dire need for a city jail. Kansas City has lacked one since 2009, meaning people accused of breaking city laws — such as trespassing, disorderly conduct or some alcohol-related offenses — are held at local police stations or carted away to facilities in Missouri’s Vernon and Johnson counties. 

Council members in recent years mulled several alternative arrangements but later pivoted from them. These included a shared jail with Jackson County’s own detention center, which opened in March and houses people charged with more serious, state-level crimes; a new municipal jail off U.S. Highway 40 and Interstate 70 next to the county facility; and a temporary jail in the Kansas City Police Department’s downtown headquarters.

Projects planned beyond city's budget limits

Even with the reduced jail costs, council members on Tuesday discussed a further need to, as O’Neill put it, “value engineer the hell out of” two more important projects to find the most affordable route possible: replacing the Police Department’s more than 30-year-old Central Patrol Division and constructing a new community resource center with wraparound services, crisis support and reentry programs. 

The projects carry $94 million and $89.2 million estimates, respectively, but city staff indicated Tuesday that final costs could not be determined without direction from council, including as to where the facilities should be located, or whether they ought to be merged. Mayor Quinton Lucas in January introduced a resolution to explore co-locating the projects in one “Midtown Justice Campus” on or around the current Central Patrol site at Linwood Boulevard and Forest Avenue, but the measure since has been held on council’s docket without discussion.

“In many ways, I don’t care where exactly we put it, other than to say the co-location is, I think, the way we deliver both projects,” Lucas told reporters Tuesday. “At $90 million (now estimated for) each, I question if we’ll have the resources to deliver both the new police patrol division and the community resource center unless we actually bring them together.”

Third District Councilwoman Melissa Patterson Hazley called attention to what she described as a “systemic problem” of council needing to scale back municipal projects designed without regard for cost, as compared to projects designed from the onset with a fixed budget in mind.

“The architect is going to draw you the Taj Mahal every time unless you give them guardrails because that’s their job,” Patterson Hazley said Tuesday.

She later continued, “I feel like nobody’s value engineering on behalf of the Kansas City taxpayers. We’re just paying these humungous bills. We’re doing financial backstops. We’re exhausting our specialized funds. And we’re taking the word of the architect and the construction company that has nothing to gain by scaling back.”

Officials are working with the following math: The city’s public safety sales tax is expected to generate $25 million per year available to fund project bonds over 17- to 19-year terms, in line with voters’ 20-year renewal.

But annual debt service (principal and interest) would have cost $34.2 million on the three public safety projects, plus the tow lot relocation, if their initial $402.6 million scope had remained as is. 

And a big chunk of what the city brings in with the public safety tax — $17.5 million of the $25 million a year — is already tied up covering other costs, such as police body cameras and information technology. That would leave about $7.5 million a year, not the needed $34.2 million, available for project bonds. The city still would need to spend millions of additional dollars to operate and maintain future facilities, too. 

With the city poised to dip into its general fund no matter how it proceeds, Lucas proposed prioritizing public safety sales tax dollars for the new capital projects promised from that source.

“We ran a campaign saying we’d do things,” Lucas said Tuesday. 

A resolution passed Thursday by council would prioritize public safety sales taxes for retrofitting the temporary jail into the permanent jail first, and then the police station and community resource center on even ground, with any remaining proceeds going toward public safety infrastructure and equipment. The resolution asks for a financing plan that caps annual debt service for the jail, police station and resource center at $21 million. 

Assistant City Manager Tammy Queen said the change from a permanent jail to a retrofit of the modular facility would drop its debt service from $17.2 million to $10.2 million per year. On the other projects, she said, city staff would “sharpen the pencils.”

“We know we have to squeeze into a budget operations for these facilities, paying them off and all the other things that we already pay for with the public safety sales tax,” Queen said Tuesday. “So we understand the assignment and we’ll certainly go forward and work on it. It’s been such an impossible puzzle to solve that we’re like, ‘We don’t know which way to go.’ I think this makes it more clear.”

This article first appeared on The Beacon and is republished here under a Creative Commons Attribution-NoDerivatives 4.0 International License. 

Atrium, State Health Plan strike a deal after public fight

by Michelle Crouch, Rose Hoban and Charlotte Ledger, North Carolina Health News
October 27, 2026orth

Co-published with The Charlotte Ledger

After months of public sparring, Atrium Health and the State Health Plan have reached a deal that allows state employees, retirees and their family members to see Atrium doctors next year at roughly the same out-of-pocket costs they pay now.

The deal comes after State Treasurer Brad Briner, who administers the plan, announced on Oct. 14 that the plan was moving most Atrium providers out of network — a move that apparently prompted the hospital to return to the negotiating table and lower the prices it charges the plan.

“It was not our intent to have this all play out in such a public forum,” Briner said. But he said the negotiations ultimately led to “a much better outcome for our members.”

Under the agreement, Atrium Health will be in the middle of the three tiers in the State Health Plan’s new tiered network for 2027, this means that people seeing their Atrium providers will pay about the same price in the coming year as they have this year. The network is designed to encourage members to choose doctors and hospitals that agreed to provide care at significant discounts, an effort to close a massive budget deficit.

In a joint news release, Atrium and State Health Plan officials said they are committed to putting their differences aside and working together. 

“For every teacher, state employee and family member we serve at Atrium Health, this new agreement is about providing the peace of mind that comes from knowing the caregivers they trust will remain within reach,” said Steve Smoot, president of the North Carolina and Georgia Division of Atrium parent Advocate Health, in the release.

While the deal makes it easy for state employees to stay with their Atrium doctors, they could potentially save “thousands of dollars” by choosing doctors in the plan’s preferred tier, Briner said. That tier includes Novant Health, UNC Health, Iredell Health and 4,500 independent providers, including Tryon Medical Partners in Charlotte.

“It is your choice,” Briner said. “We want to empower you with that choice and want to arm you with that choice because the best healthcare you get is the healthcare you choose.”

Confusion for state employees

The announcement, for now, ends a contentious chapter that left thousands of state employees unsure whether they could afford to continue seeing their Atrium doctors next year. The uncertainty was particularly difficult for employees in the Charlotte region, where Atrium is the dominant health care provider. 

