NATCHEZ — A senate bill to change Natchez-Adams School Board members from appointed to elected officials has passed committee and is heading to the floor.

Sen. Bob Dearing, D-Natchez, authored the bill that would model the election of school board members off that of the Board of Supervisors.

“There would be a board representative from each of the districts of the supervisors,” Dearing said.

Though Dearing said he himself prefers the appointment of a board member over the election, Dearing said he was asked by four of the six members of the Natchez Board of Aldermen and all five members of the Adams County Board of Supervisors to present such a bill in 2016.

“They had some concerns about an appointed school board, and we had a really good discussion about it,” Dearing said. “They voted to ask that I submit this legislation.”

Dearing said he does not recall which aldermen were present at the meeting.

Dearing said he first submitted the legislation for the 2017 legislative session, but that it had not gotten out of committee.

This year, however, the Senate Education Committee approved the bill with a 9-to-1 vote.

“That’s a good sign,” Dearing said.

Dearing said the committee asked him to come forward and explain the bill and, after several questions, put the item to a vote.

The fact that the bill passed so easily though committee, Dearing said, could have been sparked by recent disputes in the county.

“All of the controversy we had around the new high school kind of imploded,” Dearing said.

Despite this supposition, Dearing said he did not address the disagreements surrounding the new high school while presenting the bill to the education committee.

“I didn’t bring it up at all,” Dearing said.

Mayor Darryl Grennell said he has been advocating for the position of school board member to be an elected one since 1988.

“I support this bill, I’ve supported this for (more than) 20 years,” Grennell said. “To me, it’s about the ability to pass a millage. If you can pass a tax on the people, the people should be able to hold you accountable.”

Grennell said he was not sure why the bill had more favor in this legislative session as opposed to previous ones, but he is happy that there is a possibility of passage now.

Adams County Board of Supervisors President Calvin Butler said he is still very much in favor of the school board being an elected office.

“The reason that we wanted it was because with the school board, they can come to the supervisors and they can increase taxes, and we can’t deny or veto them,” Butler said. “The supervisors have to honor their millage increases. My thing is, if they have the power to raise the taxes of the community, they have to be responsible to the community.”

Though as the law currently stands the board of supervisors appoints school board members, Butler said the supervisors have no ability to control what the school board passes.

“Nobody is really accountable,” Butler said. “The taxpayer comes to us with questions, and we don’t have answers. By law, our hands are tied.”

If passed by the senate and house, the bill would take effect in November 2019.

The first election of the school board would take place on the first Tuesday after the first Monday in November 2019 — and every four years thereafter — ensuring that all new school board members would take office by Jan. 2, 2020.

“Hopefully, we can get some good candidates,” Dearing said. “If it passes.”

The bill passed committee Wednesday, and Dearing said he was not sure when it would be voted on by the senate.