Sid Salter
- Columnist Sid Salter remember Robinson, a distinguished veteran of county, state, and district politics in Mississippi, who passed away peacefully at his residence in Hamilton on May 26.
After a season of unprecedented corruption involving elected Mississippi Public Service Commissioners in the late 1980s, then-Democratic Mississippi Governor Ray Mabus faced the task of appointing a successor in 1989 to fill the unexpired term of Northern District Commissioner D.W. Snyder of Eupora, following his trial and conviction on federal charges of extortion, filing false tax returns, bribery, and conspiracy.
Snyder had been entrusted with the PSC seat by voters for seven terms. Southern District PSC Commissioner Lynn Havens resigned after facing a federal indictment in 1988 and subsequently pleaded guilty to conspiracy charges in 1989.
The Mabus appointment would draw intense scrutiny as questions roiled about the wisdom of electing public service commissioners who could accept campaign contributions from the very utilities and other companies they regulated. Who did Mabus appoint to step into the post after Snyder?
State Rep. Dorlos “Bo” Robinson of Hamilton in Monroe County was appointed. Through the prism of history, Mabus made an exemplary choice.
Robinson, a distinguished veteran of county, state, and district politics in Mississippi, passed away peacefully at his residence in Hamilton on May 26 at age 90.
Robinson was a veteran, a law enforcement officer, a longtime farmer and cotton gin operator, and someone with real-world business experience in farm credit, banking and the legislative process. He was a lay speaker and circuit church worship leader in the Methodist church for decades.
Those characteristics helped Robinson become a stabilizing force on the PSC during some turbulent years involving litigation over major utility rate hikes, changes in the powers of the PSC after the Snyder-Havens incidents and national changes in the energy regulatory environment.
Bo was a tall, rangy man with a soft voice and a pleasing manner. But his easy manner did not hide the fact that he had done more than his share of hard labor on the farm and that he had experience dealing with those not predisposed to obey the law voluntarily.
Bo was born on his family’s farm in 1935. After graduating from Hamilton High School, he enlisted in the U.S. Air Force as a military policeman at Lackland Air Force Base in San Antonio, Texas, and later at Manzano Air Force Base in Albuquerque, New Mexico. He later served nine years in the Mississippi National Guard.
He and his wife, Betty, began their 72 years of marriage in New Mexico, but returned to Hamilton when his father became too ill to run the family farm. Bo was elected as Monroe County’s sheriff from 1968-72. Eight years later, Bo was elected to the Mississippi House of Representatives in 1980 and served until 1990 when his PSC service officially began.
Robinson served in the PSC post until 2007, when he announced his intention to retire from public service. At that time, a concurrent resolution of the Mississippi Legislature was adopted by the House and Senate honoring his life and service.
At the time of his retirement, the late Leesha Faulkner reported in the Northeast Miss. Daily Journal, a surprise event honoring Robinson in Hamilton that drew political luminaries from across the state including U.S. District Judge Mike Mills, veteran State Sen. Hob Bryan, and former Gov. Ronnie Musgrove.
Faulkner quoted Sen. Bryan as noting that Robinson “was the only man sitting on the stage Saturday afternoon who had voted for the Education Reform Act of Gov. William Winter’s administration in 1982.”
Robinson talked to Winter about it, and the governor at the time asked Robinson how he felt about it, said Bryan. “Bo said, ‘Governor, I’d rather get beat for doing something than get beat for not doing anything.’”
