By Ernest A. Burguières

August 30, 2023

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Ernest A. Burguières is a Mandeville attorney who formerly served as District III Councilman. Mandeville Daily is honored to publish Mr. Burguières’ column with permission which is a combined reporting of the goings on in Mandeville government with his personal commentary.

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On Tuesday, September 5th, the final act of our shared Sucette experience will be unveiled. There will be a council meeting and there will reportedly be a vote!

If you have enjoyed and/or suffered through the Sucette experience over the past year, it may very well come to a head at 6:00 p.m. Tuesday, September 5th, in the Spitzfaden Center. If there is a capacity crowd, you ought to arrive early or resign yourself to pressing your nose against the window to watch.

There are several reasons why you may want to attend.

It will be a defining experience.

At center stage will be our five beleaguered council members. The Sucette decision that night may have a significant effect on the political future of the council and the mayor.

We are told that our elected officials are supposed to represent the views and desires of the citizens. Each elected official will have to ask himself; do I side with my friends and constituents, or, do I side with the Sucette developers? Will my vote for Sucette be in the best interest of my friends and constituents? Will I be able to look my friends and constituents in the face and say, what I did is in your best interest? Or will I betray those friends and constituents and side with the Sucette developers? Will the city attorney and the Director of Planning make new efforts to thwart the sentiment of council members? Interesting times.

The mayor and the entire council will be up for election in 2024. Qualifying is in 90-plus days, December 13-15, 2023. The primary is March 23, 2024. The run-off, if required, is April 27, 2024.

Provocative questions abound.

Will the vote on Sucette be political suicide for some? You have to wonder how the constituent contact to each council member has been trending over the past 8 months, for or against Sucette? As a point of interest, I learned that my post entitled, “The August 15, 2023, Sucette Experience” had 4,300 views. The vast majority of comments I received were in opposition to Sucette. The numbers speak for themselves.

If the council votes to approve Sucette, what will the mayor do? Will he veto it? What are his chances for re-election in Council Districts II and III if he does not veto Sucette?

If a council member believes the mayor will ultimately veto any Sucette approval, why would that council member risk the political disadvantage of voting for Sucette?

When the vote comes, who will decide the order in which the council members’ names are called out to vote? Will the first council member called upon to vote set the stage for subsequent council members? What will the strategy be? The last council member on this issue will have the advantage of knowing how his four peers have already voted.

And think of the consequences of a vote in favor. You would have approved a change in the zoning from residential to commercial… forever. If this project is not built, it will still be zoned commercial, then what other commercial venture could be foisted on the citizens? We are supposedly still facing a recession in the next 12 to 18 months. There will be the presidential election of the century. Would a subsequent commercial venture be guided by the B-2 rules or B-1 rules? A car wash? A shopping center? A grand music / entertainment venue? How do you control these future potential consequences at this stage? Who wants to shoulder that risk?

An interesting spectacle.

Our opportunity to participate in this theater of the absurd ought to be a no-miss date. You are not likely to see more intriguing brinksmanship and stress in a local government experience. Come on down and sit in the peanut gallery with the rest of us pilgrims while this sausage is made!

’Adoption’ of Ordinance 23-16 set for September 5th

Editorial

The so-called cabal of city officials, lawyers and developers who have tried to ramrod the Sucette Harbor project through at any cost have seemingly exhausted all avenues to have a 90-unit wrecking amendment removed from Ordinance 23-16.

Or have they?

The Woodward Interests developers, headed by Bill Hoffman and represented by attorney Paul Harrison, had originally proposed 201 apartment units, later reducing it to 178, before being dealt a devastating blow on July 12th when a majority on the council approved a poison pill, or wrecking amendment, that capped the number of units at 90.

Two meetings later, on August 15th, they tried nullifying the amendment. That was ruled out of order. Then they tried a motion to reconsider. That too was out of order. And along the way they even tried to rule a fellow council member out of order for just asking to have the amendment read aloud for everyone to hear. It was a surreal night.

You can refresh your memory by reading this editorial and detailed analysis of what happened August 15th. And here’s a Robert’s Rules of Order quick reference for these same issues.

And now, we supposedly approach this critical juncture — a vote. What will they try next?

We think we might know what they have up their sleeves. We’ll start with the obvious option and then knock your socks off with a suspected “nuclear option.”

Option 1: Motion to Rescind/Amend Something Adopted

Problem: Out of order according to Robert’s Rules

Assistant City Attorney David Parnell Jr., who stood in for City Attorney Elizabeth Sconzert at the August 15th special meeting, unwittingly signaled what the cabal’s next move might be with remarks he made that night during one of his out-of-order interpretations.

“There’s also motion to amend something previously amended [perhaps he meant ‘adopted’], so I mean, there’s different options. Uhm. We feel it’s proper.”

He’s referring to motion to “rescind” and/or motion to “amend something already adopted.” These two motions are the opposite sides or the same coin. One strikes text from something adopted, the other adds text to something adopted.

But there’s a problem with this tactic. It too would be — or should be — ruled out of order.

§35:2:

“[Rescind and Amend Something Previously Adopted] Can be applied to anything (e.g., bylaw, rule, policy, decision, or choice) which has continuing force and effect and which was made or created at any time or times as the result of the adoption of one or more main motions.”

Notice the words “main motion” and “adoption.” Amendments are “subsidiary motions” according to §12:1 and nothing more, therefore §35 does not apply.

The “main motion” which is what currently sits before the City Council as its open or pending business is Ordinance 23-16, and it has not been adopted yet. All the amendments made to that main motion are subsidiary motions.

For either of these two motions to succeed, the presiding chairman Councilman at Large Rick Danielson and Sconzert would have to rule that the amendment itself is a main motion. We simply don’t see how that’s possible based on RROO.

But then again, we’ve seen amazing feats of linguistic intrepidity from the legal and planning departments thus far, so who knows.

Let’s continue.

Option 2 (Nuclear Option): Motion to Withdraw

Problem: Only McGuire can do it

Mandeville Daily noticed that when the September 5th agenda and meeting packet was published on the City of Mandeville’s website August 24th, Ordinance 23-16 had been updated to reflect the amendments from July 12th, but it was also altered to read “moved for introduction by Council Member Bush; seconded for introduction by Council Member McGuire.”

The problem is, this is not true.

Mandeville Daily wonders if this signals the cabal’s “nuclear option.” Although it was probably just an innocent mistake at City Hall, perhaps members of our shadow government saw this too and are preparing for this contingency.

