On the docket for the next city and parish council meetings are increased costs for LUS, budgeting the new LUS Fiber director’s salary, more drainage projects and a reprieve for some restaurant permit holders.
Drainage
4/20 Council Preview: Fall tax renewals and more detention ponds
On the dockets of the City and Parish Councils are multiple tax renewals for essential services, a tax rededication for fire protection in unincorporated Lafayette, and declaring more detention pond projects as public necessities.
4 min read
4/6 Council Preview: Two more detention ponds; school sidewalks; privatizing Robicheaux Center pool
Relatively light agendas include a continued push to privatize local park facilities, another step towards building detention ponds to help with drainage, and approval of new sidewalks around some schools.
4 min read
3/9 Council Preview: New detention ponds, approving a contentious development and appointing board members
Here’s a selection of items on the agendas for this week’s meetings of the city and parish councils.
4 min read
COLUMN: The parish needs to raise taxes (don’t shoot the messenger)
Every part of parish government is underfunded. And there’s no way to fix it without raising taxes.
6 min read
COLUMN: Parish government isn’t ‘living within its means’
Parish government has been on life support for years now. With the city’s finances now strained, it’s time for the parish to get serious about living within its means.
9 min read
Council Preview: Sewage, drainage, budget snafus and changes to parks
The gist: This week’s council meetings include a number of items that will tee up bigger projects and decisions to come affecting everything from sewer capacity and Vermilion flooding to how the budgeting process will work and how parks will operate.
4 min read
COLUMN: The elephant in this election is Lafayette’s billion dollar infrastructure deficit
Years of kicking the infrastructure can down the road has finally caught up with us.
11 min read
Robideaux proposes moving city road dollars to regional stormwater diversion
The gist: In his outgoing budget, Mayor-President Joel Robideaux proposes moving $7.5 million in current bond dollars to pay for drainage.
3 min read
Councilman proposes temporary parishwide sales tax for drainage
The gist: Spurred by a spike in flooded homes in his district, Councilman Pat Lewis has moved to put a quarter cent sales tax, assessed parishwide, before voters this fall. Public notice of the new tax will be offered at Tuesday’s City-Parish Council meeting. The council would vote in July on calling a fall election.
3 min read
The sales tax would generate roughly $13 million annually. Lewis tells me he’d like to pursue a federal match to increase the buying power of the funds. Dollars generated from the tax would accelerate the current deferred maintenance program initiated by the Robideaux administration, he says, and go to new projects not included on that list. The tax would sunset after five years.
“There’s a lot of work to be done,” Lewis says. “In the last flood there’s areas that never flooded before in 30 or 40 years.” Lewis represents Downtown and a large chunk of the northern limits of the city and the parish, portions of which saw increased flood activity in this month’s squall, the third 100-year rain event in the last three years.
Drainage currently receives $10 million each year after a 2017 rededication of the combined public health and mosquito control property tax shifted $2.5 million in new money over to an existing millage. That proposition, a brainchild of Mayor-President Joel Robideaux, also produced a one-time $9 million transfer to kick-start the first 27 of 77 deferred maintenance projects.
Another one-time transfer of $8 million, out of the parish library system’s fund balance, is before voters this fall. There is roughly $32 million in projects on the maintenance program’s full work list of projects. LCG’s public works department has estimated an overhaul of the parishwide stormwater management system could cost between $500 million and $875 million.
At least one council member won’t support the sales tax, saying it’s not a long-term solution to an ongoing problem. Councilman Jay Castille says the parish’s massive drainage issues would be best addressed through a millage. “The millage we have in place needs to be increased,” Castille maintains. “In five years when you’re out of money, what do you do, ask voters for another tax?”
What to watch for: Whether a recently tax-averse electorate will pay more for better drainage. Lewis’ proposition faces an uphill battle given the political climate around government spending. Many voters and candidates advocate that enough drainage funding can be obtained by shifting money out of services like the public library system. Others believe only more revenue can accomplish a comprehensive fix. How to pay for better drainage, coming hot on the heels of another big rain this year, will figure prominently in parish elections across the board.
The parish can’t afford to fix drainage without more money
Some want to claim that the only thing preventing us from fixing our flooding issues is a shift in priorities. But the reality is that the parish can’t afford to fix its drainage system without more revenue.
5 min read
Council rebuffs Robideaux’s second grab at library funds
The gist: The mayor-president could not flip the votes needed to put an $18 million library fund balance transfer before voters this fall. Meanwhile, a northside library took another step toward becoming a reality.
3 min read