Three IPC members discuss budget, charter, millages

Published 6:00 am Wednesday, November 29, 2017

Iberia Parish Council members Natalie Broussard, Ricky Gonsoulin and Paul Landry fielded a variety of questions during the third town hall meeting the three have held Tuesday night.

The three council members began by giving an overview of what’s been happening in Iberia Parish Government over the past three years. Gonsoulin commented on recent work in the parish like the acquisition of a new public works facility and drainage improvements, while Broussard provided updates on pending legislation like the proposed changes to the Iberia Home Rule Charter.

About 50 people attended the event at the Sliman Theater.

Landry discussed some current budgetary woes of parish government and possible ways to solve them. Between an economic downturn and residents spending their money in neighboring parishes, Landry predicted the parish budget could see less dollars in the near future.  

“Tomorrow’s the big budget night. There’s probably about five or six items we’ll talk about,” Landry said. “If we don’t have a pickup in the economy, I don’t think next year’s budget meeting will be fun at all.”

Landry said one of the issues being discussed was the reallocation of millages to be used for more needed projects.

“We’ll probably have a sit-down to say how much we can take from each one,” he said. “The roads y’all see today is the best y’all will have. We need $34 million to improve them, we need $2.5 million to maintain them and we have $400,000. So that’s the kind of issues that we face.”

Gonsoulin picked up on that theme once the meeting got into an open format.

“I want to go to the polls and say give me a chance to put the money to good use, and to give me a chance you wouldn’t increase taxes, you’d just rededicate them,” Gonsoulin said.

There also was discussion by Landry about the cost of millages in Iberia. Contrary to popular belief, Landry said Iberia Parish has the sixth lowest millages in the state, with East Feliciana ranking the lowest.

“How many of y’all would want to live in East Feliciana?” he asked. “When you think you have a lot of property taxes, you should know we’re not paying as high as everybody else in other parishes.”

“Do you think if you taxed them more, more people would live there? People don’t move here because our taxes are low, they move here for family, for our culture and for jobs,” one person in the audience responded. “Government isn’t going to bring them here, you drive them away with taxes.”

The event ended after about an hour of questions ranging from the economy to crime.