Officials from the City of Ville Platte were center stage at Monday night’s Evangeline Parish Police Jury meeting with an agenda to set forth a plan to work together to clean blighted properties and canals throughout the city.
“We are here tonight, myself and council members, because all of their districts are affected with blighted properties,” said Ville Platte Mayor Jennifer Vidrine. “And, it is not only bringing down the city, it is bringing down the community and it is stifling us as far as economic growth is concerned when we are trying to bring businesses here and trying to bring people back here. The first thing people see is all of these blighted properties and blighted homes.”
According to the mayor, the police jury owns a total of 53 properties in the city alone that need to be cleaned.
Because of this issue, Vidrine said, “Our phones are ringing off the hook with people saying, ‘I have to look at this everyday. When are y’all going to do something about it?’”
The mayor said, city officials “want to know how can we work together with the jury and find out what the status of what the jury will do to clean up the properties that belong to the jury.”
While there are many blighted properties to clean, she did give “props” to Police Juror Daniel Arvie “because he has been working diligently with us trying to get the houses in his district torn down.” She also stated Police Jury President Ryan Williams and Police Jury Vice President Rocky Rider have also been working to clean properties in their districts as well.
According to the EPPJ’s public works director Chester Granger two blighted homes have recently been torn down in Daniel Arvie’s district.
However, Vidrine stated, “It is just so many. They are piling up and getting worse and worse and worse.”
Vidrine continued, “We need to be able to tell the public that the city and the jury are both doing what they are suppose to be doing. So, we want to hear a plan for the jury as to how they will take care of their properties.”
Police Juror Eric Soileau explained the process to tear down these homes is not easy. He stated, “We have many of these properties in our districts that we have to jump through 10 hurdles to even get on the property. It is ridiculous.”
In terms of what the jury is doing to clean properties, Police Juror Bryan Vidrine shared, “We budgeted $60,000 to clean these properties and that was for all nine of us because we all have districts outside of the city as well as in the city.”
He continued, “If we have a list of all the 53 properties, pictures and maybe some assessments, we would know which ones are more important than the rest. Then we could start on those.
“But that would be for the jurors who have property in the city, which would be five of us. I don’t know that I have any in my district but I’d still be willing to help out if I can.”
The discussion then shifted to what would be done with the properties once they have been cleaned.
Ville Platte City Council Member Bryant Riggs suggested after cleaning the properties that the police jury give them to the city to be used for single family units to be built.
“I commend y’all for putting up $60,000 to clean these properties,” said Riggs. “We recently got a grant to clean some of the city’s properties.”
He continued, “We started with a two year ordinance when I first became a councilman but I felt like that was too long so we got it down to 30 days.
“It is a problem that is going to be there, but it is a problem that can be resolved. I suggested one time to the mayor why don’t we just take over them and her response was it is a lot of properties and it is. But I suggest this, we don’t have near the kind of equipment the police jury has and we are in the business of real estate because we have an agenda where we are trying to get single family unit homes, but we need the property to do that. If y’all are willing to break the houses down I would say in good faith we would love to have the property and we take over it from that point on. We just don’t have the heavy equipment to break the houses down. But, if we take over the property then we would take care of it.”
The jury seemed to be on board with this suggestion and plans to continue its effort to clean blighted properties within the City of Ville Platte by working with city officials on identifying the properties to clean first.
Look for a story in the Sunday, February 10, 2019, edition of the Ville Platte Gazette on the Police Jury’s discussion with city officials in regard to allowing the city to use police jury equipment to clean canals within the City of Ville Platte.
Other items approved at the meeting:
•Reappointment of Wilbur Thompson to the Te Mamou Water Board.
•Appointment of Mike Fontenot to the Acadiana Area Human Services District Board.
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ELIZABETH WEST Managing Editor