A mayor takes the "good" and the "bad" when elected to office.
The "good" is like manna from heaven. Take for instance the sudden arrival of Curtis "50 Cent" Jackson in Shreveport and his lease of Millennium Studios, purchase of $2 million plus of downtown properties and his planned Humor & Harmony Festival.
The "bad" is like the lump of coal in a Christmas stocking or a sewage overflow in one's home or office. The most recent example of the "bad" is the circumstances leading to Declarations of Public Health and Safety Emergencies of Mayor Tom Arceneaux on four Shreveport apartment complexes. The list of the Villa Norte, Joie and Pines Apartments is now grown to include Linwood Homes apartments.
Each of these declarations was well merited.
The deterioration of these complexes started long before Arceneaux took office. Prior city councils, which included Tabatha Taylor, James Green, Alan Jackson and Grayson Boucher as well as the Adrian Perkins and Ollie Tyler mayoral administrations took no action against the complexes. Now it is up to the Arceneaux administration to deal with these messes.
The City of Shreveport is NOT in the housing business, and it’s NOT in the business of demolishing apartment complexes. But now that there have been four such declarations the city is on a slippery slope--actually the city has started down into a rabbit hole that has no end.
Council woman Taylor has now decided to be the champion of the under trodden who live in third world conditions. Geez--this was not an important issue to her when Adrian Perkins was mayor, and she was on the council. Now that she has all but declared to run for mayor against Arceneaux in 2026, Taylor sees herself as the de facto housing czar looking for every press opportunity she can find.
She also tries to take credit for the arrival of Jackson and his entourage that are making headlines virtually every day. Taylor did not recruit 50 Cent to Shreveport, but she acts as if he is her long lost brother she has re-united with. At council meetings she likes to mention comments about Jackson's plans for Shreveport as she has the inside poop on state secrets. She is not one of the Jackson's gatekeepers even though she pretends to be one.
Add to this self-created aura of importance is the Amazon facility which is in her district and will soon be open. The wheels were put in motion to get Amazon here long before Taylor became a council member and involved big time economic players, which Taylor is not. Just because she orchestrated the announcement of job postings for Amazon is not relevant to her future political aspirations. And if anything thinks that Amazon brass consults with Taylor on making it business decisions, then check to see what they are smoking.
What Taylor has not realized is the demolition of apartment complexes has not been budgeted by the City. Taking money out of the city surplus for these costs has many adverse consequences including possible downgrading of the city's bond rating and bond capacity. But since Taylor and her mentor James Green did not want the three recent bond proposals to pass, then she (and Green) may care less on the cost of bond money to the City even though their districts will receive much more in bond money projects than they pay in city ad valorem and sales taxes.
Unfortunately, there are more apartment complexes that are in horrible condition in Shreveport. Most of these are occupied but there are some that have been completed abandoned and boarded up. However, vagrants are still a problem as well as thieves who rip out appliances, wiring and copper tubing what can be resold. And then there are fires at the complexes which endanger those that may be on the premises as well as responding firefighters.
If Taylor really wants to be a leader versus a media opportunist then she should address the city's budget and make recommendations for cuts that will underwrite demolition and relocation costs. And while she is at it, address the impact on the city's surplus. But then that is the "dirty work" that does not engender press and media attention so don't expect Taylor to take the lead on these issues.
It’s much easier for her to make press statements that "as a Black woman" she was offended that the investigation of the Ann Brewster did not provide a new information to contradict the findings of a suicide. This after she withheld information that she had alleged gained from a Brewster relative from the investigation team until the press conference. Thus, once again, she had her 30 seconds of fame in front of TV cameras.
One can expect the problems of bad housing to continue for Shreveport and the Arceneaux administration. And at the same time for Taylor and Green to continue their less than subtle efforts to undermine the Arceneaux administration.