Ordinance 23-16 was actually moved for introduction at the May 11th City Council meeting by District II Councilman Dr. Skelly Kreller and seconded by by District I Councilwoman Rebecca Bush.

This is clearly seen on the City Council meeting video from May 11th, 2023, at approximately the 2:39:40 mark.

An “introduction” does not bring business before the council — it just says this item will come before the council at a later date. It satisfies the legal requirement of advertisement. Ordinances are not discussed or voted on when they are introduced. In fact, the council quite often introduces multiple ordinances on the same night, but nothing happens at that time. No discussion. No votes. No nothing.

But the motion to actually consider the ordinance comes under “old business” and the council can only consider one such item at a time, and each such item remains before the council (for that session) until it is properly resolved via motions to adopt, postpone, withdraw, etc. before they can move to the next item, according to RROO.

Ordinance 23-16 was actually put before the City Council for consideration during the May 25th meeting based on a motion by District III Councilwoman Jill McGuire.

Video of the May 25th, 2023, meeting at the 31:54 mark confirms it was McGuire.

Only she can make a motion to “withdraw,” according to RROO:

§4:19      

“Until the chair states the question, the maker has the right to modify his motion as he pleases or to withdraw it entirely. After the question has been stated by the chair, the motion becomes the property of the assembly, and then its maker can do neither of these things without the assembly’s consent (see 33:11–19); but while the motion is pending the assembly can change the wording of the motion by the process of amendment (12) before acting upon it.”

Why does this matter? You might want to don your tin-foil hat before you read the answer.

A successful motion to withdraw a main motion strips all amendments or changes to the motion, just as though they never happened. Ordinance 23-16 would in effect be “reset” to its original state, without the 90-unit limit, according to the interpretation we received.

§33:16

“… Any such motions that adhere to the main motion cease to be before the assembly and require no further disposition if the main motion is withdrawn.”

And — get ready to be further blown away — it doesn’t seem that there is anything that would stop a council member from making a new motion to bring it right back before the council, but this time, without the wrecking amendments attached. Why not? It is already on the agenda, is it not? Interesting question, for sure.

§33:18      

“After a motion has been withdrawn, the situation is as though it had never been made; therefore, the same motion can be made again at the same meeting.”

The nuclear option. There you have it.

Because it was McGuire who made the motion, this should be a dead-end.

Had Bush or Kreller made that motion, then sure, this might be a thing.

Robert’s Rules really isn’t the ‘law’ you say?

Based on what we’ve seen so far, there is little reason to believe the bunch involved in this cabal will follow, let alone even acknowledge, the written rules that don’t work to their advantage.

Twice already, Danielson unilaterally decided to suspend adding new amendments or holding a vote on the ordinance when it looked as though the proposal faced imminent death. The first time was July 24th and the second was August 15th.

Either he made those decisions without a consensus from the council or if he did consult them via phone, email, or in person, it would have constituted a walking quorum which would have violated Louisiana’s Open Meetings Law. We tend to believe it was the former rather than the later:

Shouldn’t it be considered just as wrong for the chairman not to allow fellow council members to vote on a matter as it would be if he were to tell them how to vote on a matter? Something to think about.

Now let’s suppose the legal department decides that Robert’s Rules of Order is really just a guide and the council doesn’t have to follow it to the letter.

The problem with that thinking is, Resolution 20-14, adopted shortly after the current City Council took office, sets the rules by which the City Council conducts its meetings, in accordance with Section 2-06(c) of the Mandeville Home Rule Charter.

This rule-setting Resolution 20-14 says our City Council is a “Robert’s Rules of Order” body. This should mean it’s the law, but again, no telling what interpretation we might be treated to September 5th.

Have you noticed how many times we’re having to put the word “should” in italics lately?

Will the truth matter on September 5th? Or is getting Sucette Harbor approved the only thing that matters?

We shall see. Keep your tin-foil hat ready to go.

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Robert’s Rules of Order trampled by the cabal

Editorial

Updated August 21, 2023 at 7:40 a.m. — Clarify analysis about scheduled vote.

Anyone who has watched or attended the series of City Council meetings debating the Sucette Harbor proposal has to be asking themselves: What the hell is going on in Mandeville city government?

A recurring theme seems to be that words don’t matter anymore, rules don’t matter anymore, and worse, does the actual law even matter, as long as Sucette Harbor gets approved?

We are going to walk through each violation of parliamentary procedure and each time the written word was ignored during the most recent Sucette Harbor special meeting August 15th. In the end, you too will feel as we do, Mandeveille has been seized by a shadow government, a cabal, of lawyers, council members, and appointees who all conspire to get around the rules and defy what the people actually want.

By the time you finish reading this, and if you go back and watch the video excerpts that we point to, you will be purchasing your copy of Robert’s Rules of Order (RROO) and making your tin foil hat to wear to the next Sucette Harbor special meeting.

Danielson discards advertised agenda, declaring there will be no vote on adoption

The advertised agenda clearly read “Adoption of Ordinance 23-16,” but at the outset, presiding chairman Councilman at Large Rick Danielson declared there would be no vote on the adoption of the ordinance that night, despite “adoption” having been legally advertised in accordance with Louisiana Open Meetings Law. His explanation was that the ordinance wasn’t ready yet for a final vote.

“I think it would be very difficult to vote on a final ordinance this evening until we have cleaned up everything in Ordinance 23-16, with any amendments, any conditions, any possible changes that we would discuss this evening. So the plan is to not vote on the final ordinance tonight.”

That may be well and good if you’re a Sucette Harbor proponent, but what about those council members who had the right to vote it down if they so chose?

Analysis:

Danielson’s surprise no-vote declaration at the start of the August 15th meeting seems to run contrary to Louisiana’s Open Meetings Law. We guess the cabal realized that if they didn’t quash a potential motion to adopt that night, it would have been completely over for Sucette Harbor.

Sometimes pieces of legislation become malformed or nonsensical due to so-called “poison pills” or “wrecking amendments,” forcing even the proponents to vote against their own proposals. It’s part of the process and it’s all fair game.

This is exactly what should have happened to Ordinance 23-16 on August 15th. The vote was legally advertised in accordance with Open Meetings Law.

Each council member should have had the right to move for adoption under RROO and state law, even if, or we should say particularly if, their intention was to kill it. That’s how the system is supposed to work. The proponents of Sucette Harbor likely would have felt compelled to vote against it.

