Louisiana news briefs

Thibodaux teacher accused of having sex with student
THIBODAUX (AP) — Lafourche Parishes deputies say a 25-year-old Thibodaux High School teacher has been arrested for having sexual contact with a 17-year-old student.
Superintendent Jo Ann Matthews said in a news release that Celeste Bergeron, of Thibodaux, is no longer employed by the Lafourche Parish School District,
Deputies say Bergeron is accused of engaging in sexual activity with the student at least twice, and the two also allegedly exchanged private messages on social media.
Sheriff’s spokesman Brennan Matherne said the initial report had not been submitted, but the alleged incidents occurred before Christmas and in the past week, once at Bergeron’s home and once at the student’s residence.

Lafourche board makes offers to buy property
THIBODAUX (AP) — Lafourche School Board members have made offers for property to build a new Bayou Blue Elementary School.
If accepted, school district’s facilities manager Evan Plaisance says a purchase agreement for the property could be completed by this spring.
Proposed offers are for an 18-acre portion of the 238-acre Ducrose Plantation at an estimated cost of about $484,000 and for 20 acres there for about $538,000. The per-acre cost is estimated at $26,900.
The property is about three miles from the existing school.
A purchase agreement will require board approval.

Study: Civil Service
employees qualify for raises
BATON ROUGE (AP) — A new report finds that almost everyone in Louisiana’s civil service workforce received job performance ratings high enough to make them eligible for a 4 percent pay raise.
Ninety-six percent of the 37,736 classified civil servants evaluated were rated “exceptional” or “successful” — the ratings needed to be eligible for pay raises.
Just 388 employees, or 1 percent of the state’s civil service workers, got a “needs improvement-unsuccessful” rating. The poor rating makes them ineligible for pay increases.
The civil service report reflects the first fiscal year under which the Jindal administration’s new employee job rating system was used throughout state government.
Shannon Templet, civil service director, said about the same percentage of employees qualified for 4 percent pay raises as under the old system.

No big winners in lottery
BATON ROUGE (AP) — The Louisiana Lottery Corporation says nobody won the two major jackpots in the Louisiana Lotto and multistate Powerball drawings on Wednesday night.
Louisiana Lotto players matching all six numbers drawn would have won or shared a $450,000 prize, which will rise to an estimated $475,000 for Saturday.
Players matching all five numbers and the Powerball would have won or shared the $146 million jackpot. The prize goes to an estimated $162 million for Saturday.
The Easy 5 drawing rises to an estimated $220,000 after none of the tickets matched all five numbers drawn for Wednesday’s $200,000 jackpot.
Winning numbers drawn Wednesday were:
—Powerball: 14-15-47-49-59, Powerball: 10, Power Play: 2
(fourteen, fifteen, forty-seven, forty-nine, fifty-nine; Powerball: ten; Power Play: two)
—Easy 5: 09-13-19-33-37
(nine, thirteen, nineteen, thirty-three, thirty-seven)
—Lotto: 03-20-30-32-34-40
(three, twenty, thirty, thirty-two, thirty-four, forty)

Utilities suspend cutoffs during frigid weather
(AP) Utility regulators say freezing weather across the state will prevent electric and gas utilities from disconnecting residential customers who are behind on their bills.
Public Service Commissioner Foster Campbell says a 2007 rule he authored instructs utilities to avoid cutting off customers when temperatures reach 32 degrees or colder and remain there.
Campbell, of Bossier City, says that kind of weather threatens the health of children, the sick and elderly when there’s no heat in a home. The same PSC rule prevents cutoffs during summer heat waves.
Campbell notes that the no-disconnect orders do not relieve customers of the obligation to pay their bills. But he says it gives people assurance that they won’t be left out in the cold or heat if they’ve temporarily fallen behind on a payment.

Abbeville teacher arrested
KAPLAN (AP) — An Abbeville High School teacher has been arrested after allegedly having an inappropriate relationship with a student.
Nicholas Willis has been charged with carnal knowledge of a juvenile.
Kaplan Police Chief Boyd Adams says Willis is in in the Kaplan City Jail on a $200,000 bond. It was unknown whether he has as an attorney.
Adams says Willis was arrested after an investigation by his department and the Abbeville Police Department. The original complaint was made to Abbeville police, and an investigation indicated that the alleged incident happened within the Kaplan city limits.
Willis teaches physics, physical science and chemistry at Abbeville High. Vermilion Parish Superintendent Jerome Puyau says Willis was placed on leave Tuesday.

Houma corrosion monitor pleads guilty to violations
MILWAUKEE (AP) — A former employee of Shell Pipeline Co. pleaded guilty Wednesday to safety violations in a jet fuel leak at General Mitchell International Airport in Milwaukee that cost millions of dollars to clean up.
Corrosion monitor Randy Jones, 44, of Houma, pleaded guilty to failing to conduct regular voltage readings and an annual survey of a pipeline used to transport jet fuel at the airport, the U.S. Department of Justice said. Jones also pleaded guilty to making a false statement.
As part of a plea agreement, Jones admitted that he knowingly failed to conduct required safety tests between January and December 2011 and submitted false data to the Pipeline and Hazardous Material Safety Administration indicating the required test had been conducted.
In January 2012, a hole was discovered in the pipeline at Mitchell Airport after jet fuel began showing up in soil surrounding the airport and in a nearby creek. Shell reported about 9,000 gallons of jet fuel leaked. The response and cleanup cost for the spill was about $19.3 million.
From The Associated Press.
Under requirements of the Pipeline Safety Act, buried or submerged metal pipelines must be protected to prevent corrosion, the government said. That involves using a device called a rectifier that applies a negative current to soil near the pipeline to keep corrosion away from the pipe. The pipeline operator is required to conduct regular readings of the voltage generated from a rectifier and conduct an annual survey of the pipeline.
Jones worked for Shell from 1992 through 2012. From 2010 until 2012, Jones was employed as a corrosion coordinator and was responsible for Shell pipelines serving Mitchell and Chicago’s O’Hare International Airport.
Under the plea agreement, Jones faces a maximum prison sentence of five years on each of the three counts. Sentencing is set for April 30. His defense attorney did not immediately return a call Wednesday.