In a letter sent to Briner and Advocate Health CEO Gene Woods last week, the American Federation of Professional Educators in North Carolina, which represents the state’s public school teachers, called the uncertainty “unacceptable” and urged the two sides to return to the negotiating table. 

“No public servant should be placed in a position where making an informed healthcare decision becomes a financial gamble,” the letter said. “Allowing preventable confusion to persist during open enrollment, when the consequences could affect a family’s health and financial security for an entire year, is a failure of responsibility to the people these institutions serve.”

The plan’s open enrollment period, when members choose their 2027 coverage, ends Nov. 6. 

Briner said he knows the process has been confusing, and he thanked state employees for bearing with him. 

“A lot of this has happened in the public domain in a way that I wish would have been privately, so that we didn’t worry our members so much about where they could not go next year,” he said.

Three-month standoff

The dispute began in July after Briner unveiled the new tiered network. After a yearlong bidding process, Atrium was placed in the most expensive, non-preferred tier. That prompted a round of negotiations between Atrium and the treasurer’s office that culminated in a Sept. 14 announcement that some Atrium rural hospitals and its children’s hospitals were moving into the middle access tier.  

Most Atrium doctors and hospitals, however, remained in the non-preferred tier.

On Oct. 6, Atrium announced an “affordability protection program” to reduce out-of-pocket costs for state employees that see their providers. The catch, for taxpayers, was that the State Health Plan would still pay Atrium’s higher rates for care, even if plan members were saving. 

Briner said this amounted to the hospital system undermining the health plan’s efforts to save money because the plan would still be paying Atrium’s higher rates for care. He also said the Atrium plan could have the effect of bankrupting the State Health Plan. 

He went to court to block Atrium’s program on Oct. 9, but a judge denied the request. 

Briner then announced on Oct. 14 that most Atrium doctors and hospitals would be moved out of network for 2027.

Within days, Atrium returned to the negotiating table with discounts that were “materially better” than what it had offered in August and September, according to State Health Plan Executive Administrator Thomas Friedman.

It’s not clear yet how much the new Atrium agreement will help the plan financially, Friedman said. “We know folks are going to go to our preferred providers more, but probably less more now, if that makes sense,” he explained. 

He said he expects to have an updated projection in four to six weeks.

Timeline: Atrium vs. State Health Plan

July 10: State Health Plan announces a new network with three tiers. Atrium is assigned to the most expensive “non-preferred” tier.

Sept. 14: Atrium and the plan announce a new agreement that moves rural Atrium hospitals and its children’s hospitals to the middle “access” tier. 

Oct. 6: Atrium announces its “affordability protection program” to reduce state employees’ out-of-pocket costs. Briner responds that the move will bankrupt the State Health Plan.

Oct. 9: Briner goes to court seeking to block Atrium’s program.

Oct. 13: A judge denies Briner’s request.

Oct. 14: Briner announces most Atrium providers will become out of network, a rate even more expensive than the “non-preferred” tier.

Oct. 26: The current deal is announced. Atrium agrees to lower rates, and all of its hospitals and doctors move to the plan’s middle “access” tier.

Size matters

As hospitals have rapidly consolidated in recent years and insurance companies merge, pricing power has shifted and they’ve been able to set the rates. Most employers and individuals have ended up having to take what they can get, pricewise, in a market dominated by giants. 

With about 750,000 members, the State Health Plan is different. As an employer group with real heft, Briner has had leverage to go toe-to-toe with the big players and demand better terms. 

Former Treasurer Dale Folwell frequently cited the State Health Plan’s size as a reason he should be able to negotiate better terms from the state’s hospitals and insurers, and he tried unsuccessfully to force all of the state’s hospitals to take lower payments tied to Medicare rates. He made a name for himself taking on the hospitals, calling them “cartels” and censuring them for high prices and lack of transparency. Folwell was also bitterly critical of Blue Cross Blue Shield of North Carolina, which he called out for a lack of transparency in their contracts. 

A pricing plan championed by Folwell only ended up generating more deficits.  

By the time Briner took over in 2025, the plan was facing a $507 million deficit, which was projected to grow to $1.3 billion by 2027 without changes. 

Asked what made his approach different from Folwell’s, Briner responded, “Divide and conquer. You can’t take them all on at once.”

Friedman said the State Health Plan also has “soft power,” in addition to the large expenditures the plan makes. 

“These systems do really want to work with state employees,” he said. “They view that as a badge of honor.”

Future investment

The State Health Plan contracts that sort the hospitals into tiers will last for three years, with optional one-year extensions for two more years. Briner said he hopes to use the savings generated by the current plan to do something he said the plan hasn’t had the resources to do: invest in keeping people healthy. 

For decades, health economists and policy wonks have said that one way the U.S. health care system could save money is if, as a society, it invested more in keeping people healthy up front, rather than paying for care once people get sick. 

The roadblock, though, has been the way most people in the U.S. get their insurance coverage: through their jobs. On average, older American adults have changed jobs almost 13 times by the time they retire, according to the federal Bureau of Labor Statistics. Younger “millennial” workers change jobs an average of nine times between the ages of 18 and 36, according to a 2024 report from the agency. 

That means companies have little incentive to pay for preventive services for a worker who’ll move on to another company that will reap the benefit of that investment. 

Friedman said worker longevity makes workers covered by the State Health Plan different. 

“Generally speaking, teachers teach, corrections officers remain corrections officers, police officers remain police officers, our retirees stay on the plan,” he said. “You can feel more confident making a long-term investment in state employees and teachers.”

Making that up-front investment means the State Health Plan can reap the benefit of healthier workers who cost less down the road, even as they get to an age where people tend to get sick.

“That’s why we need to think about these long-term partnerships, not just as a price reset but now how do we move the structure towards investing in the health of those folks, because they are going to be in the plan for a long time,” Friedman said. 

This article is part of a partnership between The Charlotte Ledger and North Carolina Health News to produce original health care reporting. You can support this effort with a tax-deductible donation.