Danielson was essentially saying that in case the results of the meeting would have been to yield a “good” ordinance which might have gained support from the majority, including a drastically changed site plan and other provisions, the ordinance may have needed to be re-advertised before a vote, not to mention the developer would have needed the time in which to make said changes.

But Mandeville Daily believes that if they wanted to change the scheduled vote, they should have used the rules to do so. This would have meant making the case to Council Chairman Councilman at Large Jason Zuckerman to publish an updated agenda reflecting that change before the legal deadline.

And as for the developer at this point, they were given marching orders from a majority on the council July 12th with the 90-unit limit. They should have (1) complied with the 90 units, (2) asked a council member to move to “reconsider” on July 24th and win that argument on merit, or (3) withdrawn their application.

If they had tried the motion to “reconsider” on July 24th, it sounds like they would have succeeded, based on District I Councilwoman Rebecca Bush’s comments August 15th, which we will dive into later in this piece.

Had they done that, we could have had a workable ordinance by now. This was their fault, and yet another unforced error. By all accounts, the ordinance deserved to be voted down August 15th.

City attorney offers absurd interpretation of time limits rule for ‘reconsideration’

The second stop on our journey to the Land of the Lawless happened when Zuckerman called his first point of order after Kreller moved to amend a previously adopted amendment. Citing RROO, the chairman should have immediately called Kreller out of order instead.

Parnell Jr., Council Clerk Kristine Scherer, acting Council Chairman Councilman at Large Rick Danielson and other officials huddled for about 20 minutes before returning the meeting to order under a ruling that a “motion to reconsider” instead of a new amendment could move forward.

This was an indirect acknowledgment that Zuckerman’s first point of order was indeed “well taken” in parliamentary terms, meaning, he was right. And under the prescribed procedure for considering a point of order, the job of the chairman, parliamentarian and lawyer is to strictly determine if the motioner, Kreller, is out of order, and not to find him some other means to achieve his objective.

And the issue really wasn’t resolved yet as we would soon find out.

Local attorney Kevin Vogeltanz spoke during public comment addressing assistant city attorney David Parnell Jr.:

Video 2

17:03

Vogeltanz: “In a prior life, I did a lot of work with Robert’s Rules. I do not believe that this is a proper motion because under Robert’s Rules you can only make a motion to reconsider an amendment at the same meeting it was passed, or at the next meeting, and we are at least two meetings beyond when the 90 amendment passed. … Motions to reconsider can be made at the same night of the meeting, or at the next meeting. The motion should be withdrawn. Thank you.

Parnell Jr.: “It’s actually when that business has adjourned. And so these meetings have been adjourned, (but) there’s been no decisions on anything. The amendments have not been voted on finally. Uh, so the issue is still before the City Council, and there hasn’t been a finding. So he’s correct that you can’t carry over business to business to business, but this is still the same piece of business. There’s an ordinance in front of you that’s had seven meetings that have been adjourned, so…”

Danielson: “Ok. Alright.”

Analysis:

What the hell is Parnell Jr. talking about?

Vogeltanz was 100% correct. Based on his prior recommendation to Danielson, Parnell Jr. at the very least had stumbled upon §12:25 of RROO which says a new amendment cannot alter or nullify an existing amendment.

What’s more, three different sections of RROO — §6:26 (4), §37:8 (b), §37:10 (b) — all specifically say that the motion to “reconsider” a previously adopted amendment can only be done at the same meeting the amendment was adopted “or on the next succeeding day within the session” of multiple meetings. The August 15th meeting was the second Sucette session meeting after the amendment in question was adopted.

So Parnell Jr.’s statement that “it’s actually when that business has adjourned” is completely absurd and contradicts everything in RROO, which repeatedly uses the term “session” and defines it as either a single meeting, or a series of meetings, like at a convention, or the series of meetings on Sucette Harbor.

Did developers believe they had a deal with Bush?

Bush, who is seen by many as a potential swing vote in this matter, let everyone know right away at the August 15th meeting that the developer team — Woodward Interests President Bill Hoffman and attorney Paul Harrison — had met with her twice to discuss the situation.

“Let me reiterate the reason I made the motion and that was to make sure we have a full hearing and consideration of all the issues. And I met with the developer twice in the past few weeks. … [Then, while looking to her left directly at Kreller] I’m a bit disappointed that this issue has come up at this juncture. I felt like there were some other things we could have addressed before, but here it is.”

Does this mean Bush was expecting this tactic and planning for it, but Kreller screwed things by showing the developer’s hand too early… had he been instructed to wait until after less controversial pieces of the ordinance had been fixed?

Consider Bush’s next statement only minutes later:

Video 2

6:33

Bush: “One thing in response … One of the reasons why I wanted to listen to the new information is, my big issue, two of my big issues are scale [and density], and what I see before me did a lot toward scale. I don’t know how I will vote, and we still have to address the number of units, but I think it’s worth discussing.”

Analysis:

Is this why the developers, despite having been asked to return with a site plan that matched the 90-unit amendment, showed up August 15th with so-called “new information” or a site plan for 178 units instead?

Does this mean that Hoffman and Harrison felt they had reached a deal with Bush, by conceding one of her issues — scale — in exchange for her allowing the 90-unit limit to be lifted?

She was very quick to offer the “motion to reconsider” once Zuckerman won his first point of order against Kreller. And she did say “we still have to address the number of units.” Because she was one of the votes for the 90-unit limit July 12th, could this be interpreted to mean she was now willing to nullify that previous action?

Having amendment read aloud considered dangerous to the cause

At one point, Zuckerman asked Scherer to read his original amendment from July 12th for which the motion to reconsider was being debated. Danielson ruled him out of order, saying that discussion was limited strictly to whether the motion to reconsider should move forward or not, to which Kreller quickly concurred.

Video 2

10:08

Zuckerman: “Can I ask you to read back the previous amendment that we passed? I want to make sure we’re not putting some different spin on what we passed previously. I just think it would be helpful for everyone…”

Danielson: “But I think that is out of order as well because that’s getting to that amendment and we’re not at the amendment yet.”

Kreller: “I agree, that is out of order.”

Zuckerman: “All I’m asking is as part of this discussion of whether or not to reopen the amendment is if we can read the amendment we’re discussing reopening. Can we do that? … I don’t think that’s out of order.”

After a few minutes of back-and-forth and then asking Parnell Jr. for his sacred permission, he relented and allowed Scherer to read the minutes from the July 12th meeting that described Zuckerman’s amendment.

