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GULFPORT, Miss. (AP) — A coastal Mississippi city’s residents are worrying about the growing cost and sporadic delivery of their utility bills.

People in Gulfport say they’re seeing spikes in what they owe and billing cycles for water, sewer and garbage collection that cover differing lengths of time beyond the usual 30 days.

Loretta Howard told The Biloxi Sun Herald that she received a $213 utility bill this month. It covered 43 days and greatly exceeded the $39.42 she paid each month from March through August.

“I’m on a limited income,” the 88-year-old said. “If I pay that bill, it means I’m going to be short on groceries.”

The sporadic billing also is problematic for residents who have the charges automatically deducted from their checking accounts.

“I’ve had no success getting any answers or information,” said Marley Walker. “Why didn’t they take the time to send a notice letting the people know what was going on?”

Walker said his bill grew 92% for the extended billing period, while one of his neighbors saw a 59% increase.

The city’s public information officer LaShaundra McCarty said register heads are broken on some electronic meters and being replaced, which could delay billing since some meters have to be read manually. The newspaper reports the full $4.2 million replacement project could take years.

McCarty suggested a bill as high as Howard’s could involve a leak. She said the city hopes to replace temporary workers in the water department with two permanent full-time employees who can respond to calls and emails from residents.

JACKSON, Miss. (AP) — Some billboard messages have been removed in Mississippi because they urged people to vote on the wrong election date.

WAPT-TV reports that the billboards in Jackson said the election is Nov. 16.

The correct date for Mississippi is Nov. 5.

Kamari Guthrie is spokeswoman for a nonprofit, nonpartisan group called vote.org. She says the organization ordered the vinyl covers for billboards, but they were intended to go up in Louisiana, where runoffs are Nov. 16.

Hal Kilshaw is vice president of government relations for Lamar Advertising, which owns the billboards where the messages went up. He says workers noticed the date was wrong, and all of the incorrect messages were removed by Saturday.

JACKSON, Miss. (AP) — Two candidates for secretary of state said Monday that they have different ideas about whether Mississippi should change its laws to expand early voting.

Under current Mississippi law, absentee voting is limited to people who have a temporary or permanent disability, are at least 65 years old or will be out of town on Election Day.

The Republican nominee, state Sen. Michael Watson, said he sees no need to change the system.

“I think our system, as is, is working,” Watson said. “Obviously, lots of excuses that you can use — work, or out of town and a few other things that you can kind of talk about. Again, we give them 45 days to get in there. In my opinion, it’s easy enough as it is.”

The Democratic nominee, former Hattiesburg Mayor Johnny DuPree, said he supports expansion of early voting to get more people involved in the election process.

“You have a fundamental right to vote, and why do I have to give an excuse to vote?” DuPree said. “That’s like, why do I have to give an excuse to breathe? I believe that we should have no-excuse early voting.”

Thirty-nine states allow people to vote early without having to provide an excuse such as being out of town on election day, according to the National Conference of State Legislatures.

The two candidates spoke Monday in Jackson at a forum sponsored by Mississippi State University’s Stennis Institute of Government and the Capitol Press Corps. Both said they support efforts to educate people about voting.

The election is Nov. 5.

DuPree and Watson are competing to succeed third-term Secretary of State Delbert Hosemann, a Republican who faces Democratic state Rep. Jay Hughes in the open race for lieutenant governor.

The secretary of state serves with the governor and attorney general on the state election commission.

Candidates file campaign finance reports and businesses file documents of incorporation at the secretary of state’s office. The office also regulates charities and securities, and it oversees public land leases, which generate money for schools.

DuPree, 65, is a real estate broker and served 16 years as Hattiesburg mayor. He was previously a Forrest County supervisor and Hattiesburg school board member. He was also the Democratic nominee for governor in 2011, falling to Republican Phil Bryant in the general election.

Watson, 41, of Pascagoula, is an attorney has served three terms as a state senator in a district that’s entirely in coastal Jackson County.

RIPLEY, Miss. (AP) — Mississippi electric cooperatives continue to move toward offering internet.

Tippah Electric Power Association board members voted this month to create a broadband internet subsidiary. The cooperative’s 13,500 members in Tippah, Benton, Union, Prentiss and Alcorn counties are now voting by mail on amending its incorporation charter. At least 10% of members must vote. Of those, at least 60% must favor the change for it to pass.

General Manager Tim Smith tells The Northeast Mississippi Daily Journal that if Tippah Electric goes ahead, building a network will take up to three years.

Tippah is at least the sixth of Mississippi’s 25 cooperatives to announce internet plans.

The moves come months after state legislators allowed rural electric providers to enter the business.

Lawmakers cited complaints that current providers weren’t serving rural areas.

GLENDORA, Miss. (AP) — A new bulletproof memorial to Emmett Till was dedicated Saturday in Mississippi after previous historical markers were repeatedly vandalized.

The brutal slaying of the 14-year-old black teenager helped spur the civil rights movement more than 60 years ago.