This article first appeared on North Carolina Health News and is republished here under a Creative Commons Attribution-NoDerivatives 4.0 International License. 

Rural communities push back on school consolidation efforts: ‘They’re just looking at numbers on the paper’

By Devna Bose and Leonardo Bevilacqua, Mississippi Today
October 27, 2026

Mississippi has lost thousands of public school students over the past decade, leaving fewer children enrolled in the state’s 138 school districts and less money to go around. 

State leaders think they’ve found a solution: School consolidation. 

House Speaker Jason White has formed a select committee to examine how merging districts in Mississippi could benefit students. Lawmakers say the state has too many small, underperforming school districts that spend too much on administration.

Representatives have identified several counties as potential candidates for consolidation, including Tallahatchie, Copiah, Washington and Bolivar. But state leaders are struggling to articulate a cohesive vision. It’s not clear if their intent is to merge staff, close schools or both.

House Education Chairman Rob Roberson, a Republican from Starkville, says the push is primarily about improving education while acknowledging that saving money is another factor. 

“It’s unfortunate, and it makes me sound like a bad guy, but I’ve got to look at it realistically,” he said, admitting that administrators’ jobs may be on the chopping block. “Adults matter to me, but the kids matter more.”

But people in communities across Mississippi worry that state leaders are only concerned about saving money without considering how school closures will affect their small towns.

In Tallahatchie, locals fear consolidation will stall progress while Copiah residents fret about deeper dysfunction.

“I don’t think it’s about the kids,” said Bernard Berryhill, a former West Tallahatchie teacher. “I think it’s about dollar bills.”

Shrinking populations, shrinking budgets

The stakes are different for school districts that may be forced to merge. In Copiah County, consolidation could bring Wesson schools in closer proximity with communities with a history of low academic performance and administrative turnover. Hazlehurst schools would lose local control, including the ability to direct their spending and hire school staff. 

“They're just looking at numbers on the paper,” said Hazlehurst school board President Paul Rhodes. “And there's going to be some other costs that may go along with it that they're not even considering.”

The move comes as Hazlehurst schools face a possible state takeover. School leadership has made the kind of progress in recent months that might put off a state takeover, but a key question they still face is: Are your dysfunctional days behind you?

In some ways, the consolidation makes financial sense. 

The Copiah County School District’s central office is less than a mile away from Hazlehurst City Schools’ in downtown Hazlehurst. Both districts’ bus barns are in the county seat. 

But for local communities, the possible savings seem meager compared to losing representation on the school board and mixing district finances and instructional planning for student populations with different needs.

“We want what’s best for the kids,” said Barbara Higgins, whose nonprofit Empowering Doves helps connect Hazlehurst seniors with scholarships. “If they’re afraid of progress, make sure the students have what they need first. We want the chance to grow. And we have been.”

‘The raw end of the deal’

The eastern side of Tallahatchie County is anchored by Charleston, a town of about 1,900 people with a bustling downtown square. The other end of the county is a constellation of four-way stops, rural communities with little more than town halls and gas stations. 

There’s already a sense of inequity between the two ends of the county, said Stephanie Kassem, leader of the Boys & Girls Club in Tutwiler.

The east side has “a stronger tax base, so of course they get more money,” she said. “That's led to this feeling that they get better things than they would over here.”

Berryhill, the former teacher, said he’s concerned that funds would not be fairly divided between the county’s two districts, East Tallahatchie and West Tallahatchie, after a consolidation. 

Superintendent Tony Young’s perspective, West Tallahatchie School District is doing well on its own, financially and academically. He is already concerned about losing money next year because of a new school funding formula that’s tied more closely to student enrollment. A clause that protects districts from losing funding because of declining enrollment expires next summer.

Almost 70,000 students have left Mississippi public schools since 2013. In that time, West Tallahatchie schools have lost more than 300 students, nearly half of its student body. East Tallahatchie has lost a third.

Opposition to consolidation in Copiah County is centered in Wesson and Hazlehurst, where parents and community leaders fear the change would provide few benefits while deepening disparities in resources.

Crystal Morgan, whose three children attend Wesson schools, fears consolidation will overwhelm teachers and crowd classrooms. The consolidation proposed by the legislature last session redrew boundaries to coincide with board of supervisor lines, which would mean some Hazlehurst students would be zoned into Wesson schools. 

She said she hopes her kids don't end up getting “the raw end of the deal with extra students in their already small classroom,” and worries about adding poorly-performing schools to the district.

“Wesson thrives because it’s a small and tight knit community,” she said. 

Tanya Marsaw, a mother of a Crystal Springs High senior, said the district’s students learn and play in subpar facilities. She’s not sure if that would change in a consolidation, but wonders if new leadership after a merger could pave the way for some improvements. 

“My daughter plays volleyball,” she said. “She goes into the Wesson locker room… It's like going somewhere else. They don't have rats, they don't have roaches, they don't have paint chipping off the wall, none of those things.”

Fears of violence

For many Tallahatchie County locals, who are proud of the academic growth of both districts, the first question about consolidation is, “Why?” The immediate second question is, “How?”

Lorenzo Pimpton, a West Tallahatchie teacher and coach, said busing a student from Tutwiler, in the western part of the county, to Charleston in the east could take hours if there are multiple stops. 

The idea, a possible reality of consolidation, is “outlandish” unless lawmakers find the funding for the community to build a centralized school, said Rep. Tracey Rosebud, a West Tallahatchie graduate who now represents the whole county.

“Otherwise, it’s going to be ugly to transfer kids across the region like that,” he said. 

And those long bus rides could lead to fights, he said. Rosebud is particularly concerned about violence between older students if they’re forced together unexpectedly. The two schools have long had a friendly rivalry that sometimes turns hostile, he said.

From her work at the Boys & Girls Club, Kassem worries a merger could destabilize already-struggling students. She knows the trauma many Tallahatchie students are living with: unable to depend on regular meals at home, unreliable transportation and other issues.

“You're in that kind of awkward age and then you are self-conscious, and this is a huge change to be going through,” she said. “I think it would be too much … and would add to some of their trauma.”

A seat at the table

Whatever lawmakers decide on an administrative or school consolidation, Berryhill hopes they consider locals’ voices and make slow, intentional changes.