Analysis:

We knew the fix was in — that all the events of August 15th were being orchestrated by the shadow government — when Danielson tried to block the public from merely hearing the words read aloud.

Words. Just words. The truth. The public isn’t allowed to hear the truth. It might confuse them. It could destabilize the shadow government.

Zuckerman’s amendment — adopted by a majority of the council July 12th — is so dangerous and damaging to their cabal, the public wasn’t even going to be allowed to hear the words.

RROO §37:18 reads: “Whenever the motion to Reconsider is taken up, it is debatable if the motion proposed to be reconsidered is debatable, and debate can go into the merits of the question proposed to be reconsidered, as noted in Standard Characteristic 5.”

Zuckerman was right. He had in effect called a second point of order. But sadly, the point of order was “well taken” not because Parnell Jr. consulted RROO as we did here, but rather because he believed it would end up serving their long game to get around the 90-unit limit. Read his answer carefully:

Parnell Jr.: “But again, her motion is to reconsider that based on new information. Those are the only grounds you can file a motion to reconsider. You can’t just say I changed my mind two weeks later. It’s based on the new information that’s been received. That’s been the motion that’s made, seconded and is being discussed now. So again, I think it’s a good idea to find that original … amendment to the application, because you’re contemplating going back to what the applicant originally said, versus what the amendment y’all did the first time, or some other new amendment that may pass tonight.”

We peasants humbly thank Parnell Jr. for his magnanimous act of allowing us to hear words from the minutes of a meeting subject to Louisiana’s Open Meetings Law read aloud.

And we feel obligated to correct the record here, seeing that Parnell Jr. opened the door so widely.

This whole notion that the only way you can “reconsider” under Robert’s Rules is if there is some “new information” is poppycock.

It is a reason you can reconsider, but not the only reason you can reconsider.

“Those are the only grounds you can file a motion to reconsider,” he said.

RROO §37:1 reads: “The purpose of reconsidering a vote is to permit correction of hasty, ill-advised, or erroneous action, or to take into account added information or a changed situation that has developed since the taking of the vote.”

So really, the council could reconsider a previous action for whatever reason they want — not just “new information” — as long as it is within the time limitations that Parnell Jr. repeatedly ignored. Pretty much anything can fit into “ill-advised” if you are one of the affirmative swing votes who had changed their mind.

Parnell Jr. started repeating this “new information” mantra during the meeting, and soon other council members started repeating it too, but it was not based in rules that govern the motion to reconsider.

So where did he get it from?

Under §6:25 and §6:26, which is sort of like the table of contents for motions “that bring a question again before the assembly,” you will find: “pull from the table,” “rescind,” “amend something previously adopted,” “discharge to committee,” and last but not least “reconsider,” each with a brief summary of what they are with pointers to their respective detail sections.

But §6:26 does not set the rules for those items. The rules for “reconsider” are found at §37. This summary list at §6:26 is the only mention of the term “new information” in the entire body of RROO and it is non-binding, but the details found at §37 are binding.

City attorney forced to concede after Zuckerman pressed another point of order

And then about 10 minutes later, the absurd turned into insanity, when Zuckerman essentially called a third point of order:

Video 2

27:44

Zuckerman: “I just heard an interpretation from you to say, well, the business of the council, this overall issue hasn’t been concluded, … I’d like somebody to just read that out of Robert’s Rules, whether it’s the parliamentarian or the city attorney.”

District III Councilwoman Jill McGuire: “And we did vote on the amendment.” [Parnell Jr. had minutes earlier said, “The amendments have not been voted on finally.”]

Parnell Jr.: “But the motion to reconsider was brought based on new information which is the only grounds it can be brought.”

Zuckerman: “I’m questioning your interpretation of whether it can be brought several meetings later after it’s been voted on. I’d just like somebody to read that.”

Parnell Jr.: “There’s also motion to amend something previously amended, so I mean, there’s different options. Uhm. We feel it’s proper.”

Person in Audience: “Could somebody read the rules, please?”

Zuckerman: “I’m just asking for somebody to read the rule.”

Analysis:

He could not answer the question. When given the benefit of the doubt and asked to show where — four times by Zuckerman and once by some lady in the audience — he could not even point to a general section or chapter of RROO.

Instead, he ominously let everyone know that they — this shadow government — have other “options” that they are willing to use in order to remove the 90-unit limit and to get this project pushed through. It was a reminder that they, this cabal, are the ones in charge, not us.

Parnell Jr. made another peculiar statement, by saying that the amendments weren’t really adopted yet, prompting the earlier retort from District III Councilwoman Jill McGuire.

So we finally ended up getting a second recess during which members of the audience were treated to several scrums of council members, developers, city officials, lawyers and members of the public who also happened to be lawyers.

The result, as we all know by now, was Danielson kinda-sorta acknowledging — without actually saying the words — that Zuckerman’s third point of order was also “well taken.” Zuckerman was three for three, even if Danielson refused to admit it.

What’s next?

At least some good came from Parnell Jr.’s performance that night. He unwittingly telegraphed the cabal’s next move: “There’s also motion to amend something previously amended [perhaps he meant ‘adopted’], so I mean, there’s different options. Uhm. We feel it’s proper.”

Hoffman et al are not likely to just go away and surrender the issue even though they’ve been backed into a corner. They may very well try what Parnell Jr. signaled with his “different options” remark.

In RROO, motion to “Rescind” or motion to “Amend Something Previously Adopted” found at §35 in RROO could very well be their last attempt to strike the 90-unit amendment using actual rules.

These motions allow one to either strike text from a previously adopted main motion or modify text of a previously adopted main motion.

§35:2: “[Rescind and Amend Something Previously Adopted] Can be applied to anything (e.g., bylaw, rule, policy, decision, or choice) which has continuing force and effect and which was made or created at any time or times as the result of the adoption of one or more main motions.”

Notice the words “main motion.” Amendments are “subsidiary motions” according to §12:1 and nothing more, therefore §35 should not apply.

According to the rules, such a motion would be ruled — or should be ruled — out of order.

But based on what we’ve seen during this process, there is no telling what this bunch involved in the cabal will do.

Sucette Harbor must be approved at all costs.

Let’s pray that Zuckerman and McGuire have their copies or RROO on-hand at the next meeting. Better yet, maybe they should hire attorneys to attend the meetings with them.

Don’t forget your tin foil hats.

