Lafayette City Council faces another bright red line on ARPA veto vote
With a set of vetoes, the mayor-president has boxed the City Council in again, setting the stage to spend city money without their approval.
With a set of vetoes, the mayor-president has boxed the City Council in again, setting the stage to spend city money without their approval.
The roles have reversed from the 2020 budget cycle, and now the City Council ought to play budget hawk.
Much of the spending in Guillory’s plan was of questionable eligibility, and the administration struggled to make the case for moving ahead now with so much uncertainty.
Too many of the proposed projects deliver questionable returns, create unfunded maintenance liabilities, and inexplicably use parish dollars to pay for city responsibilities.
Here’s a selection of items on the agendas for this week’s meetings of the City and Parish councils.
Mayor-President Guillory wants the City Council to approve a $406 million five year capital improvement program that would saddle the city with $180 million in new debt. Yet he hasn’t revealed plans, garnered public input, or addressed long-term maintenance liabilities for most of these projects. The City Council should tread carefully.
As homelessness rises, panhandlers have been caught up in a months-long police dragnet that critics say is ineffective and inhumane. Soon, the Louisiana Supreme Court will weigh whether it’s constitutional.
Projecting historically big increases in sales tax revenue, he is championing a quarter billion dollar increase in the city’s five-year capital outlay plan, including $132 million of new debt.
In two budgets proposed Tuesday, the Guillory administration showered funding on infrastructure and Downtown Lafayette. But in its rescue plan budget, the administration allocated little to no money for direct economic aid, housing or attacking the pandemic.
The lack of engagement might be forgivable if the proposal was amazing, but it’s not. We need to start over from scratch.
Surprising council members, the Guillory administration will introduce Tuesday a plan for spending $83 million in federal coronavirus aid.
The report’s headline is simple — consolidation is unfair and dysfunctional — but its findings go a bit deeper than that. Here are several big takeaways.
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