In September of 2021, Ford Motor Company announced big plans. The promise of a $5.6 billion electric truck and battery plant just five miles from the predominantly Black town of Mason, Tennessee. The move would bring over 26,000 jobs to the area.
Then in February 2022, the state’s Comptroller Jason Mumpower delivered an ultimatum to the town leaders: relinquish the town’s 153-year-old town charter or lose financial control. The city has had a shaky economic history but is only recently led by Black leadership.
Is this justified, or is it giving white supremacy?
Justin Carter takes a closer look into this situation between the sovereign city of Mason, Tennessee and the attempt for the state to take it over ahead of its potential financial boom in his latest TSR Investigates episode. Justin spoke with Mason’s Vice Mayor Virginia Rivers, who said the town’s all Black charter relieved most of Mason’s debt. Mason’s past leaders, white men, were found to have confiscated almost a million from town funds after investigations.
When the black administration took over in 2016, the town had almost a million stolen in the city from the white leaders that were in previous leadership at that time.
The town’s financial recovery and a potential boom from Ford plant plans are why Rivers was shocked when Mason’s 1300 residents got a letter from the state comptroller Jason Mumpower. He alleged the town was “poorly managed” and threatened to take its charter power away. Mumpower claims the town’s finances would be in better hands with the state. Rivers believes they are being sneaky since Ford would be bringing many jobs to the area shortly.
The Shade Room reached out to Mumpower for comment, and he was unavailable. Still, he did explain his sudden interest in Mason, Tennessee, in a past interview with The Tennessee Holler.
Because if Mason doesn’t get their finances in order, opportunities are gonna bypass them. The opportunity for neighborhoods to develop. Mason doesn’t have a grocery store or a gas station, and Mason really suffers from not having the ability to have those things in their community.
So, what is really going on here? Hit play to see Justin take a closer look into Mason’s predicament for his latest TSR Investigates below.