"If the state is going to make a change, I’d prefer it’s gradual,” he said. “Where can we meet in the middle? A new campus or a new building, maybe.”

When Hazlehurst students exited their buses on the first day of school in August, they were met with landscaped lawns and planters outfitted with red mulch, repainted buildings and glossy gym floors.

The upgrades were the brainchild of Nonya Thrasher, the superintendent appointed in September. She fielded donations and volunteers from local businesses as part of a beautification project. Thrasher brought local leaders into the schools, and cleared the majority of outstanding accreditation violations that kept the district on the state’s radar. 

To many in the community, she has brought something that has eluded the district in recent years: hope. 

For Higgins, a girl scout leader in Hazlehurst for over 30 years, her support for consolidation hinged on the school board’s decision to hire Thrasher, who she says is the most qualified and effective superintendent the district has had in years.

As they discuss consolidating Hazlehurst and Copiah County schools, state lawmakers may also be lingering on a painful and chaotic state takeover of the city district that lasted from 2008 to 2014. The district was out of compliance with nearly every accreditation standard and has struggled to run a functional special education department. 

For now, Thrasher is part of the conversation. She is expected to address the subcommittee on school consolidation in October.

Roberson wants the communities to be involved in the discussion, he said, which also requires admitting there’s a problem.

“Leadership shows up trying to protect what they have,” he said. “What you currently have will not exist over the course of the next few years, because it’s not working. If it was, we wouldn’t be having this conversation.”

This article first appeared on Mississippi Today and is republished here under a Creative Commons Attribution-NoDerivatives 4.0 International License.

‘Wasn’t a freak accident’: New records show how ADM’s safety lapses injured several employees in 2023 explosion

By Sky Chadde, Investigate Midwest

Key takeways

A known risk. Soybean processing plants have a documented history of explosions because of leaked Hexane, a flammable substance. ADM itself identified in 1997 a scenario similar to what preceded the explosion in September 2023.

Training questions. It’s unclear how much training ADM provided its plant workers. It allowed one employee to complete a complicated procedure from memory, and another employee told OSHA he was unaware of critical safety equipment.

Stonewalling. ADM prevented OSHA from interviewing an expert the company hired to investigate the cause of the fire, which is still publicly unknown. A former Department of Labor attorney said OSHA could have fought harder for answers.

The smell was stronger than normal.

Yoan Heredia had breathed in the flammable Hexane gas before. In the building he supervised on the sprawling Archer Daniels Midland campus in Decatur, Illinois, workers regularly encountered the gasoline-like odor. That was because the Fortune 500 company used Hexane to transform raw soybeans into a cooking staple, vegetable oil. Usually, its presence wasn’t cause for concern to the ADM employees.

But, roughly an hour into a night shift on Sept. 10, 2023, Heredia noticed something troubling — the smell was “so bad I felt lightheaded and slightly confused,” he later told federal investigators. On the radio, there was a call to “get out.”

“That’s all I remember,” he later said.

An ambulance rushed him to a local hospital, where he was then flown to a trauma burn unit in Indianapolis, 175 miles away. When he regained consciousness two days later, he awoke to burns on his “whole face,” his sister-in-law told the local paper (https://herald-review.com/news/local/crime-courts/adm-explosion-decatur-injuries/article_d7bd8310-5041-11ee-88b3-2fd0fd1ba47e.html?ref=investigatemidwest.org).

Heredia was one of eight people who suffered severe injuries from the explosion at ADM’s flagship plant that night. The blast tore open a building’s entire side, and it knocked the company’s soybean processing operation offline for at least several months.

After the incident, ADM posted regular updates on its website (https://www.adm.com/en-us/news/adm-statement2/?ref=investigatemidwest.org) about its employees’ conditions. However, the company did not offer any details or information explaining the cause of the explosion, despite Decatur’s U.S. Congressional representative, Nikki Budzinski, saying publicly (https://herald-review.com/news/local/business/article_2dfdeee6-50e6-11ee-bc21-4f46e181f559.html?ref=investigatemidwest.org), “We need answers.”

Federal records obtained by Investigate Midwest offer the clearest picture yet of ADM’s lack of safety oversight at the Decatur plant, which government investigators say paved the way for the potentially deadly threat of leaked Hexane gas.

ADM’s safety training at the Decatur facility was poor, the Occupational Safety and Health Administration found: It provided incorrect guidance about a crucial piece of safety equipment; a longtime supervisor performed a complicated procedure that preceded the explosion by “memory”; and a newly hired supervisor was unaware of important safety tools. It all contributed to Hexane escaping containment.

An alarm detected the leaked gas roughly an hour before the explosion and workers noted Hexane’s presence, but no evacuation order appears to have been given in time, according to OSHA records.

ADM has known for decades leaked Hexane posed a risk. In internal safety documents from 1997, the company identified it as a threat. There were also examples from other companies in the soybean processing industry that showed the consequences of mishandling safety protocols. In 1994, a blast at an Indianapolis plant injured (https://www.upi.com/Archives/1994/06/28/Explosion-at-Indy-feed-mill/8265772776000/?ref=investigatemidwest.org) 15 people. In 2003, two people died (https://www.osha.gov/ords/imis/establishment.inspection_detail?id=306678657&ref=investigatemidwest.org) in an explosion at an Iowa facility.

Investigate Midwest asked John Newquist, a former longtime OSHA official, to review the federal records related to ADM’s Decatur facility and provide feedback based on his years of agency experience. The documents’ redactions limit a full understanding of OSHA’s findings. However, the available records were enough for Newquist to conclude the Decatur explosion was preventable.

“This wasn’t a freak accident,” he said. “The hazard was known, the safeguards meant to stop it were unreliable, and there were warning signs before the blast.”

Investigate Midwest first contacted ADM in mid-September. Its spokesperson, Jackie Anderson, has not returned more than a dozen emails since then, and several calls to her phone number on the company’s website have not been returned. The Decatur facility’s communications manager, Dane Lisser, did not return multiple emails nor calls to his office and cell phone numbers. Neither returned requests for comment through LinkedIn, as well.

