Chamber hears progress on road improvements

The guest speaker at this month’s Ville Platte Chamber of Commerce meeting, Donald Bergeron, police jury secretary/treasurer, gave an update on the status of the parish’s major road improvement project.
He said work on the road improvements, paid for by a $28.6 million bond issue approved by the voters in 2013, began last November and is expected to end next year. He said the bulk of the work will be done this year.
The improvements are divided into two parts: north and south. Twenty one of the 82 miles of roads scheduled to be improved in the northern part of the parish have been completed. In the southern part, 12 of the almost 70 miles have been completed, Bergeron said.
Randy Deshotel briefed chamber members on plans for the chamber’s annual banquet April 29. He said that he and other members of the planning committee intend to limit the number of items to be sold during the silent auction to 30 to 35. He explained that the number of items in the silent auction had grown so much, it was difficult keeping up with the cataloguing of the auction items.
Instead of volume of items for the auction, he said the planning committee would like to have higher-value items for the silent auction.
Deshotel said the chamber needs several more volunteers to coordinate the receiving and cataloguing of items for the silent auction.
Chamber members were reminded that the deadline for submitting nominees for man and woman of the year, which must have bios submitted with the nominations, is April 3, which also is the deadline for submitting nominations for business of the year and business person of the year. The people and businesses getting the most votes in those categories will be announced during the banquet.