Parish council refinances bonds

The St. Mary Parish Council held a shorter than usual meeting on Wednesday that saw the majority of work involve the passing of a series of resolutions authorizing the parish president to execute a variety of actions regarding infrastructure repair within the parish.
There were also two other resolutions passed, one approving the “issuance, sale and delivery of not exceeding $700,000 of General Obligation Refunding Bonds and the issuance of not more exceeding $2,000,000 of Revenue Refunding Bonds of St. Mary Parish Water and Sewer Commission No. 4.”
The second resolution involved the issuance of $7.5 million of sales tax refunding bonds of St. Mary Parish. Both resolutions were described as refinancing efforts involving parish projects that were already completed.
One council member took the opportunity on Wednesday to address an issue that has been in the headlines lately and has caused some controversy within the community. Councilman Rev. Craig Mathews spoke to other council members and the audience in attendance about the school board’s recent decision to close two parish elementary schools and some problems he said occurred with the decision-making process.
“I had the occasion to attend a school board meeting the other night,” Mathews said. “As we are all aware, the school board made some critical decisions and I don’t so much have a problem with the decisions that were made as I do with the proceedings that were followed or not followed during that public meeting.”
Mathews was referring to a recent meeting of the St. Mary Parish School Board where the decision was made to close M.D. Shannon Elementary School in Morgan City and J.A. Hernandez Elementary School in Franklin after the current school year. Mathews said there were problems with how the school board conducted the public comment section of the meeting.
“There was one thing in particular that I was very disappointed about,” Mathews said. “Never in my professional career have I ever felt so disrespected, so degraded during a public meeting. After getting the (school board) president’s permission to make a public comment to the board regarding a particular concern I had, I was abruptly interrupted by a school board member, a one Mr. Michael Taylor. I would hope that he and other members of public bodies would have more consideration. I was only at the podium for two and a half minutes before this gentleman (Taylor) called for a point of order during my public comment. When a member of the community is standing before you and expressing concerns and you single them out, particularly another elected official, that is disgusting and degrading for anyone elected to public office to act in such a manner.”
Mathews ended his comments on Wednesday by applauding the way the parish council handles interactions with the public which he said was in stark contrast to the way he was treated at the school board meeting.
“I want to commend this body (parish council) for the way we handle our constituents who come before this public body to address whatever their concerns might be,” Mathews said. “They have the right to come before us and address us as elected officials. I think it would behoove our parish and our constituents to be more selective and more cautious when we go to the polls and elect people to public office.”
Other business included the allocation of $2,500 from several wards’ sales tax funds to St. Mary Community Action Agency for the Little Zion Community Outreach in Centerville. There was also a pre-application request for funds for the Local First Responders luncheon.
There was also a request from Morgan City for the parish council to support and participate in a fishing tournament the town is applying to host. Morgan City requested $2,500 in financial support, the use of the St. Mary Parish Jesse Fontenot Memorial Boat Landing and the waiver of launch fees for boats that register for the tournament.