Housing officials put police substation on hold

Houma Police Chief Todd Duplantis has spent the last two decades patrolling the streets of Houma and recalls a time when Senator Circle’s crime rate was overbearing. Over the years, he has seen crime rates decrease and hopes to make the next big push for safety with an east side substation close to that area.

“Upon being made chief in 2008, I had a decision to make at that time, either to sit behind a desk in the office and suck up the AC or get out in the community. I chose to get out in the community,” Duplantis said.

A substation would help bring officers of HPD into the community.

Duplantis stressed the importance of having cooperation from all parties involved in the substation – Houma Police Department (HPD), Houma-Terrebonne Housing Authority (HTHA), Terrebonne Parish council and residents to move forward. He asked for the agenda item to let HPD utilize Senator Circle Apartments 101 A and 101 B for the location be tabled for further discussion.

“I don’t think all the players were at the table when this all happened,” he said. “I don’t want to go into anything with half cooperation.”

HTHA voted 4-1 in asking federal housing officials to let HPD use the two apartments. Commissioner Joe Thompson voted against the motion.

Wayne Thibodeaux, executive director of HTHA, offered the soon-to-be renovated apartments to compliment the one-room guard shack in the Senator Circle entrance HPD currently uses to file reports.

But the location of the substation is still up for negotiation, as some local officials have other ideas.

“This is my third term as council member, and one of my serious passions is to one day put that east side substation on the corner East Street and Memory Lane,” Terrebonne Councilman Alvin Tillman said at last week’s HTHA meeting. “That’s basically the hub of our criminal activities.”

In addition to upsetting Tillman’s future plans for the substation on East Street, two more would-be residents of Senator Circle would be out of housing. According to Commissioner Joe Thompson, 186 applicants are on a waiting list.

Duplantis also discussed getting residents involved in crime prevention by implementing a neighborhood watch in Senator Circle, regardless of where the substation ends up. Currently, there are 17 such programs in Houma.

“One of the goals I had was that I wanted to make a difference within our community,” Duplantis said. “Of course, over time there has been a big difference, and Senator Circle is a very safe neighborhood within the community.”

A neighborhood watch program, which has been successful in other parts of the community, would only add to Houma Police’s safety efforts.

“We’ve been very successful,” he said. “What we do is we go into the community, and we get the information from the residents, and we tell them where the crimes are.”

“I want the police department with the people in the community,” Duplantis continued, who mentioned scheduling a meeting for the neighborhood watch program in Senator Circle, and nobody showed up.

That doesn’t discourage Duplantis, however.

“I’m not giving up, I’m going to continuously try to get into that community,” he said. “I want to help the people.”