Over the past several years, OSHA has cited ADM’s Decatur facility multiple times for lax safety standards (https://www.investigatemidwest.org/i-know-i-have-a-dust-problem-adm-repeatedly-failed-to-prevent-potentially-deadly-grain-explosions/). In 2019, for instance, the agency found ADM did not properly maintain equipment that hoovered up dangerous grain dust. During the processing of soybeans and corn, dust is flung into the air. If it meets a spark, it blows. The poor maintenance had allowed large amounts of grain dust to build up, causing an explosion.

One year, four accidents at Archer Daniels Midland’s Decatur, Ill. headquarters; company fined over $400,000 in past 10 years - CU-CitizenAccess.org (https://cu-citizenaccess.org/2023/12/one-year-four-accidents-at-archer-daniels-midlands-decatur-ill-headquarters-company-fined-over-400000-in-past-10-years/?ref=investigatemidwest.org)

Poor maintenance was also at the center of an April 2023 dust explosion at the same plant, OSHA found. ADM had installed a system that could snuff out nascent fires. It was supposed to be inspected annually, but no one had since 2016. When this fire started, the system failed to work.

Initially, dust was thought to be the main reason for the September 2023 explosion that injured Heredia. After the explosion, ADM employees told firefighters they thought dust was the culprit. OSHA investigators eventually focused on leaked Hexane gas, though.

ADM is Decatur’s largest employer, and, during the day, about 4,000 people mill about the campus. Fewer people work the night shift, an ADM contractor told OSHA. “We have been lucky,” the contractor said. “If during the day [sic], this would have been a much larger event in regards to injuries.”

OSHA fined ADM $50,000 after conducting an investigation between September 2023 and March 2024. It cited four violations:

1. Not maintaining accurate safety information for its employees;
2. Not having “effective engineering and administrative controls” to prevent Hexane from leaking;
3. Not adequately addressing “human factors” that can lead to blasts; and
4. Not ensuring safety procedures were performed as written.

All the citations related to ADM’s “process safety management (https://www.osha.gov/process-safety-management?ref=investigatemidwest.org),” which, per OSHA requirements, is a standardized approach companies must create that prevents the release of hazardous materials. OSHA determined ADM’s management “had deficiencies … prevent(ing) the release of Hexane.” Safety management problems can “reasonably be predicted to result in permanently disabling injuries and/or death,” OSHA said.

OSHA closed the case this January, making the investigative file available. Investigate Midwest filed a Freedom of Information Act request in March seeking a copy.

ADM contested the fine, which was ultimately reduced (https://www.osha.gov/ords/imis/establishment.inspection_detail?id=1696750.015&ref=investigatemidwest.org) to about $25,000. The second and third violations — related to ADM’s administrative controls — were dropped. The records provided to Investigate Midwest do not state why.

Dennis Cooper, a member of the Decatur City Council, worked part-time at ADM for about a decade. Cooper always felt safe in the facility and said he’s glad a major company has its North American headquarters in town.

But he also feels the fine OSHA imposed was too low.

“I feel the fine should have been higher with that type of incident, the negligence that they found, and with the company making the amount of money that ADM makes,” Cooper said. “That fine was just a slap on the hand. … We want people to know that if they go to work, most likely they will come home each night to their families.”

Safety gaps before blast

When Heredia arrived for work at 6 p.m. on Sept. 10, 2023, he and others stepped, unknowingly, into a risky environment, according to the OSHA records. With a wife and two young daughters, Heredia had started at ADM in April 2023. That night, he was supervising a scheduled maintenance shutdown, and nothing seemed amiss. “Everything was as usual,” he later told federal investigators.

Because he was new, Heredia leaned on a more experienced employee, he told OSHA. Jeff Scharfenberg had worked at the plant since 1991, and he’d been a supervisor for almost two decades. Heredia told OSHA Scharfenberg was “knowledgeable and leading the shutdown for us due to my inexperience as a supervisor.”

Scharfenberg told OSHA he oversaw the shutdown without consulting written procedures that night. He was “good with memory,” he said. OSHA investigators wrote in their report that this showed “operating procedures were not followed.”

Accidents and emergency calls mount at Archer Daniels Midland plants in Decatur in past year (https://www.investigatemidwest.org/accidents-and-emergency-calls-mount-at-archer-daniels-midland-plants-in-decatur-in-past-year/)

The two men had different responsibilities that night. Scharfenberg oversaw the “Prep Building,” where machines cracked soybeans open. The beans then fell onto a conveyor belt. Through a tunnel, the beans were transported into a different building. Heredia oversaw this area, called “extraction.” Here, the cracked beans tumbled into a tank filled with liquid Hexane. The substance, an ingredient in paint thinners, extracts the beans’ oil.

The buildings operated in lockstep, and both were being shut down. But it was a tricky procedure. It’s when “these plants are most vulnerable,” said Newquist, the former OSHA official.

To prevent injuries and deaths in situations like this, ADM was required to develop what’s called a “process hazard analysis” — a careful review of everything that could go wrong during a shutdown and the necessary safeguards. ADM had not examined how to perform the shutdown in a “step-by-step fashion,” which OSHA and Newquist said was critical.

The company’s analysis also failed to address a common issue in the extraction area, OSHA found. Employees regularly left doors open during warmer months, and at least one person was written up over it. Open doors risked allowing Hexane gas to escape and enter the Prep Building, where it could contact a spark. OSHA requires companies to mitigate “human factors” like leaving doors ajar, but ADM did not do so, the agency found.

Other safety issues were at play, as well. The extraction area had sensor alarms that alerted workers to increased levels of Hexane in the air, but the Prep Building lacked them because, technically, Hexane was not used there — despite company safety documents from 1997 identifying a leak into the Prep Building as a real risk. It’s also unclear how much training the employees had on mitigating Hexane risks.

Both were rectified after the explosion. OSHA required ADM to install alarms in the Prep Building and to mandate all plant employees attend two safety training sessions.

Scharfenberg still works for ADM, his LinkedIn profile shows, and declined to comment. Heredia, who left the company in summer 2024, did not return requests for comment.

