It was a 4-3 vote by the New Iberia City Council in 2004 to dissolve the New Iberia Police Department, but this Saturday’s vote to reinstate will ultimately be decided by the public.

The half-cent sales tax has driven plenty of public conversation about the future of the city’s law enforcement, with public action committees and groups of concerned citizens advocating for and against the measure.

The city of New Iberia is the largest municipality in Louisiana to contract its police services, and Mayor Freddie DeCourt has called it an experiment whose time has ended. But with more than a decade’s worth of experience dealing in New Iberia crime, the Iberia Parish Sheriff’s Office absence in patrolling would mean replacing the city’s law enforcement infrastructure, and the expenses it entails.

Dissolving the PD

The NIPD was dissolved in 2004 after a vote by the New Iberia City Council amid a circus of public hearings, lawsuits and New Iberia police officers adamantly trying to preserve the department.

At the time, Mayor Ruth Fontenot cited the main concern for its dissolution as financial and budgetary. Before officially ending the department, the City Council had cut the NIPD from 83 officers to 10 before completely relying on the IPSO.

Iberia Parish Sheriff Sid Hebert was also heavily selling the benefits of a contract between the city and IPSO. Instead of a city police force, the sheriff’s office would oversee law enforcement in the city for an annual cost of $3 million.

When the $3 million contract was initially signed, it was advertised as saving the New Iberia taxpayer $1.2 million annually. The agreement obligated the Sheriff to enforce all state and city laws, including providing 24 hour a day traffic control service, traffic enforcement, funeral escorts, criminal investigations, narcotic and juvenile divisions, 911 services and animal control services. The Sheriff was also responsible to establish crime prevention programs and a community services division for the city of New Iberia.

A minimum of 10 officers were required to be on duty at all times within the city. The required staffing before the contract was eight. The IPSO agreed to increase its staff by 55 additional officers who were previously NIPD officers.

Hebert argued that the move would eliminate the duplication of services provided by the two agencies, and that two-thirds of the proposed savings would come by reducing employee benefits by $814,139.

Some residents tried fighting the change even after the vote was made. After a referendum was made to stop the vote, the city hired a special counsel to determine that the public cannot vote to change a resolution after its been made. There was also a recall petition to oust Fontenot as mayor by some residents in anger of the vote.

The measure was approved with a 4-3 vote, with council members Nolan Pellerin, Robert Suire, Rocky Romero and Dan Doerle voting in the affirmative and Peggy Gerac, Hilda Curry and Georgianna Brown voting against.  

Members of the New Iberia Police Association and Captain W.M. “Mac” Wood filed an injunction against the city questioning the legality of the contract almost immediately afterward, which was ultimately struck down by the Sixteenth Judicial District Court.

The agreement was signed for a 10-year deal and the IPSO has patrolled New Iberia ever since, but with the same issues coming to the surface more frequently over the years.  

Council frustration

The contract was put into the hands of Mayor Hilda Curry when she came into office in 2005 and then later Sheriff Louis Ackal who took office in 2007. Curry, who was one of three on the council who voted to keep the department, said at the time she wasn’t against consolidation, but for a public vote. But as time went by, Curry and members of the City Council began to issue grievances with the agreement.

One of the biggest arguments from City Council members has been that they have no oversight or power in city law enforcement. If a resident calls a City Council member about a complaint, they can only forward that complaint to the IPSO. There have also been complaints of vagueness and lack of performance standards from the council.

Enforcing city laws has also been talked about. This year’s City Council has brought up the enforcement of nuisance and littering ordinances, which Mayor Freddie DeCourt has said will be strictly enforced if the tax is approved.

Last year, the contract was up for renewal in the final year of Curry’s term as mayor. Curry herself had some trepidation about renewing the agreement at the time due to an alleged uptick in crime. City Council members also expressed concern that the required 10 officers to patrol the city were not present at all times as the agreement required.

The decision made by Curry and the council was a one-year renewal, effectively pushing the NIPD debate to a new city council and mayor the next year.