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Admit the people have a right to know who is being considered

Should be transparent, open from start to finish

Editorial

The Planning & Zoning Commission is a big deal to a lot of people, and rightfully so. Surely the City knows this by now, yet they seem to continue to struggle with openness, transparency, and consistency when it comes to the selection process.

City officials — both elected and appointed — have claimed in the past that the reason the process here in Mandeville is so guarded is in an effort to protect the privacy of the applicants. This claim comes despite them being well aware that the Louisiana Public Records law very clearly says that most of the information concerning such applicants is public and must be made available.

Of course, there are those who claim the real reason the process is so secretive here is that elected officials generally would rather avoid the inevitable criticism over who they do not pick.

The Louisiana Public Records Law, or Title 44, specifically addresses these applicants. R.S. 44:12.1 (A) reads:

“The name of each applicant for a public position of authority or a public position with policymaking duties, the qualifications of such an applicant related to such position, and any relevant employment history or experience of such an applicant shall be available for public inspection, examination, copying, or reproduction as provided in Part II of this Chapter.”

This does not say the City has to release copies of the resumes or whatever documents an applicant may have mailed, emailed or faxed to the City. While such documents could be obtained via a public records request — such as the one made by Mandeville Daily August 11th, Section 12.1 (A) is really only directing the City to make certain information available. There is a difference.

Mandeville Daily believes that the requirements of R.S. 44:12.1 (A) could have been satisfied — as far as we are concerned — by publishing a complete list of applicants, containing the information required by law, specifically: the name of each applicant, their qualifications for the position, and their relevant employment history.

It would have been that simple. Mandeville Daily would have felt no need to exercise its right to submit a public records request. People are naturally going to be suspicious of their government — as they should be — when that government, either by accident or by intention, creates the appearance of impropriety.

So the solution to this problem is really very simple:

1) Acknowledge that the people — the voters — have an inherent right to observe this process from start to finish, as opposed to how it is now, where it is simply announced at a meeting that we have a new Planning & Zoning appointee-designate whom the people may know little or nothing about.

2) Set up a form on the City’s website for people to submit their applications for the Planning & Zoning Commission, while making them aware which parts of their information will be made public in accordance with the applicable state law (R.S. 44:12.1). Once the application period closes, all the applicants’ information which is covered by law will immediately be viewable by the public online, in one nice, consistent list where each application is treated equally and fairly in the eyes of the public.

Boom. Done.

This stuff with the Cressy appointment was an unforced error.

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1984 state act says City Council has final say after Civil Service Board signs off

Council first votes to approve raise then separate vote to fund it

Council ‘no’ vote does not mean ‘unfunded mandate’

Contradicts board member’s statements from July 18th meeting

Editorial

Updated 8/7/2023 at 6:41 a.m. to include a reference to the first COLA from one year ago.

Does the Municipal Police Employees Civil Service Board have the authority to set police pay and then leave the City Council obligated to fund it, a notion we have been led to believe for years?

The presumption of absolute authority

During the July 18th joint Civil Service Board and City Council meeting, longtime board member Jack B. McGuire reminded everyone: “So this board has the authority to set the salaries of the police officers who are covered by the police system and that is our sole authority subject to funding by the City Council.”

McGuire then dropped a not-so-subtle hint to the City Council members in attendance about what could happen if they didn’t fund the request. He recounted the events of four years earlier when the Civil Service Board was asking for a 15-percent across-the-board increase but the City Council at that time initially only wanted to grant 3.5 percent.

“But thanks to a large number of city employees and police officers who attended some meetings then, the council eventually adopted 14.2 percent, which probably is the highest annual raise that we’ve ever had and that was made the same for non-employees and municipal employees,” McGuire said.

The joint meeting came about because this City Council put into law that a cost-of-living adjustment (COLA) would be proposed in the Mayor’s annual budget. This was on the heels of what many saw as a generous yet much-needed pay scale overhaul in 2022, where most city employees saw 10- to 40-percent raises, followed by the first annual COLA of 5.9-percent last year.

The peculiar story behind Act 84-164

But does the Civil Service Board have the authority to unilaterally set police pay and then if the City Council doesn’t fund it, it becomes an unfunded mandate?

The answer may be unsettling to some, but the evidence supporting the case we are about to make has been right under our noses the entire time. Here is the real story:

Mandeville was granted a special carveout of sorts in 1984 by the Louisiana State Legislature when it passed Act 84-164, creating a separate municipal police civil service board for Mandeville. The legislation describes the board’s responsibilities and duties, how they are appointed, and so on. It was amended in 2009 and again in 2017, mostly to change who appoints the police chief, how the board members themselves are appointed, and how the personnel director is hired.

McGuire referred to this act as if it were sacrosanct legislation:

“One [civil service system] for police was enacted by municipal ordinance of the board of alderman [which preceded the City Council form of government Mandeville now has] and was then to ensure that a future board of alderman meeting could not by a majority of vote repeal it, enshrined it in a state legislative act. So the police system is actually regulated by a state act. The only change that can be made in that is if you change the state act,” he told the council members in attendance that night.

But according to a copy of Louisiana Revised Statutes Act 84-164 obtained from the Law Library of Louisiana — as amended by Acts 09-418 and 17-83 — the personnel director, who is indirectly appointed by the Civil Service Board itself, creates the compensation plan which must be approved by the Civil Service Board after a public hearing, and then — you guessed it — also approved by the Mandeville City Council.

The text in Section 3 which lists the duties of the personnel director reads: “To develop and to administer a compensation plan for all positions in the classified civil service. Such compensation plan shall be effective only upon approval by the (Civil Service) board after public hearing thereon and approval by the municipal governing authority [the City Council].”

It is important to note that because Section 3 mentions that a duty of the Civil Service Board is to approve the compensation plan, that same duty is subsequently repeated under Section 4 which lists all the duties of the board. But this in no way means that only the Civil Service Board approves the compensation plan.

Talk of unfunded mandates

Perhaps this is what has led to a misunderstanding by some over the years. If one were to read or quote only Section 4, they might be inclined to misinterpret the entire act as saying the Civil Service board alone sets the pay scale. This is clearly not the case.

Up until this point, more than one city official has thrown around the term “unfunded mandate” as if the compensation plan for police would magically go into effect without an ordinance once the Civil Service Board approves it from the personnel director.

But as we can see now, this is clearly not what Act 84-164, Section 3 B(2) does. In fact, we only need to go as far back as February 2022 to prove it.