Wrong guidance provided

Something immediately went wrong after the shutdown began at 6:13 p.m.

When the buildings were up and running, there was little chance of Hexane gas leaking. So many soybeans traveled through the tunnel between the two buildings and emptied into the extraction tank that there was no room for gas to escape. However, during a shutdown, there were no soybeans in the tunnel. That meant a natural plug could disappear.

Two backups were designed to seal the tunnel and prevent leaks: a flap valve (https://www.troyvalve.com/valve-products/flap-valves/standard-flap-valves?ref=investigatemidwest.org) and a sliding gate. Both had problems.

The flap valve opened to allow soybeans to flow into the tank, and it closed to stop gas from leaving the tank. But, employees told OSHA, it regularly stuck open because processed beans were “caked on.” It was cleaned only once a year, OSHA found.

For the gate, ADM’s written guidance for employees stated it closed automatically after pushing a button. However, that wasn’t accurate, OSHA found. One of the Prep Building’s managers, Dan Peterson, told OSHA it took “awhile” for the gate to shut. Sometimes, he said, operators would use a wrench to “persuade it to close.” Peterson wasn’t working that night.

As Scharfenberg supervised the Prep Building shutdown, he told OSHA, he “didn’t know the status” of the extraction area. He was “not aware of (the flap valve) sticking.” He did know the gate needed to be closed manually, but he told OSHA there was “no problem with it closing usually.” Heredia told OSHA he didn’t know if there was a flap valve or a gate.

As the shutdown started, the gate was not closed.

Dangerous gas spreads

Five minutes later, at 6:18 p.m., a sensor alarm near the extraction tank detected large amounts of Hexane in the air. The sensor read 8.8%, eight times what ADM, internally, considered dangerous.

Apparently, no one noticed the alarm, but workers began to smell a gasoline-like odor. For Scharfenberg, it did not seem to trigger alarm bells. “I smelled a little bit of Hexane but not to the point it did what it did,” he told OSHA.

Others found it worrisome. Two employees of Austin Industries, an ADM contractor, walked into the Prep Building, breathed in Hexane and walked out. They told an ADM supervisor, OSHA found. An Austin Industries manager later told OSHA: “We told our guys if you see something unsafe, stop work and tell someone.” Austin Industries did not return requests for comment.

The OSHA records do not identify who the contractors reported to or what happened after they did so. “Nothing in the (OSHA) record shows an effective response, such as an evacuation,” Newquist said.

About 50 minutes after the alarm, at 7:11 p.m., the explosion ripped apart the building, knocked at least one person, Heredia, unconscious, and burned multiple workers’ bodies. One man suffered “multiple skull fractures” and would spend weeks in a medically induced coma, according to a lawsuit the injured employee filed.

Whether the gas leaked into the Prep Building because of the faulty backups or because doors were propped open — or both — is unclear in the records. Regardless, gas was present, and it found a spark, the source of which is not established in the OSHA records.

OSHA did determine that, at the same time as the explosion, an employee turned off a circuit breaker that controlled a piece of equipment in the Prep Building. The OSHA records do not say explicitly whether it malfunctioned. Later, the Decatur Fire Department identified operating equipment as the source of the fire.

The fire department, though, did not fully investigate the cause of the fire “because of the extensive damage to the facility,” then-fire chief Jeff Abbott wrote in an internal summary. A Decatur city spokesman, Ryan Huffer, declined to comment when asked whether this was normal procedure. The city also said the department had no fire investigators at the time, and it has no related “investigative records.”

Potential dangers lingered

In the aftermath, black smoke surrounded Scharfenberg, and his shirt sleeve caught fire, he told OSHA. He found two injured workers and got them to safety. He then returned to find others and led them to safety, he said.

The plant had a system to douse fires, but it had been out of service the two weeks prior. Instead, the backup system activated. About 10 minutes after the blast, Decatur firefighters arrived and found several areas in flames, according to city records.

With fires blazing, ADM representatives issued a warning to first responders. “ADM reps were telling me that another possible dust explosion was our biggest hazard,” one firefighter reported.

Some of the damaged buildings were inaccessible. But to prevent another fireball, ADM personnel told firefighters to hose down airducts, motors and a dust collector, according to city records. It took a couple hours to control the fire, and firefighters didn’t leave until the next afternoon.

Concern lingered for days. In an internal email about a week afterward, an OSHA manager told his colleagues: “There is still ongoing discussion regarding imminent danger due to grain dust.” Employees who worked in other parts of the Decatur plant that continued to operate after the fire could be at-risk, given the April and September 2023 explosions, the manager said.

“The soy operations may not be active at the moment,” he wrote, “but there is concern about other operations now that we’ve experienced 2 major grain dust explosions within 6 months.”

Two weeks after the explosion, OSHA inspectors could still not access some areas, according to the case file. One building’s basement had a “huge scorch mark,” and it was “not deemed safe” to enter, an inspector noted.

It’s unclear how long soybean processing stopped functioning, but it stretched into early 2024 at least. In a March 2024 interview with OSHA, Scharfenberg said it was still not operational: “Hopefully we rebuild and get up and running again.”

ADM lacks transparency

ADM didn’t fully cooperate with OSHA’s investigation, especially on one major question, according to OSHA’s records.

While ADM facilitated OSHA’s interviews with employees, the company prevented the agency from speaking with a longtime fire investigator the company hired. About two months after the explosion, OSHA requested to interview Doug Rayburn (https://rayburnfsi.com/artist/john-douglas-rayburn/?ref=investigatemidwest.org), the owner of Rayburn Fire Scene Investigations, based in Orland Park, Illinois.

In an email to his boss, an OSHA investigator described his meeting with Adam Young, ADM’s attorney: “ADM is not willing” to let OSHA interview Rayburn because “he is their expert.” Young added, according to the email, “We have been transparent providing information.”

To the OSHA investigator, it seemed unclear whether the agency could compel ADM to share Rayburn’s findings. “Not sure if we can or want to push this issue at this time,” he told his boss. If his boss responded, it is not in OSHA’s records.

