This Morning's Headlines / Thu, Jan. 03, 2008
New downtown club planned
A new nightclub that will feature live music and Latin dancing will open at Main and Sixth streets in the next few weeks. Sara and Jeremy Meighan are the owners of 600 Main. The couple has been sponsoring Latin dance nights at several clubs around Baton Rouge for the past 10 years. "It's hard not having our own place," Sara Meighan says. "It seems the best move for us to have our own place to house Latin night." Along with playing Latin music on Fridays, 600 Main will bring international music acts. "We're looking to do different types of dance nights than the other clubs in town," she says. "It will be loungey, where people can sit down and talk and have a drink." The couple hopes to open 600 Main by mid-January or early February. "We want to be open and have something for the Spanish Town Mardi Gras Parade," she says. --Timothy Boone
Jacobs Engineering leases office space off Sherwood Forest
Jacobs Engineering will move into the old CDI Engineering building off Sherwood Forest Boulevard later this month. Chad Rigby, an agent with Maestri-Murrell Brokerage, says the company has leased 31,013 square feet on Westfork Drive. Jacobs occupies a 200,000-square-foot office building on Essen Lane, but Rigby says the firm needed more space. "Baton Rouge is quickly becoming an engineering capital," he says. The CDI building became open after the firm moved into United Plaza. --Timothy Boone
Amedisys enters Puerto Rico market
Amedisys has purchased a home health nursing agency in Carolina, Puerto Rico, giving the Baton Rouge company a presence in the territory. Details of the transaction, which closed Wednesday, were not released, but Amedisys says it will contribute less than $1 million in net revenue this year. This is the second deal Amedisys has announced this week; on Monday, it announced the purchase of six home health agencies from Savannah, Ga.-based Memorial Health University Medical Center.
New tenant for Monroe headlight plant
Gov. Kathleen Blanco will announce today that the state has found a tenant for the empty Guide Corp. headlight plant in Monroe and the company will create hundreds of jobs, The (Monroe) News-Star reports. The Guide Corp. plant closed almost a year ago, eliminating about 800 jobs. The newspaper reports the new tenant is a company that will assemble a specialty line of cars. Plans are for the company to hire 200 workers and ramp up to 800 employees within five years. Click here for the story.
New Louisiana channel offered locally
LCN-TV—Louisiana Connection Network—is Louisiana’s newest television network. Offering a mix of Louisiana culture, heritage, entertainment and industry shows, the Gray-based network can be seen in 21 parishes, including East Baton Rouge. “We want to be informative as well as entertaining,” owner Jaime Johnson says. LCN programming started airing programming in June. It is available on Cox Communications’ digital package (Channel 140), Charter Communications’ digital package (Channel 109) and Vision Communications (Channel 77). For more information, visit lcntv.com.
Publisher: Christmas spirit, or ethics violations?
Was all the Christmas giving by Sen. Cleo Fields in the spirit of the season—or a way to skirt ethics or campaign finance laws? That's the question Business Report Publisher Rolfe McCollister ponders as we head into the new year. If Fields does not run for elected office in the future, then he deserves a thank you for his generosity, McCollister writes, but "if there is an election in the near future, then handing out cash, whether it be at Christmas or on Election Day, smells funny and should be addressed in the new ethics code for state officials and the Legislature." McCollister also uses the words of Edwin Edwards and other former elected officials to prove why ethics reform is vital for our state's future. Plus, he expresses disappointment with two school board members that previously drew his support. Find out why by reading his column here. Send comments to editors@businessreport.com
No more House Environment Committee
State Rep. Gordon Dove, a Houma Republican, says the House Environment Committee will officially be disbanded when the lower chamber gathers this month. Instead, all environmental issues will now be directed to the House Natural Resources Committee, which Dove has been tapped to chair. “I feel like it’s an additional workload we can handle,” he says, “but it will add some additional duties for the committee.” The Natural Resources Committee has traditionally handled hunting and fishing issues, although recent years have brought an influx of coastal management topics to the panel. Everything from marsh conservation to tidelands moves through the committee. But now its legislative scope is growing larger—and for good reason. During last year’s regular session of the Legislature, the House Environment Committee was assigned only eight bills. It’s a meager slate, especially compared to the 42 bills Natural Resources handled. The decrease is because of a variety of factors, ranging from a lack of interest by lawmakers to other committees expanding their jurisdictions. Another note of interest for lobbyists: If you want to get a handle on the natural resources process on both sides of the Legislature over the next four years, get to know Terrebonne Parish. While Dove has the House side locked up, his fellow parish delegation member, Sen. Reggie Dupre, a Democrat from Bourg, is chairing the Senate panel. That means there will be an added emphasis inside the committees on coastal restoration, barrier island projects and commercial seafood. “But we will also be giving a lot of attention to oil and gas,” Dove says. “We don’t want to undercut the significance of that.” --Jeremy Alford
News roundup: Ford picks Indian company as top bidder for Jaguar, Land Rover; Taylor to speak to Black Chamber; West Virginia takes interim tag off Stewart; Dolphins fire Cameron after one season
From Detroit to Bombay: Ford Motor Co. picked India's Tata Motors Ltd. as the top bidder for its Jaguar and Land Rover units, The Associated Press reports. The company says it will spend the next few weeks negotiating a deal for Tata to take over the two storied brands. United Way head to address business group: Howard Taylor, CEO of the Capital Area United Way, will be the guest speaker at the Baton Rouge Black Chamber of Commerce's monthly breakfast at 7 a.m. Friday in the McKinley Alumni Center. Admission is $5 for members, $10 for nonmembers. To register, click here. Mountaineers promote assistant: West Virginia named Bill Stewart as its head football coach, less than 12 hours after he led the Mountaineers to a 48-28 victory over Oklahoma in the Fiesta Bowl. Stewart had been an assistant coach at West Virginia since 2000 and was named interim coach last month, when Rich Rodriguez left for Michigan. Former LSU assistant coach Jimbo Fisher, a West Virginia native, had been mentioned as a possible candidate. Dolphins looking again: Cam Cameron was fired as the Miami Dolphins' coach this morning by new boss Bill Parcells after plunging to an 0-13 start in his first year on the job and finishing with just one victory. The dismissal comes three days after Parcells ousted general manager Randy Mueller and means the reeling franchise will have its fifth coach in five seasons.
A6 sets meeting to discuss Riviere casino
A6 will meet at 5:30 p.m. on Thursday, Jan. 10 at the M Bar on Third Street to discuss a number of issues, including any action the civic group will take on Pinnacle Entertainment's proposed Riviere casino project. A6 is looking for volunteers to study the casino and help the group come up with a stance on the issue before the Feb. 9 local option vote. For more information, go to a6br.com.
