Last year Lafayette Parish retail sales got off to a sluggish start, trailing 2009 by 14 percent during the first two months and still off almost 11 percent by March. Sales soon after began to close the gap, however, and we ended 2010 up a small 0.78 percent, thanks in large part to a strong showing in December. December spending topped the $517 million mark, making it the fourth highest month on record for the parish, and total sales for the year were $4.8 billion. It was a clear sign of the parish’s resilience in the face of the drilling moratorium.
And it appears that the momentum is carrying over into 2011. For the first two months figures are already ahead 8.64 percent, with February showing a 9.5 percent increase over February a year ago. Sales in January totaled $369.8 million, and in February they grew to $382 million. — Leslie Turk
In rendering his ruling, District Judge John Trahan all but called the real estate developer a liar for inconsistencies in his accounts of what prompted him to punch a school teacher unconscious.
Frank’s Casing Crew, now doing business as Frank’s International, will make its final appearance on ABiz’s list of the Top 50 Privately Held Companies in Acadiana this year, and once again, it will likely be at the top with more than $1 billion in annual revenues. The 75-year-old company specializing in tubular fabrication and installation services to the oil and gas industry plans to go public this year.
The defeat, or rather highjacking of House Bill 420 in the final days of this year's Legislative Session, say Reps. Vincent Pierre and Terry Landry, is the result of the propaganda spread by one unidentified local media outlet and an unnamed former state Representative, but nothing to do with the original legislation's lack of checks, balances or details.
City-Parish Council Chairman Brandon Shelvin heaped steady doses of condescending ire on a Blue Cross/Blue Shield of Louisiana executive while failing to reveal his financial ties to a BC/BS rival.
Abbeville native David Primeaux was a popular professor until his death late last year, and while he was successful at camouflaging a dark past, he couldn’t outlive it.
Tehmi Chassion’s failure to recuse himself in the school board’s selection of a group health benefits provider raises ‘serious questions’ on whether he violated state ethics law.
He’s a singer. A songwriter. A piano man. A family man. He’s even got his own Wikipedia entry. He’s David Egan. And he knows ancient secrets about the monolithic stones of Stonehenge that he’s not willing to share.