Ann Rosenthal worked as an attorney for the U.S. Department of Labor, including OSHA, for more than 35 years. During an investigation, she said, OSHA can subpoena anyone with relevant information.

“They could have done more (to obtain all the relevant information),” she said. “They could have fought harder. … OSHA did not do an adequate inspection by not trying harder to talk to the expert.”

But providing proper oversight might have required resources the agency did not have, she said. The agency had 736 inspectors (https://www.oig.dol.gov/public/DOL-OIG 2025 Top Management and Performance Challenges.pdf?ref=investigatemidwest.org) as of summer 2025, a historically low figure, and the Trump administration’s proposed budget calls for even fewer. Few federal attorneys — coupled with DOGE forcing experienced staff out and a federal hiring freeze — means heavy caseloads, she explained.

Rosenthal noted OSHA could have pursued a “willful” violation, given the Decatur plant’s history of safety issues. During its investigation into the April 2023 explosion, OSHA noted the plant’s rash of incidents and levied a “willful” violation against ADM. The result was a much larger fine. However, companies can dispute OSHA fines, and ADM and the agency are still negotiating a settlement (https://www.osha.gov/ords/imis/establishment.inspection_detail?id=1664999.015&ref=investigatemidwest.org).

ADM did not return requests for comment about why it blocked OSHA from interviewing Rayburn. Young, ADM’s attorney, did not respond to a request for comment. Rayburn, the fire investigator, did not return requests for comment.

Investigate Midwest contacted OSHA multiple times about this incident, and each time the agency said it was working on a response. However, it did not provide a comment by publication.

Calls for transparency

Three years since the explosion, ADM has not released any information about its cause and has not shared any updates with Decatur leaders, according to Cooper and David Horn, another city council member.

Horn said Decatur is proud to have ADM in town, but he thinks the company could be more transparent about how it’s addressing safety concerns.

“It’s the lack of reassurance both to the city as a whole and to the elected officials,” Horn said. “There’s an opportunity to have a better open dialogue, and I feel that will be an opportunity for ADM to strengthen its reputation with the residents of the city.”

Investigate Midwest shared OSHA’s findings with every member of the Decatur City Council. Only Cooper and Horn agreed to interviews.

In the days after the 2023 explosion, U.S. Representative Nikki Budzinski, a Democrat who represents the Decatur area, called for a “thorough” investigation into the explosion. She told the Decatur Herald & Review, the town’s newspaper, that it needed to be “comprehensive so that we can really get the real answers so this never happens again.”

In a statement to Investigate Midwest, Budzinski said it’s essential that OSHA has the power to hold companies accountable for safety lapses.

“While OSHA's findings and citations deliver the clarity we sought regarding safety breakdowns that occurred,” Budzinski said, “our neighbors and workers shouldn't have to wait for essential safety information.”

HOW WE REPORTED THIS

This story started with a Freedom of Information Act request I filed in March 2026. I’d written about the September 2023 explosion at the ADM’s Decatur facility before, but there was actually very little information available about how exactly the explosion happened. When I received the records in early September of this year, I read through them and tried to interview the people involved and affected by the explosion. I also interviewed experts who have worked at OSHA for years.

Citations and references

Interviews/statements

Emailed analysis from John Newquist, former OSHA official, Sept. 21, 2026

Interview with David Horn, Decatur City Council, Sept. 22, 2026

Interview with Dennis Cooper, Decatur City Council, Sept. 24, 2026

Emailed statement from U.S. Rep. Nikki Budzinski’s office, Sept. 25, 2026

Interview with Ann Rosenthal, former DOL attorney, Sept. 30, 2026

Emailed statement from Ryan Huffer, City of Decatur spokesperson, Oct. 5, 2026

Public records

OSHA investigation (https://www.documentcloud.org/documents/28661321-a9-release-1696750-archer-daniels-midland-company-redacted/?ref=investigatemidwest.org) into Archer Daniels Midland

OSHA investigation (https://www.documentcloud.org/documents/28716372-b9-release-1707299-austin-industries-inc-redacted/?ref=investigatemidwest.org) into Austin Industries

Decatur Fire Department narratives (https://www.documentcloud.org/documents/28713240-doc02776920260911130735/?ref=investigatemidwest.org)

Decatur Fire Department photos (https://www.documentcloud.org/documents/28686399-adm-fire-photos-sept-2023/?ref=investigatemidwest.org)

Government releases

“US Department of Labor investigation finds ADM failed to inspect, test critical safety systems in explosion that injured 3 workers at Decatur facility (https://www.dol.gov/newsroom/releases/osha/osha20231018?ref=investigatemidwest.org),” OSHA press release, Oct. 18, 2023

“US Department of Labor’s Top Management and Performance Challenges, (https://www.oig.dol.gov/public/DOL-OIG 2025 Top Management and Performance Challenges.pdf?ref=investigatemidwest.org)” DOL Office of Inspector General, January 2026

“Process Safety Management (https://www.osha.gov/process-safety-management?ref=investigatemidwest.org),” OSHA website, undated

“Hazard Recognition (https://www.osha.gov/process-safety-management/hazards?ref=investigatemidwest.org),” OSHA website, undated

“Hexane (https://pubchem.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/compound/Hexane?ref=investigatemidwest.org),” PubChem website, undated

OSHA Inspection Detail, Inspection: 1696750.015 (https://www.osha.gov/ords/imis/establishment.inspection_detail?id=1696750.015&ref=investigatemidwest.org)

Company releases

“ADM Statements Regarding East Plant Incident (https://www.adm.com/en-us/news/adm-statement2/?ref=investigatemidwest.org),” ADM website, last updated Sept. 25, 2023

“Major Employers (https://www.decaturedc.com/industries-here/?ref=investigatemidwest.org),” Economic Development Corporation for Decatur and Macon County website, undated

News stories

“Explosion at Indy feed mill, (https://www.upi.com/Archives/1994/06/28/Explosion-at-Indy-feed-mill/8265772776000/?ref=investigatemidwest.org)” UPI, June 28, 1994

