Written by Walter Pierce
Wednesday, 21 April 2010
A smoke-free Festival International is a good idea whose time has come.
When a blog ignites five times as many words in reader commentary as the blog itself, you know you’ve struck a nerve. But it was somewhat surprising that last week’s blog, “Festival International aims to become smoke free,” became, per capitals, the most talked-about item to appear on our Web site in a while.
Written by Walter Pierce
Wednesday, 14 April 2010
April 20, 2010, could turn out to be one of the most important dates in the city of Lafayette’s history.
I wish I could take back the observation in last week’s column that deconsolidation is dipping on our civic thermometer. It’s not for many in the city of Lafayette. The danger in writing for a weekly newspaper that goes to press Monday night and hits the street Wednesday morning is the matter of Tuesday evening. That’s when the Lafayette City-Parish Council throws up the big tent and stages its weekly political circus, and April 6 was of Ringling proportions.
Written by Walter Pierce
Wednesday, 7 April 2010
It’s falling right now, but a meeting of mayors could have it on the rise.
Lafayette Parish is not going to deconsolidate any time soon — voters will not be given an opportunity to make that decision in 2010 and likely won’t in 2011, the same year as city-parish council elections. Because of a state law that prevents an elected official’s term in office from being shortened due to a change in government, if the parish doesn’t vote on deconsolidation by spring of next year, the parish likely wouldn’t be able to deconsolidate, assuming a groundswell of support for returning to two governments emerges, until 2016.
Written by Walter Pierce
Wednesday, 31 March 2010
I knew Kent Hutslar only well enough to envy his talent, and to marvel at the remarkable ease with which he moved through the world. He could bend your ear for 30 minutes about the latest photographic technique he was drawn to or the music he was digging before you could get in a word edgewise. Just nod, smile and let Kent ramble.
Written by Walter Pierce
Wednesday, 24 March 2010
Lafayette has it, but will the chamber of commerce buy it?
If this journalism thing doesn’t work out, I may seek employment in the federal Office of Acronyms. The feds love acronyms, and I evidently enjoy a facility for creating them. Over the last few weeks as we tried to get our arms around this Cool Town issue, I, out of thin air and with great aplomb, personal fanfare and self congratulations, came up with an acronym that I believe perfectly encapsulates what it is about Lafayette that has us poised to become a hip, sophisticated city that attracts the creative class — the writers, artists, engineers, architects, planners and other professionals who are drawn to a city because of its festivals, its restaurants and museums, its parks and public spaces, its employment opportunities and cultural amenities.
MAY 17 Here's a column from James Gill, this time in the Advocate. Gill, who has jumped ship from the Picayune, writes about the absurdity of dueling polls in this post. The numbers are so wildly different, it is obvious that both sides are "cooking the books," he writes. In particular, he looks at Sen. Mary Landrieu, and how her recent actions in DC have been received by those polled. Gill's acerbic, amusing prose is a welcome addition to a paper so conservative as to be occasionally lacking in personality.
MAY 17 Blogger Tom Aswell continues delivering bombshells about the state education department and Gov. Jindal's education "reform" efforts. In this post, he reports that students in the Shreveport area have been signed up for a charter school without their knowledge or consent. Most interesting to Aswell is how this Texas-based charter (with ties to GOP types) got the personal student information it has, if the students didn't give it.
MAY 17 This post by JR Ball in the Baton Rouge Business Report is an interesting tongue-in-cheek look at recent Baton Rouge economic development efforts. Among the items he examines is the idea that gaining a Costco makes BR a "world-class city." (Really? All you need is a different brand of Sam's? MK!) This effort, and other recent ones, are all built on the taxpayer's back, with tax zones, tax incentives and tax rebates, Ball writes.
MAY 17 Blogger CB Forgotston is critical of the legislature's reliance on a revenue-estimating committee's decision to include projected tax amnesty income in this year's forecast. That's a problem, CB posts, because the deadline for these people to pay their taxes is June 30, 2014. So when do you think these people who haven't paid taxes in years are going to pay their taxes? Surely not before June 30, and that means the money won't be there for this year's budget, he argues.
MAY 17 Here's an interesting blog out of California by a Hollywood writer, attorney and academic named Brian Alan Lane. He blogs about higher ed, and was a whistle-blower in a scandal over false credentials. In this post, he takes aim at LSU's new top dog, King Alexander. It's convoluted and a little confusing, but it sure makes Alexander a lot more interesting than he was yesterday.
MAY 17 Blogger Robert Mann writes about the LSU Board's refusal to allow Dr. Fred Cerise to testify before the legislature about Gov. Jindal's plan to close down all the state's charity hospitals and dump the poor on the private system. It's hard to imagine anyone more qualified than Cerise to testify about that, so why would anyone try to prevent him doing so? Mann thinks it is because the powers that be aren't interested in hearing any truth about the plan.
MAY 17 This post on the Louisiana Sinkhole Bugle, a blog that notes developments in the Bayou Corne and Jefferson Island salt domes, talks about a proposed expansion of the salt dome storage under Lake Peigneur in Iberia Parish. Residents are working against it for several reasons, including two biggies: the sinkhole disaster in Bayou Corne and the continuing, unexplained bubbling on the surface of the Lake.
MAY 17 NOLA police arrested more people Thursday accused of either being involved in the Mother's Day shooting or hiding the suspect afterward, this Gambit story reports. The NOLA police chief said he suspects the whole thing was gang-related and throws out a challenge to the gangs: he's got informants now, he says, and he knows a lot more than the gangs want him to know. The people who live in the neighborhoods terrorized by gangs are ready to talk, he says.
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