T-PT analysis: short-handed council sets stage for acrimonious followup

Three Lafourche Parish councilmen defeated two administrative proposals at the council’s last, shorthanded meeting, but the parish president vowed afterward to reintroduce the resolutions for a full vote.

The absence of Councilmen John Arnold, Jerry LaFont and Lindel Toups was glaring during debate over the two resolutions, the only real points of contention during a relatively breezy meeting. With one-third of the council absent, two dissenting votes were enough to strike down any formal proposal.

Councilman Jerry Jones, who started to separate himself from voting with the administration’s wants last month when he disagreed with the hiring of a department head, made an unlikely ally with Councilman Daniel Lorraine.

The pair, although in the minority of a 4-2 vote, blocked a resolution that would have requested permission from the state bond commission to open a $5 million line of credit. Jones supported a similar measure last year.

Parish President Charlotte Randolph said the line of credit is necessary to “front the money” on the parish’s grant-funded projects, which don’t receive actual funds until after completion. About $30 million worth of grant-funded projects are nearing readiness, Randolph said.

The parish typically takes placeholder money from its autonomous royalty fund, a process that can restrict funding elsewhere until the money is reimbursed. The parish president said without the line of credit, some projects that could start within the next year will be delayed.

The council approved a similar arrangement last year, and the parish established a $5 million credit line with Capital One Bank. The new credit line would replace last year’s, which was never drawn from and expired in December, Lafourche Parish spokesman Logan Banks said.

Lorraine and Jones spoke out against the credit line. Lorraine said it was too vague and that he feared the money could be used without restriction.

The District 9 councilman offered an amendment that restricted use of credit to developments funded with Community Development Block Grants, federal money that has been promised for several Lafourche projects. Only Jones supported the amendment, so it failed.

“If you restrict it to one line of funding, then you’re defeating the purpose,” Randolph retorted, adding that the parish also uses other grant funding to complete some projects.

Finance Director Ryan Friedlander informed the council it would still have to pass an ordinance to actually establish a credit line. But the parish does need authorization to establish the line prior to seeking bond commission approval.

The second resolution failed the same way – in spite of a 4-2 majority.

Lorraine, this time joined by Council Chairman Joe Fertitta, also criticized the prospective approval of a cost-sharing agreement with Jefferson and Plaquemines parishes related to a coastal restoration project.

The agreement stipulated that Lafourche fork over $1 million in Coastal Impact Assistance Program funds toward a $66 million segment of Long Distance Sediment Pipeline Project.

The project is meant to restore marsh in the Barataria Basin by means of transporting sediment from the Mississippi River. The segment in question would stop at the Barataria Waterway, but it is anticipated to extend as far west as Little Lake, Randolph said.

Lorraine said there isn’t an immediately justifiable benefit.

“It’s not going to help Lafourche for 15 to 20 years,” Lorraine said. “How can we vote to give $1 million to another parish when it doesn’t benefit us?”

Randolph admitted that the allocation would be a “gamble” but said coastal restoration is her top priority. BP fine money, which will mostly be directed to coastal states, could help fund an anticipated extension of the pipeline to the northwest rim of Little Lake.

The cost of the extension would be about $20 million, Randolph said.

Archie Chiasson, Lafourche’s coastal zone management administrator, said even if the project stopped at the Barataria Waterway, which is about 32 miles east of Little Lake, it would protect Lafourche against storm surge.

The extension would bolster protection to the eastern side of the south Lafourche ring levee system, restore marsh to the Clovelly area and protect the Louisiana Offshore Oil port in addition to solidifying wetlands.

The gamble lies in whether the project would lose its Tier I Priority level in the state’s coastal master plan once the first phase is complete, but Chiasson and Randolph said that’s not likely.

“Our intent was to create a barrier to storm surge,” Randolph said. “This benefits Lafourche and surrounding parishes.”

After the meeting, the parish president made it clear that both resolutions would reappear on the agenda before a full council, setting the stage for what should be a contentious meeting next week.

Council to review Bayou Blue projects’ funding

Jones introduced a proposed ordinance last week that aims to rescind a measure rededicating $450,000 from the Lakelong Drive Drainage project fund into an account to refurbish Bayou Blue Bypass Road.

Both projects fall under Dist. 5 jurisdiction, represented by Arnold. He has said the rededication is needed because Bayou Blue Bypass Road is dangerously damaged and because the drainage project is mired in studies, so construction can’t begin this year.

