After more than two and half hours of debate and discussion, the Lafayette City-Parish Council approved by a 5-4 vote a substitute ordinance creating a charter commission with greater leeway in what it recommends, including the recommendation that the City-Parish Home Rule Charter be repealed and Lafayette return to dual city and parish forms of government that were in effect before 1996.
As expected, the discussion, debate and the votes — on amendments to the substitute ordinance and on the ordinance itself — were largely along city and parish lines; the five city-majority council members comprising a simple majority on the nine-member CPC voted in unison. Sponsored by District 4 Councilman Kenneth Boudreaux, the ordinance that passed Tuesday night replaces the original ordinance creating a charter commission that was submitted by District 2 Councilman Jay Castille. That original ordinance only gave the charter commission discretion to review and recommend amendments to the Home Rule Charter, but not to recommend repeal.
Jared Bellard (District 5) and William Theriot (District 9) were the most outspoken parish-majority council members to oppose the substitute ordinance. Both have repeatedly stated their opposition to deconsolidation.
Citing a litany of “best of” lists the city of Lafayette has landed on in the last couple of years, Bellard took an “if it ain’t broke, don’t fix it” tack in attacking the substitute ordinance and the very concept of deconsolidation: “So what is wrong, what is so broke with this government with all this great information?” he asked. “I would just like to know what is wrong with this current form of government.”
Theriot channelled American history, bookending his initial input on the matter with the rhetorical offering, “United we stand, divided we fall.” But Theriot may have been the most prescient of the bunch with his observation, “Do you want to know the true reason this debate is taking place? Preservation of political power.”
Boudreaux’s substitute ordinance also shortens the time the commission will have to work from 18 months to nine, a contraction that Bellard likened through his repeated use of the word “shove” to recent legislation on health care reform in Congress.
But ultimately the city men cleaved to the argument that the substitute amendment is not about deconsolidation, it is merely about expanding the purview of the charter commission and, ultimately, letting parish voters decide. “What is wrong with expanding the scope of what we’re asking the people to do?” Boudreaux asked of his parish colleagues.
The charter commission that will be created will now be unfettered in what it can recommend — anything from minor adjustments to the current charter to repeal of the current charter to total consolidation of the parish, that is, dismantling the governments in the smaller municipalities and going “whole hog,” as District 7 Councilman Don Bertrand is fond of saying. City Parish President Joey Durel said at the meeting that he doesn’t anticipate deconsolidation arising from the commission’s work. “I would be stunned if their first move was to repeal consolidation,” he told council members.
The way the commission will be selected is also a departure from Castille’s original ordinance. District 3 Councilman Brandon Shelvin offered an amendment to Boudreaux’s substitute ordinance allowing all nine council members voting together to appoint seven of the nine commission members — four from the city and three from unincorporated Lafayette Parish; and to let Durel appoint one commission member from the city and one from the unincorporated part of the parish. Castille’s ordinance gave four appointments to the city-majority members, three to the parish-majority members and two to Durel, with the city and parish council members voting as separate bodies. Bellard expressed concern that Shelvin’s commission-appointment amendment would stack the commission in favor of the city, nonetheless, it passed by a 5-4 vote with all five city-majority council members voting for the amendment.
District 1 Councilman Purvis Morrison also proposed an amendment requiring the commission, if it recommends repeal of the charter, to create alternative charters for the parish and the city. That amendment was approved by a 6-3 vote, with Morrison joining the city men on the vote.
MAY 21 Gambit columnist Clancy DuBos writes about the Mother's Day shooting, and how the stages of shock and blame and healing mirror those traveled by the same city following Hurricane Katrina. The city will recover, just as it did following the storm, by reaching out to help the people injured most seriously by the event, DuBos writes. It's how we heal, he says.
MAY 21 Here's a post on the Advocate (but buried on a subpage, not on the front) that reports something Louisiana Voice reported some time ago: a top DOE official lives in Los Angeles and "commutes" to Baton Rouge. The positioning of the story caused a stir on Facebook Monday, with several posters asking if the Advocate was covering someone's hiney. Sentell's stories on DOE are notoriously soft, and this one is no different: don't expect any hard questions in here.
MAY 21 Here's another post from blogger Tom Aswell about the "course choice" program. He's already reported on kids being signed up without their consent or knowledge, and has more here: For example, he tells of a six-year-old who was signed up for high school Latin. He also digs a little deeper into the sister companies of the main one operating in Louisiana; all of them seem to have complaints against them. Stinky.
MAY 21 Given the 80 percent cut in higher ed funding since he's been in office, it's clear Gov. Jindal would rather give tax cuts to out of state companies than have a functioning system, blogger Dayne Sherman argues in this post. The cuts have been such a disaster, Sherman says, that it will take 30 years to fix what's been broken. He says he believes the aim is to shut down most of the schools before Jindal leaves in 2016.
MAY 21 Blogger CB Forgotston says there are too many elections in Louisiana, and they're costing us too much money. The proof is in the pudding: turnout for most of these nonsensical pollings gets worse and worse, CB opines, even as millions of dollars that could be spent on health care or higher ed go down the tubes. The legislature must take action to stem the tide of pointless elections, he says.
MAY 21 Here's an interesting investigative piece by WVUE on the retirement benefits of some Jefferson Parish public employees. According to the story, the taxpayers are paying 100 percent of the retirement contributions of employees who started work prior to a certain date in April 1986 -- and have done for more than 30 years. It costs the parish millions annually, and might not be legal, the story reports.
MAY 21 This post on Bayou Buzz provides insight from Louisiana's intrepid pollster, Bernie Pinsonat, on the winners and losers from this year's legislative session. But to hear Bernie tell it, there's almost nuttin but losers: Jindal, the Republican party, the Fiscal Hawks all get big goose eggs in his win column.
MAY 20 This post on The Lens takes a look at a huge (either $500K or $250K) bill that one NOLA charter now has for school lunches. The RSD says the charter group didn't fill out the proper paperwork for federal reimbursement, but the story details how the RSD didn't ensure the people running the charter had the proper training, despite requests from hapless charter employees trying to fill out forms. Either way, somebody's asleep at the wheel.
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