“5 workers remain hospitalized after explosion at ADM plant in Decatur (https://herald-review.com/news/local/crime-courts/adm-explosion-decatur-injuries/article_d7bd8310-5041-11ee-88b3-2fd0fd1ba47e.html?ref=investigatemidwest.org),” Decatur Herald & Review, Sept. 11, 2023

“Budzinski on ADM blast: ‘We need answers,’ (https://herald-review.com/news/local/business/article_2dfdeee6-50e6-11ee-bc21-4f46e181f559.html?ref=investigatemidwest.org)” Decatur Herald & Review, Sept. 11, 2023

“ADM rethinking Decatur expansion as demand for plant-based protein falls (https://www.bizjournals.com/chicago/news/2023/10/25/adm-plant-based-proteins-decatur.html?ref=investigatemidwest.org),” Chicago Business Journal, Oct. 25, 2023

“‘I know I have a dust problem’: ADM repeatedly failed to prevent potentially deadly grain explosions (https://www.investigatemidwest.org/i-know-i-have-a-dust-problem-adm-repeatedly-failed-to-prevent-potentially-deadly-grain-explosions/),” Investigate Midwest, May 21, 2025

“Archer Daniels Midland (https://fortune.com/company/archer-daniels-midland/?ref=investigatemidwest.org),” Fortune, undated

Investigate Midwest is an independent, nonprofit newsroom. Our mission is to serve the public interest by exposing dangerous and costly practices of influential agricultural corporations and institutions through in-depth and data-driven investigative journalism. Visit us online at www.investigatemidwest.org (https://investigatemidwest.org/)

After 65 years, Freedom Riders finally complete their journey to New Orleans

by Diego Perdomo, Verite News New Orleans
October 29, 2026

Multiple generations of Black civil rights activists met at Xavier University on Wednesday (Oct. 28) to honor a group of Freedom Riders after they finally completed a disrupted bus journey from Washington D.C. to New Orleans 65 years after the original trip was halted.

The original ride, the first in a series of trips to protest Jim Crow laws, was interrupted when a segregationist mob firebombed their buses in Anniston, Alabama on May 14, 1961. The 13 riders were able to escape the bus before it exploded but sustained beatings from the mob. The next day, they flew directly to New Orleans and sought refuge at Xavier University after hotels refused to host them out of fears of further violence.

Leaving D.C. on Oct. 17 and stopping in historical cities like Selma and Jackson, the latest cohort of Freedom Riders completed the bus route their predecessors were unable to. Among the riders were original participants of the 1961 Freedom Rides, including Steve Thomas, who travelled from Jackson to Montgomery.

Interlocking hands to sing “We Shall Overcome” and hosting a litany of faith-based activists, the reception highlighted a legacy of Black political action amidst concerns of voter suppression after the Louisiana v. Callais Supreme Court decision gutted key provisions of the Voting Rights Act and a nationwide redistricting eliminated majority-Black congressional districts across the Deep South, including one of two in Louisiana. 

“We are approaching another election and once again questions about voting rights, equal representation, civic participation and the integrity of our democratic institutions is before us,” said the Rev. Traci Blackmon, who is based in Missouri. “Across the nation, the communities are wrestling questions that should have been settled permanently long ago: ‘Who gets to vote?’”

Among the some of the original Freedom Riders recognized were New Orleans locals Jerome “Big Duck” Smith and Dodie Smith-Simmons. Smith famously met with then-U.S. Attorney General Robert Kennedy in May 1963, confronting him about the failure to protect him and other civil rights activists against angry white mobs across the South. The meeting is seen as a pivotal factor that pushed the federal government to support the civil rights movement. Smith continued to fight for civil rights and mentor New Orleans’ youth until his death in August. Smith-Simmons, who attended the event, also trained freedom riders when she was with CORE.

Before the Xavier event, the Freedom Riders first stopped at the TEP Interpretive Center — located at the former William Frantz Elementary School — to meet founder Leona Tate, one of the first students to integrate the school in 1960.

They then made their way to Xavier University’s St. Katharine Drexel Chapel for a recognition of their efforts and a program to highlight the legacy of Black activism. Like the original bus trip, solidarity with HBCUs was a throughline for the new campaign as student leaders paid tribute to the actions of their predecessors.

“Mr. Smith was more than a fighter and freedom rider. He was a father, a mentor, and a man who demonstrated love, courage, culture and commitment to his family. We honor him today, and his sacrifice, his service and his journey,” said Xavier University student Paytra Flood, who spoke at the event. “As we welcome back Freedom Riders to Xavier, we recognize that we are standing on the shoulders of those who came before us. As students at this historically Black University, we have the responsibility to understand history that shaped our communities.”

While the original Freedom Rides were undertaken to confront ongoing transit segregation, this year’s trip sought to mobilize voters and encourage activists to understand what they can do today to enact change.

Kredelle Petway-Phillips, a legacy Freedom Rider who also participated in the recent trip, said she wanted to remind young Americans of the importance of their vote and ability to make change. Her Freedom Ride was an July 1961 airplane trip from Montgomery, Alabama, to Jackson, Mississippi, where she was arrested by Jackson police and held for three days. Petway-Phillips’ participation in the rides was seen as integral to the eventual desegregation of flights. When she visited Jackson for the 50th reunion of her flight, she said it was rewarding for her to see Black people represented in the local government.

“It’s up to you young people to vote and keep the legacy alive,” Petway-Phillips said.

“Fight for what’s right [and] vote for the common good of all people because what affects one affects the other. … We all suffer when one suffers.”

The Xavier ceremony wrapped up with a second line from the chapel to a statue of Norman Francis, who provided safe refuge for the May 1961 Freedom Riders when he was Xavier University Dean of Men. Francis, who died earlier this year, later became Xavier’s first Black and non-clergymember president in 1968.

“The reality is that we have to declare that there is more work to be done,” said Bishop Erika Crawford of the Eighth Episcopal District of the African Methodist Episcopal Church that represents AME churches in Louisiana and Mississippi. “There are testimonies about what happens when we refuse to allow the last stops to be the final stop …This is the last stop, but don’t let it be the final stop.”

This article first appeared on Verite News New Orleans and is republished here under a Creative Commons Attribution-NoDerivatives 4.0 International License.