Matt Matherne, the former Dist.5 councilman whom Arnold unseated last fall, has watched the last two meetings meetings from the council chambers and criticized the lawmakers for approving the ordinance.

Matherne said the road is not dangerous – “no holes, just bumps,” he said – and the drainage improvements project is more pressing because local homes have flooded twice.

The drainage project’s estimated fund balance was $598,000 when the council enacted the parish’s 2012 Operating, Maintenance and Capital Budget last November. The council approved allocations to the fund totaling $140,000 in 2009, $200,000 in 2010 and a $264,000 in 2012. The monies were allocated from Road Sales Tax District A.

The rededication reduced the Lakelong Drive Drainage Improvements Project fund to about $148,000. The project calls for the installation of a 48-inch pump and levee creation to protect an area that has been susceptible to backwater flooding from the Gulf Intracoastal Waterway.

Randolph told Matherne that enough funds were left in the account to complete the permit process and the rest of the money can be secured once the permits are cleared.

“If the project is permitted, then we can find that kind of money,” she said.

Neil Angelette, the architectural engineer overseeing the project, said the Corps of Engineers has confirmed that two acres of wetland exist in the project area. Thus, an amended, more expensive cost projection will be forthcoming and could be revealed before the next vote on the matter, Angelette said.

Arnold’s ordinance passed by a 6-3 vote at the council’s June 12 meeting. Aaron Caillouet, LaFont and Lorraine opposed the reallocation.

Jones, who represents Dist. 1, told the Tri-Parish Times he changed his position because he has received phone calls from frustrated residents.

Council tries again to increase Randolph cabinet vulnerability

The District 1 councilman also introduced complementing proposed ordinances geared at amending the Home Rule Charter to fire Randolph’s top assistant and to make it easier for the council to terminate other department heads.

The first proposal calls for an amendment to the Home Rule Charter that would require the parish administrator to be a resident of the parish for one year prior to nomination for the position and call for immediate termination of a non-complying administrator.

It clearly targets Crystal Chiasson, the current parish administrator who lives in Napoleonville.

The second proposal is an amendment to the Home Rule Charter that lessens the number of votes needed to oust a department head or parish administrator from seven to two-thirds of the council, which is six votes in the current format.

Both Chiasson and Jones declined to comment on the proposals. “We’ll discuss it (at the next meeting),” Jones said.

Amendments to the Home Rule Charter, the parish’s governing document, require voter approval. If the ordinances pass, the propositions will appear on the Nov. 6 presidential ballot.

For Chiasson, the proposals represent the latest affront in a years-long tug-of-war between the council and administration concerning her employment.

It’s the first time Jones has been in public opposition of the parish administrator and the first time the councilman has sided with lawmakers who want to reduce the number of votes needed to fire a department head.

The council is required to ratify Randolph’s nominations before the fifth meeting of every new term. In the first meeting this year, the council ratified Chiasson with a 5-4 vote. Fertitta, Phillip Gouaux, LaFont and Lorraine were in opposition.

The council first attempted to fire Chiasson in September 2009. The resolution fell one vote shy of the seven required, with Jones, Michael Delatte and former-Councilman Rodney Doucet in support of Chiasson.

One month after that failed ousting, the council approved an ordinance to amend the Home Rule Charter to reduce the number of votes needed to fire a department head or administrator from seven to six. It passed 7-2, with Jones in opposition, but the ordinance was rescinded the following month because the council couldn’t bring the amendment before the public for a vote within the three-month period required.

Chiasson’s residence was heavily debated during the ratification hearing.

The parish administrator is second in line to the parish president and would succeed the top executive official in the event Randolph is forced to leave office. Because Chiasson lives outside the parish, she cannot fulfill the parish presidency in the event she is needed. Thus, her holding the administrator position prompts extra responsibility from the next-in-line council chairman, Gouaux reasoned during the ratification debate.

“Because of that, I’m not eligible to serve as council chair, as well as anyone else that does not agree to give up their job on a temporary basis to take on that responsibility,” Gouaux said in January. “I think it’s totally absurd for parish government to change the way they operate because of one person.”

All proposed ordinances appear before the council at its next meeting, which is 5 p.m. on July 24 at the Mathews Government Complex, 4876 La. Highway 1.