Council has always had right to just say ‘no’

The way city government works is, anytime they do something that requires spending money, not only do they have to pass an ordinance authorizing the thing they want to do, but then they have to adopt a second ordinance, called a budget adjustment, that gives them the money to do the thing they just approved. (Or they simply include the money in the next annual budget and wait until then to do the thing they want to do.)

This is exactly how the pay scale overhaul of February 2022 was done. The police raises were enacted by Ordinance 22-02. And then, at the very same council meeting, the money that funded those raises was approved in budget adjustment Ordinance 22-04.

But la pièce de résistance can be found in the wording of Ordinance 22-02:

Notice the first and fifth “Whereas” clauses. These make our case.

Because Act 84-164 is specifically cited means the City is, and always has been, very aware of the role the Civil Service Board plays, and while that role is significant, it is still very limited. By the way, the exact same language was used in the first COLA adopted and funded roughly one year ago, Ordinance 22-24.

In other words, the City Council has to first approve the pay scale change in one piece of legislation, and then, in a completely separate act, they must approve to fund it. So it actually takes two different votes by the City Council to enact one pay scale change.

The only way it could ever become an unfunded mandate would be if the City Council were to vote for the pay scale change ordinance but then — for some weird reason — vote against the budget adjustment ordinance.

If what McGuire is saying were true, then the City Council wouldn’t have needed Ordinances 22-02 (pay scale overhaul) or 22-24 (first COLA); the raises would have simply become the law after the Civil Service Board approved them, leaving the City Council only a perfunctory duty in adopting budget adjustments for each.

But that’s not what the Act 84-164 says, and of course, that’s not what happened in 2022, or any other time a pay scale change has happened.

Act 84-164 gave Civil Service Board seat at the table

The only material thing Act 84-164 did when it comes to the police compensation plan was it ensured the Civil Service Board a role in negotiating police compensation plans.

Sure, it’s possible they could get a lone council member to introduce an ordinance without full council support, but it would simply fail, and there would be no raises, and there definitely would be no unfunded mandate.

This brings us back to the current situation and the debate over the proposed 5.8-percent COLA recommended by the Civil Service Board. Mayor Clay Madden had proposed a 2.7-percent COLA. What will happen August 7th when the two parties meet again?

Mandeville Daily has a strong suspicion they will come to an agreement on a new number. They’ll negotiate, just as Act 84-164 really intended they do.

The complete text of Louisiana Revised Statutes Act 84-164 — as amended by Acts 09-418 and 17-83 — can be downloaded here.

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Related Stories:
Mandeville police, workers get historic raises in pay-scale overhaul (2/12/2022)
Mandeville’s lowest paid get less than market minimums (11/18/2021)
OPINION | Goodwill COLA gesture exposes delicate relationship with Civil Service Board

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Council gets second joint meeting August 7th

Some on council soften, recant support for higher COLA at recent budget meeting

Who really said what at the first joint Civil Service meeting?

Editorial

No good deed goes unpunished.

What started out as a noble gesture to the hard-working employees of the City of Mandeville — after decades where pay scale adjustments were few and far between — the City Council decided to put into law that a cost-of-living adjustment (COLA) would be part of the Mayor’s annually proposed budget.

This was on the heels of what many saw as a generous yet much-needed pay scale overhaul in 2022, where most city employees saw significant raises, which also baked in an annual COLA moving forward to be based on the Social Security Administration’s annual number. No one ever imagined that we’d see the 8.7 number that was announced this year due to inflation during the Biden administration. The Mandeville COLA mandate was later amended to give both the Municipal Employees Civil Service Board (MECSB) as well as the City more flexibility in negotiating a COLA at a joint meeting.

The only problem is, what happens when the two parties are seemingly a mile apart on their numbers?

That’s what we’re seeing play out now.

5.8 percent versus 2.7 percent

The Civil Service Board returned a recommendation of a 5.8-percent COLA for the upcoming fiscal year, but Mayor Clay Madden proposed only 2.7 percent, which some on the council seem fine with, by the way.

Others on the council, like Councilman at Large Rick Danielson and District II Councilman Dr. Skelly Kreller, sent mixed signals, advocating 5-percent and 4.5-percent COLAs respectively during the July 18th joint Civil Service Board meeting, but then during later City Council meetings they seemed to back off those prior statements made in front of the Civil Service Board members and moved toward advocating a second joint Civil Service Board meeting.

To be fair, Danielson did take care to surgically qualify his recommendation at the joint meeting, saying “but that’s going to be a budgeting thing.”

Kreller, however, did such an about-face during the special budget meeting just eight days later on July 26th — suggesting a pay freeze for 2024, cutting City-paid retirement system contributions, as well as a pay increase for the City Council — that Councilman at Large Jason Zuckerman expressed frustration at the contradiction.

As for Zuckerman, he had deferred offering a specific number during the July 18th joint Civil Service Board meeting, only saying that he wanted to wait until the council moved deeper into the budget review process, which is still going on as of this posting.

Mandeville Daily submitted a public records request for and received the audio recording of the July 18th joint Civil Service Board meeting. A transcript of key exchanges from that meeting as well as the City Council special budget meeting July 26th can be found at the end of this piece.

Overshooting the mark

It was during the July 26th special budget meeting that a consensus of resistance to the Civil Service Board’s 5.8 number began to materialize, not just from Kreller’s reversal.

Danielson, Zuckerman, Kreller, District III Councilwoman Jill McGuire, District I Councilwoman Rebecca Bush… they all peppered Finance Director Kathleen Sides with questions and scenarios during the meeting.

Zuckerman warned of the risk of “overshooting” the number by going too high, especially considering that the pay scale overhaul of 2022 — which established and paid a 5.9-percent COLA that first year after the new pay scale — was less than 18 months ago.

Most City of Mandeville employees, including police, saw anywhere between 10 and 40-percent raises, even without that first COLA of 5.9 percent.

Zuckerman drummed up enough support from his fellow council members at the July 27th regular meeting to ask the Civil Service Board if they’d be willing to meet to reconsider the COLA.

And now it would appear that Zuckerman has been granted his request with the second joint meeting scheduled for August 7th at 6 p.m.

The City has about $48.9 million in the bank, so to speak, (excluding enterprise fund) and even with a 5.8-percent COLA is projected to continue a trend of surpluses in the millions.

But Zuckerman and others on the council expressed that they are not worried about this year, per se, but rather what could happen over the next decade.

