Parish roads center of police jury attention at monthly meeting

At least a dozen property owners attended the monthly police jury meeting Monday, May 12, for a public hearing on roads the parish intends to abandon, meaning the parish will no longer maintain those roads. The public hearing also took up the issues of approving new road names and road name changes.
The property owners addressed the police jurors during the half-hour public hearing, which took place before the regular monthly meeting began. During the regular police jury meeting, jurors voted to abandon roads where property owners had no objections.
The major concerns of property owners was whether they would have access to their properties if the parish abandons the roads. The police jury consulting attorney, Marcus Fontenot, in response to questions by property owners, said adjacent property owners should enter into “reciprocal rights-of-way” agreements in order to avoid having the matter settled in court.
When the jurors turned to naming or renaming roads, the director of the parish office of emergency preparedness, Liz Hill, asked that two of her office’s dispatchers speak.
The dispatchers described personal experiences when receiving emergency calls from distraught people. Both gave examples of people calling 911, such as a seven-year-old whose “father was on the floor.”
The dispatchers and Hill said the problem stems from roads in different parts of the parish that have the same or similar names. People calling 911 often are in a panic and cannot calmly describe where they are. Many “don’t know their address,” one of the dispatchers said.
Hill said there is a parish ordinance that was passed in 1995 that gave her office the responsibility of approving new or changed road names and that post offices in the parish assign addresses through her office. The ordinance “was put in place to assist y’all so you wouldn’t have these headaches.”
Juror Kenny Burgess said during his 20 years experience as an emergency responder, he has known of more than one ambulance dispatched to different roads that have the same or similar names.
Juror Lamar Johnson expressed frustration about a constituent on a road with two houses that has been unable to change the name of the road for three months. He said the $1,500 cost the parish charges for changing the name was not an issue with the constituent.
Ryan Ardoin, police jury president, read a list of the roads to be named or renamed before the jurors approved of the list.
The jurors also discussed whether they should issue permits for four-wheel trail rides. That issue involves the illegality of unregistered vehicles -- which do not have license plates -- being operated on public roadways.
Burgess cautioned that the parish might be held liable if it issues a permit for illegal use of four-wheel vehicles that result in an injury, adding the police jury might “open a can of worms,” if it allows four-wheel trail rides.
Fontenot, the police jury’s legal consultant, agreed, and juror Eric Soileau advised the jurors not to issue such permits until it secures a state attorney general’s opinion on the issue. The police jury voted not to issue permits for four-wheel vehicle rides, or any “illegal vehicle” ride, on public roadways.
Chester Granger, parish public works director, briefed the jurors on chip sealing that he expects to begin soon. He also said he is delaying drainage work so that crew can be assigmed to state mandated replacement of two bridges in the parish.
Ronnie Landreneau, the police jury’s consulting engineer, distributed lists of road improvement projects to be funded by taxes authorized by a vote of parish residents.
The police jury scheduled a public hearing for Wednesday, May 21, at 6 p.m., to review and approve of the list presented by Landreneau.
Brenda Hubbard-Thomas, executive director of the Louisiana Workforce Investment Board office in Opelousas, briefed the jurors on the work her organization is doing.
She said the organization’s Ville Platte office has assisted 2,500 people since July 1 of last year. That assistance includes help in finding employment, preparation of resumes, on-the-job training, submitting unemployment claims and other services.
She also named people in Evangeline Parish who are in leadership positions, including Judy Guillory, Acadiana Works Ville Platte office director, and LWIA board members Bob Manual, Mark Buller and Candy Gerace. Acadiana Works board members are Danny Lamoine and Camille Fontenot, who is executive director of the Ville Platte Chamber of Commerce. The local Acadiana Works office is behind the chamber office on Main Street.