League of Women Voters Oxford/Mississippi hold candidate forum

Candidates met Thursday at St. Peter’s Episcopal Church for the League of Women Voters Oxford/MS candidate forum. From left, Randy Watkins, Kelly Luther, Carnelia Fondren, Sarah Liddy, Larry Little and Leroy Thompson.
Photo by Alyssa Schnugg

By Alyssa Schnugg
News Editor
alyssa.schnugg@hottytoddy.com

On Thursday, the League of Women Voters Oxford/Mississippi held one such forum at St. Peter’s Episcopal Church inviting all Mississippi candidates in each U.S. Senate and House race as well as local Chancery Court, Circuit Court and School Board elections.

Democratic Randy Watkins, a professor of chemistry at the University of Mississippi who is running for the U.S. House District 1 seat against incumbent Trent Kelly was the only state candidate to attend the forum.

Watkins, who is originally from Iuka, said he decided to run after working in 2015-2016 with Congressmen Steve Cohen (D-Tenn., Memphis) in Washington, D.C. as a science and technology congressional fellow. Part of his job was to watch the Mississippi delegation and how they voted.

“Everything that is bad for this state they would vote on and everything good for this state they would vote against,” he said at the forum. “It’s become party over the district.”

Circuit Court Judge Kelly Luther is running to retain his seat as a judge in the Third District. He is being challenged by attorney Shirley Byers, who did not attend the forum. Another loner was Lafayette County School Board candidate Leroy Thompson who is running against Mike Gooch.

However, all three candidates for Chancery Court did attend the forum – Larry Little, who served as the Oxford Municipal Judge for more than 20 years; Oxford attorney Carnelia Fondren, who served as assistant district attorney; and Marshall County attorney Sarah Liddy, who serves as the Youth Court Referee and Master in Chancellor in Marshall County. They are running to replace current Judge Glenn Alderson who is retiring.

The chancery court candidates were asked how they think they can improve the speed in which cases are managed in the court.

Fondren and Liddy both agreed cases could be handled faster if attorneys could file electronically.

“It would make things go smoother,” Fondren said.

Liddy also said she’d like to see pretrial conferences.

“Many times cases are settled the day of the trial and that’s a whole court day wasted,” she said.

Little said the court already has all court records available to be viewed online and disagreed about the pretrial conferences.

“It’s not the best use of the court’s time in many cases,” he said.