A COLA is not the same thing as a one-time bonus which would be based on how well the City did just this year. The COLA is a percentage and it is permanently added to an employee’s pay rate which then becomes their new pay rate.

When Zuckerman says they don’t want to “overshoot the mark” he is likely referring to the effects of payroll growth outpacing revenue growth and compensation for certain positions moving beyond their real-world marketplace valuations.

Not-so-subtle hint

What further complicates things is the unique relationship that Mandeville’s Civil Service Board has with the City of Mandeville compared to other cities in Louisiana. According to longtime Municipal Employees Civil Service Board member Jack B. McGuire, they have the authority to outright set the salaries for police, even though the City Council still has to vote to fund it.

During the July 18th joint Civil Service Board meeting he said, “So this board has the authority to set the salaries of the police officers who are covered by the police system and that is our sole authority subject to funding by the city council.”

McGuire then dropped a not-so-subtle hint to the City Council members in attendance about what could happen if they didn’t fund the request. He recounted the events of four years earlier when the Civil Service Board was asking for a 15-percent across-the-board increase when the City Council at that time initially only wanted to grant 3.5 percent.

“But thanks to a large number of city employees and police officers who attended some meetings then, the council eventually adopted 14.2 percent, which probably is the highest annual raise that we’ve ever had and that was made the same for non-employees and municipal employees,” McGuire said.

At the July 26th City Council special budget meeting, when council members asked what would happen if they refuse to fund the Civil Service Board’s 5.8-percent request, Human Resources Director Joanna Anderson — who is hired by the Mandeville Personnel Committee, which in turn is appointed by the Civil Service Board — echoed McGuire’s sentiment with only two words, “unfunded mandate.”

Apparently, the Louisiana Legislature saw fit to create an exception for Mandeville in 1984 when it comes to civil service boards. With Act 164, it supposedly granted the Mandeville Civil Service Board the authority to set police pay, but not regular civil service pay. There have been other acts by the Legislature in the intervening years to amend the original act.

As of this posting, Mandeville Daily has requested the full text and an opinion of Act 84-164 from multiple state sources, including the Law Library of Louisiana.

And none of the city officials in attendance at the City Council meeting that night could expound on the “unfunded mandate” explanation. Sides deferred to the legal department, which was not represented at the meeting.

Can the Civil Service Board give themselves raises to whatever they want and the City Council simply must fund it? Or… will the board be willing to come to an agreement August 7th on a COLA that the City Council feels more comfortable with?

We shall see August 7th at 6 p.m.

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Pull quotes:

Joint Civil Service Board meeting

July 18, 2023

Councilman at Large Rick Danielson:

29:48

“(O)ur number one asset is our employees, period. And when we did the salary survey, we made a major investment, we bit the bullet to do a catch-up that had not been done in a long time. What can we afford? What can we not afford?

“Me personally, I feel that 2.7 is too low. What’s the appropriate number? If I was going to pick a number, I’d say at least 5 percent, but that’s going to be a budgeting thing. That’s how I feel.

“I don’t know the perfect number, but I do think that 2.7 is too low.”

District II Councilman Dr. Skelly Kreller:

32:45

“The other thing too, and I agree with, um, Mr. Danielson, you know, when I was crunching the numbers, I thought we should have… I don’t think the city can afford an 8.7, but… the 2.7 figure is low, and I think we should be in the middle, and my number was about 4.5…

“Because what I think we need to consider is, along with that, the COLA, if it’s 4.5, and we give merit raise, OK, and let’s say this individual gets a 4… so that’s 8.7. That’s a nice number. Coming from a 2.7 and adding 4, that’s really, you know, I think kind of chintzy. So I would um, I’d like to meet little bit in the middle.”

Councilman at Large Jason Zuckerman:

48:00

“We want to pay highly competitive salaries and very good compensation packages so that we can retain, we can attract and retain.

“For me it comes down to what can we do and what’s reasonable. We’re just now getting into the budget process. … So I’m not ready to throw out a number yet that I can agree to. I think for me I need to get through much more of the budget process to decide what can we do.

“Certainly I’d like to do as much as we can. And I would certainly put it above other priorities to do as much as we can for our employees.”

District I Councilwoman Rebecca Bush: (did not speak)

District III Councilwoman Jill McGuire: (did not attend)

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City Council special budget meeting

July 26, 2023

Zuckerman attempts to gauge support for COLA

41:05

Zuckerman: “So those are my thought’s on it. I know Dr. Kreller, you were at the meeting, and Mr. Danielson, you were at the meeting, were pushing for a higher COLA than what was being presented [the 2.7 in Madden’s budget].”

41:18

Kreller: “I’m gonna correct that. I was not pushing for a higher COLA. What I was listening to was, Mr. McGuire wanted it much higher than the 5.8 and what Brian Burke said and what they decided was, let’s get an average, and they asked us. And so my number 4.9* but they, you know, recommended 5.8, and so that’s where we are. But… a recommendation to us. Now, at that point, I didn’t have the budget in my hand, and so we’re going to have to take all that into consideration. Uh, 5.8, 5.8, and this was Kathleen’s number, it would affect $698,000. And 2.7 is $325,000. Um. So I mean that’s a significant change. I’m open to anything. Personally, I think our employees make good money… with the merit raise and with their package, and a COLA 2.7, or 3.5, whatever it is, I think they’re making a real nice, nice salary, and I mean that’s competitive.”

Zuckerman: “I hear ya, and I agree with a lot of that… I do wish that you would have verbalized that at the Civil Service joint meeting. Because what I heard at the joint Civil Service meeting was, you were recommending a 4.9-percent* COLA and you were good with that, when they came back to us all and asked so if 4.9* percent is, just say, that’s fine, I think that’s overshooting the mark. I think we need to stay conservative with it considering everything we’ve done in the last 18 months, but 4.9* is what came out of Dr. Kreller at the meeting. The recommendation from the Civil Service board was 5.8, um, we have to decide, like you said, we have to decide what we’re going to do.”

Kreller: “Quite frankly I’m not sure where you’re going with that but I stand, you’re right, I said 4.9*. I was trying to break it, get an an average there because I knew what they were doing.

Zuckerman: “I’m just trying to figure out, trying to move the discussion along and figure out where everybody’s at on what they think the COLA should be, that’s all.”

*Kreller had actually proposed a 4.5-percent COLA at the July 18th joint Civil Service meeting and not the 4.9 percent that Kreller first mentioned in this exchange at the July 26th meeting. It would appear that once Kreller mentioned 4.9, both he and Zuckerman kept referring to that number instead of what Kreller had actually said.

