Central Mayor David Barrow is defending his city’s arrangement with East Baton Rouge Parish Sheriff Sid Gautreaux amid questions about the way the sheriff’s department provides law enforcement to Central.
Two Baton Rouge citizens raised the issue in a letter sent to several local and state officials requesting a “review and explanation” of how Gautreaux provides police protection to Central “without being paid compensation for this dedicated policing.”
“We haven’t had any discussions with the sheriff about this so I don’t have any response to this,” Barrow says of the letter. “But I don’t understand why they care. They don’t live in Central.”
Downtown residents and neighborhood activists Mary Jane Marcantel and Ben Taylor, who penned the letter, say they care because of what they believe is an equity issue and its implications for the city of St. George.
Gautreaux has acknowledged that under an informal agreement inked by his predecessor, Elmer Litchfield, the EBRSO provides police patrols to Central much as it did when the city was unincorporated—in other words, with funding from the parishwide millage that pays for all EBRSO services, not by a dedicated millage paid only by Central taxpayers.
As a practical matter, that means taxpayers in the cities of Baton Rouge, Baker and Zachary—all of which pay dedicated millages to support their own municipal police departments and also pay property taxes to support EBRSO operations—are subsidizing Central’s law enforcement services.
Organizers of St. George say they plan to have the same sort of arrangement with Gautreaux once their new city is up and running, hence the significance of the issue now that voters in St. George have approved incorporation.
East Baton Rouge Parish District Attorney Hillar Moore, a recipient of the letter, agrees with Marcantel and Taylor that there’s a fairness issue and says he’d like to see the issue addressed, though adding he has no legal authority to do anything about it.
Baker Mayor Darnell Waites, who also received the letter, says he was previously unaware of Central’s arrangement with Gautreaux and now plans to talk to the sheriff about it.
“I want to meet with my people and vet all of this,” Waites says. “Then I want to sit down with the sheriff.”
Another recipient of the letter, Zachary Mayor David Amrhein, says his small city—just two-thirds the population of Central and one-fifth the population of St. George—pays more than $4 million annually to support its own police department plus nearly $2 million to the sheriff’s office so he also would like to see the equity issue addressed.
“I know Central doesn’t pay that much and St. George won’t pay that much,” he says.
Gautreaux has said he understands the concerns and has told Central and St. George officials if and when St. George is up and running, he will have to revisit the issue with Central and work out agreements for both cities that are financially comparable to the arrangements paid by other cities in the parish.
