Perhaps because Mr. Cumbest has some transparency issues of his own involving the Hospital system. The Mississippi Ethics Commission has issued four opinions directly addressing the issue of an elected official’s spouse working in a community hospital since 2008. Three of the four opinions directly address the issue of a Supervisor’s wife working at a community hospital. Here is one:
It is a bit more complex than that however as this opinion from March 2012 demonstrates but the end result is ultimately the same. To the extent the facts in the 2012 opinion mirror Supervisor Cumbest’s fact pattern one wonders how it was missed by both the County and Hospital’s legal departments.