The 14-year-old African American teen was kidnapped, beaten and killed in 1955, hours after he was accused of whistling at a white woman. His body was found in a river days later. An all-white jury in Mississippi acquitted two white men of murder charges.

Patrick Weems, executive director of the Emmett Till Memorial Commission, said the new marker was dedicated Saturday.

Members of Till’s family, including a cousin who was there the night Till was kidnapped, attended the ceremony at the site where the teen’s body was pulled from the Tallahatchie River.

This is the fourth historical marker at the site. Previous ones became a target for vandals.

The first historical marker was placed in 2008. Someone tossed it in the river. The second and third signs were shot at and left riddled with bullet holes.

The new 500-pound (225-kilogram) steel sign has a glass bulletproof front, Weems said.

Weems said the markers were placed as an attempt to acknowledge the truth of what happened there and hopefully spark “new conversations.”

“For 50 years nobody talked about Emmett Till,” Weems said.

“I think we just have to be resilient and know there are folks out there that don’t want to know this history or who want to erase the history. We are just going to be resilient in continuing to put them back up and be truthful in making make sure that Emmett didn’t die in vain.”

Two of Till’s cousins, the Rev. Wheeler Parker and Ollie Gordon, attended Saturday’s ceremony, Weems said.

Parker had traveled with Till in the summer of 1955 from Chicago to the Mississippi Delta to visit relatives.

In a speech in Mississippi last year, Parker recalled the immediate sense of danger he felt when they encountered the woman at the store. Parker awoke hours later — at 2:30 a.m. — to the sound of Till’s assailants knocking on the door of their grandparents’ cabin and his grandmother offering them money to leave the family alone.

ABERDEEN, Miss. (AP) — A former jail guard in northeast Mississippi says she was fired for being transgender.

Elise Hebert says she was treated differently from other Chickasaw County jail guards, and that supervisors didn’t keep her transgender status secret despite her request.

The lawsuit , filed this month in federal court in Aberdeen, seeks back wages and damages from Chickasaw County.

Hebert says she was frequently belittled by coworkers and supervisors, including Sheriff James Meyers and Warden Brand Huffman. She says she was disciplined for incidents for which other officers weren’t punished, saying the treatment created a hostile work environment violating her civil rights. Hebert says she was fired in 2017 after her paycheck didn’t arrive on time and she couldn’t afford gasoline to drive to work.

JACKSON, Miss. (AP) — President Donald Trump announced Friday that he will appear in Mississippi to rally Republicans days before statewide elections.

The Republican president’s reelection campaign announced plans for a rally at the BancorpSouth Arena in Tupelo on Nov. 1, four days before Mississippians go to the polls to elect everything from a governor to county supervisors.

The Trump statement makes no mention of the gubernatorial showdown between Republican Lt. Gov. Tate Reeves and Democratic Attorney General Jim Hood. However, Republicans have been hoping for a visit from Trump to boost turnout, and Reeves eagerly greeted the announcement.

“I am proud to welcome President Trump back to Mississippi — a state that is proud to stand behind our President,” Reeves said. “He knows how important it is to defeat Democrat Jim Hood, who supported Hillary Clinton and still works to undermine Trump like the rest of his radical party.”

Reeves has long sought to tie Hood to national Democrats who are unpopular among white voters in Mississippi and tie himself to Trump, who has been popular in the Magnolia State. Hood, though, has tried to emphasize that he would work with Trump and fight the race on local issues. On Friday, Hood said Trump is seeking to rescue Reeves.

“The real reason he’s coming to Mississippi is because Tate Reeves has failed miserably to inspire or excite even his own supporters,” Hood said in a statement. “Tate Reeves can’t hold his own in this race, so he’s looking for someone to hold his hand. And when the president leaves, Tate Reeves will still be here, wallowing in eight years of failed leadership and his inability to do anything to improve the lives of working Mississippians.”

The president will be appearing in the largest city in northeast Mississippi, a region that has historically been Hood’s home base, even as the Democrat has defied the statewide tide toward the GOP.

Trump tweeted support for Reeves on Tuesday and previously on Oct. 3.

“Tate is strong on Crime, tough on Illegal Immigration, and will protect your Second Amendment,” Trump wrote in one Oct. 3 tweet. He continued in another: “He loves our Military and supports our Vets! Get out and Vote for Tate Reeves on November 5th. He has my Complete and Total Endorsement!”

Trump traveled to Mississippi in 2018 to campaign for Republican Cindy Hyde-Smith, who had been appointed to the Senate by Bryant after longtime Republican Sen. Thad Cochran retired.

Donald Trump Jr. and his girlfriend, former Fox News contributor Kimberly Guilfoyle, will appear Thursday at the Longleaf Plantation hunting lodge near Hattiesburg to raise money for Reeves. Tickets are $500 each.

Mississippi’s current Republican governor, Phil Bryant, is prohibited by state law from seeking a third term. Two other candidates — independent David Singletary and the Constitution Party’s Bob Hickingbottom — are running low-budget campaigns for governor.