Harlan Kirgan
St. Landry Parish President Bill Fontneot is expecting a judicial decision within days on the validity of the dissolution of the hospital district that had governed St. Luke Hospital in Arnaudville.
Fontenot said he authorized Adams and Reese, the firm that drafted the ordinances for both St. Landry and St. Martin parishes, to proceed with the legal action.
The council voted that its’ legal counsel, Chad Pitre, ask the 27th Judicial Court District for a declaratory judgement about its decision to dissolve the district at its March 15 meeting.
The St. Martin Parish voted unanimously to end the district formed in 1963 at its Feb. 7 meeting by approving an agreement with St. Landry Parish.
The St. Landry Parish Council approved the agreement on a 7-6 vote at its Jan. 18 meeting.
Under the partnership agreement, St. Martin and St. Landry parishes established a special taxing district and managing authority which operated the facility until it closed in 1990. The building has been vacant and its condition has steadily declined since that time.
An Arnaudville group led by Mavis Arnaud Frugé, director of the Jaques Arnaud French Studies Collective, and members of NuNu’s Art and Culture Collective have spent eight years seeking ways to acquire the building as a home for a French-immersion educational and cultural program.
Pitre has told the St. Landry Parish Council that it is within its authority to dissolve the district, but council members pressed ahead to seek a judicial decision.
The contention about the dissolution surfaced at the March 15 meeting when George Marks, director of NuNu’s Art and Culture Collective, asked the St. Landry Parish Council to establish standards for its conduct.
Marks asked the council if it is free to lambaste each other, the parish president and constituents in public.
“During these past few weeks and years there is still an unchecked conduct by various council members who shame this elected body,” he said.
“As constituents we don’t want to be the recipients of what many might call bullying name calling or .. sticking fingers in person’s chest when talking to them,” he said.
Marks said Creole French is not just spoke by blacks, but added, “even if it was, so what?”
Marks said to Arnaudville council member Alvin Stelly that not all artists are gay.
“Arnaudville and surrounding communities are not being overrun by hippies, and ... even if it were, they have a right to live wherever they choose just like you and just like me. Folks moving into the area are choosing to invest in the community,” he said.
“They are the ones that have turned abandoned store fronts into thriving businesses,” he said.
Fruge, who attended the March 15, meeting introduced a group of New York University students who were staying for 10 days in Arnaudville for a French immersion program.
“Most people don’t realize that for four years French immersion has been ongoing in Arnaudville,” she said.
Dr. Melanie Haney, of the Department French at NYU, said the students “... see that French is vibrant and alive” during their visit to Louisiana.
“We teach them the cultural, linguistic and historical context of French in Louisiana during seven weeks. Then we come down here for 10 days,” she said.