Canceled meeting delays report

• By VIC COUVILLION
• Special to The Advocate
• Published: Nov 24, 2009 - Page: 4B

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LIVINGSTON — Livingston Parish residents can expect road improvement projects in the 2010 fiscal year, which starts Jan. 1, but members of the Parish Council do not know the amount of funds that will be available for overlay and other upgrades to parish roads and bridges.

At a brief meeting Monday night, council members learned that an expected item on the agenda, a discussion of a roads improvement priority list and an estimate of how much money will be available for road work in the coming year, was not up for discussion.

The council’s Ways and Means Committee, which was scheduled to meet earlier in the day and have the financial and road priority data available, canceled its meeting so road improvement issues were not on the full council’s formal meeting agenda.

Councilman Buddy Mincey raised the issue and asked council members why the roads improvement priority list and a proposed budget for road improvements were not available.

Council Chairman Jimmie McCoy said he did not know why the Ways and Means Committee failed to meet but promised the item would be on the agenda for the next regularly scheduled council meeting which is slated for 6 p.m. Dec. 10 at the parish Courthouse.

Under its Home Rule Charter, the council is mandated to draw up a three-year priority list of which roads are in greatest need of upgrading.

As Council Attorney Blayne Honeycutt explained, the council can amend the list on a yearly basis.    

After the meeting, Mincey and McCoy said that about $5 million for parish roads was available for spending last year.

Both said they anticipated that a report on road money available for next year would be ready soon.

McCoy said that in the past council members have generally been in agreement over which roads commanded the greatest amount of attention and that the priority list is supported by the council.

“I think we have done a good job with the program and have always tried to do what was best when it came to upgrading our roads,” McCoy said.

A citizens’ initiative earlier this year forced the council to make some modifications relative to which roads are accepted into the public roads system.

That action has mandated that before new roads, especially those serving new subdivisions, are brought into the system, they must meet certain specifications as to width, length and number of residents served.