Eat and be merry: The Baton Rouge Area Chamber’s third annual ‘Around the Table’ event will take place April 28. Characterized as a “meet and eat” experience, notable community and business leaders Ray Belton, president and chancellor of Southern University, and Anne and Greg Milneck, of Red Stick Spice and Digital FX, will open their homes to 225 people from the community for dinner, conversation, and networking. “This event is an annual reminder of the power of connection and conversation in building a community to be proud of,” says Adam Knapp, president and CEO of BRAC, in a statement. Get more details and register here by April 7.
Good news: Ample rainfall that began last summer and continued into the fall could lead to an abundant crawfish season—albeit with smaller crawdads than some may like, an LSU AgCenter researcher says. Aquaculture researcher Ray McClain says last fall’s rain encouraged female crawfish to leave their burrows. Mild temperatures in the fall and winter are good for growth. “We had ample rainfall during (the) summer when crawfish are down in the burrows, which gave us fairly good broodstock survival and reproduction,” McClain says in a news release. “When crawfish population density is high, you typically get way smaller crawfish,” he adds.
Making moves: Three subsidiaries of Entergy Corporation closed on their purchase of the 1,980-megawatt Union Power Station located near El Dorado, Arkansas Thursday. In a news release, the New Orleans-based energy company says Entergy Arkansas, Inc., Entergy Louisiana, Inc., and Entergy New Orleans, Inc. purchased the combined-cycle, gas-fired station from Energy Power Partners L.P. for $948 million, or about $237 million for each unit. That price is about half of what it would cost to build a comparable new plant. Entergy Arkansas and Entergy New Orleans each acquired one unit and Entergy Louisiana acquired two units. The sides announced a purchase agreement in December. Read the full release.
