Road ruling opens lane of opportunity

A decision Friday by the Louisiana Ethics Administration has paved the way for Terrebonne Parish to purchase a tract of land from Rene Claudet, owner of the Quality Hotel on Hollywood Road, without a conflict of interest charge being leveled against the property owner’s brother, Terrebonne Parish President Michel Claudet.

The issue is connected to efforts by Terrebonne Parish to purchase strips of property along Hollywood road to widen the now two-lane, and heavily traveled stretch on the west side of Houma. The answer, ethics administrators have determined, is to designate Joseph L. Waitz, Jr., district attorney for the 32nd Judicial District, and his office to serve as a representative agent for the parish when it comes to buying land from the hotel, and in effect offering a substitute player in place of Michel Claudet to conduct that one piece of government business.

Thirty-four property owners along the road are in various stages of negotiation with the parish government and about half of those tracts involved have already been purchased.

The area to be acquired from the Quality Hotel involves 0.156 acre, which represents 4.2 percent of the total acreage needed to complete the road-widening project.

Louisiana Ethics Code Section 1113 prohibits a public servant, members of his immediate family or any entity in which he has an interest to enter into a transaction that involves his jurisdiction.

Section 1112 prohibits a public servant from participating in a transaction that involves any member of his family that has a substantial economic interest.

Additionally, Section 1102(21) identifies “substantial economic interest” as being of greater benefit to the public servant than to the general public.

Terrebonne Parish attorney Courtney Alcock submitted a request for consideration to the Ethics Administration on May 21, 2010.

Ethics Administration spokeswoman Tracy Baker explained in a printed statement that the Ethics Administration ruled that since the district attorney’s office operates as a governmental entity separate from the Terrebonne Parish Consolidated Government there would be no conflict of interest if Waitz handled purchasing the property in question as a representative of the parish.

“After consultation with attorneys for the Ethics Administration, to ensure any participation by the parish president, removing the process of expropriation from TPCG entirely was the best option,” Alcock said. “Using the district attorney’s office maintains the expropriation within a transparent public agency and that office has attorneys that handle civil matters and have some experience with expropriation such as property acquisition on behalf of the levee board.”

Previous action of this nature by the district attorney’s office with the Terrebonne Levee and Conservation District helped set the stage for this action.

Michel Claudet, who himself is a trial attorney according to his professional résumé, said that he had indicated to parish officials early-on his concern of a potential problem with purchasing the Quality Hotel property in the same manner that other properties along Hollywood Road were being acquired. Parish authorities agreed that the parish president should not be involved in this purchase and sought a way for it to be expropriated.

“I have not been involved in anything [regarding this matter]. I’m trying to stay as far away as I can,” Michel Claudet said.

Waitz was not available to comment on the ethics decision and neither he nor Rene Claudet returned telephone messages.

A schedule for road construction is dependent upon when all the land needed to widen Hollywood Road is secured by the parish.

Property owned by the Quality Hotel will be purchased for Hollywood road widening with representation from the district attorney’s office to head off any conflict of interest involving Terrebonne Parish President Michel Claudet. MIKE NIXON