At the same meeting, the City Council also contracted former St. Mary Parish Sheriff David Naquin to work as a liaison between the city and IPSO. Naquin’s responsibilities included analyzing the intergovernmental agreement and checking daily crime statistics to see if there really was more crime going on.

In August of 2016, the answer was no. Naquin agreed with some City Council members who wanted more “meat and potatoes” in the contract, but for all intents and purposes he said it was working as it should.

“It was probably at the time a good contract,” he said. “But by today’s standards it just lacks a little bit, so if we tighten a few of those things up we’ll see if there’s any interest in keeping what we have or starting over.”

As for not having the required 10 patrol officers, Naquin said it didn’t seem to be true.

“If” to “When”

With the inauguration of a new mayor and new City Council in January, the tone of public discourse changed from “if” to “when” during council meetings.

Mayor Freddie DeCourt, who seemed to take a moderate stance compared to his opponents during last year’s election season, began starting talks with the council to re-establish the NIPD in the first few meetings of his tenure.

When the contract’s renewal came up in June, both DeCourt and Ackal decided on a one-year, non-renewable contract that stayed mostly the same as the previous. There were a few changes, however, including the IPSO no longer being responsible for animal control and the 10 officers required to be patrolling only being required to be on duty.

The City Council, largely made up of political newcomers, shared DeCourt’s enthusiasm. Council members Dustin Suire, Sherry Guidry, and Deidre Ledbetter have all pushed for a new NIPD. Veteran Councilman David Broussard voted against the half-cent sales tax proposal when the vote came, citing the fact that the residents he’s talked to in his district have mostly opposed it. Broussard has been largely silent on the issue since.

Mayor Pro Tem Dan Doerle has been one of the only active voices in the city pushing against the NIPD’s re-emergence. Doerle, who made the affirmative vote for the establishment of the contract in 2004, has since echoed the financial and budgetary arguments that were made during that time.

“This tax is a half-cent sales tax,” he said at an August neighborhood watch meeting. “It’s going to bring in $3 million. We need more money than that, that’s my concern,” Doerle said. “Let’s not get into a situation that we had before. What do we do if you can’t fund it? It’s a nightmare when you’re an elected official and you make the budget, but you can’t control the budget.”

Funding

Funding has been the central point of this Saturday’s election. During his relentless relentless campaigning, DeCourt has assured voters that the half-cent sales tax estimated to bring in $3 million annually will be enough to supply the needed expenses for the department.

New Iberia has primarily paid its law enforcement through a 1960 sales tax that brings in $6.4 million annually. However, that tax is also meant for the fire department, construction of streets and bridges, sewerage and any public works improvement. As police departments across the country continue to get more expensive, the city has had to scale back on other departments to accommodate the IPSO contract.

Combined with the new tax, the city is estimated to budget about $7.8 million for law enforcement. DeCourt also says that will leave some funds left over that could be go toward departments like parks and recreation, road improvement and city building maintenance.

As for the NIPD, DeCourt estimated about $7.8 million going toward the new department, with an extra $1.6 million allocated to one-time startup costs for the first year. In total, there would be $8.7 million in revenue available to pay for the department.

It’s a budget that Ackal called “tighter than a crab’s butt” back in March, however the Sheriff has given his support for the city police force’s return, with the caveat that he’s not a supporter of new taxes on principle.

The costs aren’t exorbitant, however. The city of Houma has the closest approximate population to the city of New Iberia in Louisiana, and is currently operated under Terrebonne Parish Consolidated Government. For the 2017 fiscal year, the parish allocated $9.4 million expenditures to the police department, about $1.6 million more than DeCourt’s proposed budget.

For DeCourt, a new NIPD is synonymous with a re-emergence of community policing. The mayor said the department would re-open the lines of communication between law enforcement and local residents, particularly among the West End, who have expressed grievances with current policing.

If the tax fails, it will mean city officials going back to the drawing board with a new deal between DeCourt and Ackal. Either way, Saturday’s vote will change the course of city crime and law enforcement.