Judge Allows Lawsuit Against MRC To Proceed

A federal judge in Jackson, Miss., issued an order April 28 allowing a lawsuit by a newspaper publisher and lumber company against the Mississippi River Commission (MRC) to proceed. The lawsuit alleges a lack of transparency in meetings.

The suit was originally filed in September 2024. Emmerich Newspapers Inc., which publishes dozens of publications across Mississippi, Louisiana and Arkansas, sued the MRC over what it claimed were secret meetings where proper records were not kept and the public was not notified or admitted. Emmerich was joined as plaintiff by a lumber company that manages hundreds of acres alongside the Mississippi River. The lumber company claims the Corps of Engineers’ decisions on flood control, informed by advice from the MRC, adversely affect its properties.

The judge’s decision allows the lawsuit to proceed without ruling on the merits of the allegations.

Congress created the Mississippi River Commission in 1879 to survey the river and, after the 1927 flood, to work under and alongside the Corps of Engineers in inspecting flood control measures along the river.

Emmerich claims the MRC violated the 1976 Government in the Sunshine Act, which amended the Freedom of Information Act and provides that “the public is entitled to the fullest practicable information regarding the decision-making processes of the federal government.” Emmerich claims that, since 2010, the MRC has been holding “secret” meetings separate from its regular high-water and low-water inspection meetings.

“In these secret, non-public meetings, the MRC has received information in the nature of formal presentations and briefings, discussed and considered that information and made decisions associated with the management of the Mississippi River,” the suit alleges.

Senior District Judge Keith Starrett dismissed one part of the lawsuit on procedural grounds, agreeing with the MRC’s argument that it is not a “federal agency” under the Sunshine Act. However, he allowed most of the claims to continue to the next stages.

“Although the court has held that the MRC no longer falls under the Sunshine Act, the regulations promulgated for the MRC pursuant to the Sunshine Act are still in force,” Starrett wrote in his order. “Because [the regulation] is still ‘on the books,’ it has the force of law, and the MRC is duty-bound to follow it.”

The MRC argued that these private meetings were not subject to the public meetings requirements because “deliberations” did not occur in those meetings, but Starrett wrote that, because the “plaintiffs have been excluded from the subject meetings, and there are no transcripts or records regarding the subject meetings due to the MRC’s practice of conducting the meetings in private, plaintiffs are at an obvious disadvantage with regard to their ability to allege specific underlying facts regarding whether ‘deliberations’ occurred at the meetings.”