Richard wins Iberia Parish president race

Experience, Larry Richard said, makes him best equipped to enact change as the next Iberia Parish president.

When he decided to seek the office for this election, Richard, 57, said his time on the Iberia Parish Council ultimately gave him the inspiration to do so.

“I guess what really got me to run was to put Iberia Parish in a better position than it is now,” he said in a recent phone interview. “I would do that by addressing issues that are hurting us right now.”

After graduating from Opelousas Senior High School in 1977, Richard served in the U.S. Army as a communications graduate in the Communication Signal Corp and also served in the U.S. Army 101st Airborne Division. He moved to New Iberia in 1982 and, after 20 years of oil and gas work, Richard retired from Marathon Oil Co. in 2002, and he continues to own LR&A Inc., a traffic control, construction material and speciality service company he formed in 1999.

Richard also represented District 13 on the Parish Council for three terms (2000 to 2012).

“When you start looking at my experience — my time in the military, my time in oil and gas, my time on the Parish Council, my time in small business — my past experience is going to totally separate me from my opponent,” Richard said on his candidacy.

Specific issues to focus on, Richard said, included economic development, coastal restoration, flood and drainage control and roads and bridges. He suggested efforts to streamline permitting and improve infrastructure would ultimately attract business to the parish, especially the Economic Development District and its tax increment financing.

“We have some serious, serious infrastructure issues,” he said. “The TIF district was designed to bring in business to this parish and the way to do that is to improve infrastructure. These things are not being addressed quickly enough, in my opinion.”

Richard has been married for 32 years to wife, Kim, with whom he raised two children, Tyler, 27, and Morgan Ann Richard-Olivier, 24.

Richard faces Iberia Parish Councilman David Ditch. Early voting is Saturday and Oct. 12-17. Election day is Oct. 24.