Kreller floats salary freeze for 2024

1:03:05

Kreller: “With the salary survey we brought everybody up and they’re getting paid very nicely and now with this high COLA, now I’m talking about the 5.8, OK, let’s just say that. Can we think about a possible salary freeze for 2024? And put a freeze on the salaries?”

Joanna Anderson, Human Resources Director: “We have civil service rules that talk about merit increases and words they use are ‘shall.’ It’d be pretty hard to get around the merit increases.”

Bush: “I’m not sure I’m conformable with that.” (chuckles)

Kreller: “Several years ago, if I’m not mistaking, they froze the salaries in the City of Mandeville.”

Danielson: “I think it was only for the directors.”

Kreller: “It was the directors? OK. So… it seems like that’s a possibility.”

Bush: “Look, the good will we have attained in the past year, you just, that all goes down the drain.”

Kreller: “You think the good will that we’ve raised all these salaries? … For the directors. That level.”

Bush: “I mean I think you have to … continue to strive to be an employer of choice. I want to attract top directors as well.”

Kreller: “I’m just throwing this out. I ran a business for 38 years and I assure you, some of these increases, I would have never done that, because I could not even afford that. And we are getting to a point here we need to consider down the line.”

Kreller asks about a pay raise for council members

1:38:05

Kreller: “I do have one item. On page 7. The council meeting fees. I just noticed. Those have been the same.”

Danielson: “That’s your pay.”

Kreller: “I know it is. That’s where I’m going. OK? I’m thinking about that you know as a retiree. You know, maybe we should adjust that a little bit.”

McGuire: “Have fun with that one, Dr. Kreller. You’re on an island on your own, my friend.”

Kathleen Sides, Finance Director: “I think the ordinance says you can adjust it for the next council.”

Kreller: “I would rather do it, you know, prior to an election.”

Danielson: “Although it did actually increase about four years ago. It was $60,000 and went to $72,000 because it was $1,000 a month and it went to $1,200.”

Kreller suggests asking employees to start paying city-funded retirement

1:52:08

Kreller: “We have got to think about not paying the 100 percent… The employees are going to have to participate… That’s my feeling, OK. Because it is absolutely, it cannot be sustained. And I don’t think it’s going to go five years.”

1:52:30

Anderson: “So the city of Covington felt that way for a very long time and recently they have started paying the employee portion of retirement, and it was to retain their employees and to attract the best of the best. And they’re doing a good job since they’ve done that.”

Kreller: “But they just did that, not too long ago.”

Anderson: “They did, a few years ago.”

Kreller: “But in the private sector, the employee pays something. That’s it, you know. That’s how you survive as a business owner.”

1:52:10

Zuckerman: “I don’t think you can make a general statement like that… I just think you have to look at the total package. What your total compensation is… I think what’s important is the total compensation. If pay is less, benefits might be higher. If pay is high and you gotta pay your own benefits, that’s gotta be taken into account… People do those calculations… they do that math. They see what the value of benefits is.”

Kreller: “The cards are gonna come falling down and we’re going to have to do something drastic.”

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Understanding the differences between B-1 and B-2 zoning districts

By Ernest A. Burguières

July 31, 2023

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Ernest A. Burguières is a Mandeville attorney who formerly served as District III Councilman. Mandeville Daily is honored to publish Mr. Burguières’ column with permission which is a combined reporting of the goings on in Mandeville government with his personal commentary.

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I was listening to Larry Grundman and Councilman Jason Zuckerman’s comments about the application of the B-2 zoning designation in the Sucette case. What follows was inspired by them.

Something struck me at the last Council Sucette meeting… Director of Planning and Development Cara Bartholomew stated that with Sucette, it was the applicant that selected the use that it wanted to apply to their project. This in turn caused Planning to identify the zoning designation that would allow these uses.

I guess their thinking was the since planned development is theoretically open with no restrictions they could pick any use that they wanted.

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Editor’s Note:

There are two zoning districts that could come into play here:

• B-1 Neighborhood Business District: Businesses that are in a typical neighborhood.
• B-2 Highway Business District: Businesses that are next to or near a highway or major thoroughfare.

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What I came to realize from Cara’s comments is that it’s not necessarily the zoning classification they requested, but the uses they requested that could only fall into the classification B-2 for those areas of the property. Since the Planned District classification provides that the development regulations for the zoning classification under which those proposed uses are allowed as a “baseline” to consider departures from those regulations, one must first make the leap to agree that proposed uses under that zoning regulation (in this case B-2, Highway Commercial) are appropriate for that site. They are not.

I don’t recall any real discussion of this particular issue. The applicant in effect gets to select the zoning that they would like to apply and the city must accommodate?

Understanding what B-2 means

The B-2 zoning rules are found in 7.5 of the CLURO:

7.5. – BASE DISTRICT REGULATIONS BY ZONING DISTRICTS.

The regulations of this Article identify the purpose of each of the created zoning districts and shall be considered the minimum requirements, in addition to all other applicable regulations of this Comprehensive Land Use Regulations Ordinance or other laws of the City or state as provided, for the use and development of all land within the separate zoning districts in conjunction with the Table of Permitted Uses By Zoning District included in this Article.

7.5.9.5. Special B-2 Highway Business District Criteria.

1. Access. B-2 districts shall be located on lots with street frontage on major arterial or collector streets only and shall not require travel through existing or proposed residential districts to access the B-2 district.

Additionally, I believe B2 provides for the largest limit on a building, 100,000 square feet, more like what you see in the Rouse’s area or Whole Foods area. It should be noted that at 108,000 square feet the Sucette hotel is bigger than permitted even in B2.

Then I looked at the Planned Development regulations. When you drill down on the language certain things pop up.

7.5.15.1. Purpose of the Planned District.

Planned District applications shall contain a statement by the developer as to how the submitted plan departs from the existing requirements of this Land Use Regulations Ordinance and any other regulations applicable to the proposed use or uses for the district in which the proposed use could be established of right and how each departure improves what otherwise would be required under these regulations.

Have we heard how the Sucette departures improves what otherwise would be required under these regulations? I think I will have to check my notes, I would say, no.

7.5.15.2. Planned District Permitted Uses.

The uses permitted in this zoning district, including signage, shall be in accordance with those uses listed under this district in the Table of Permitted Uses By Zoning District found at the end of this Article and shall be subject to all applicable provisions of this Land Use Regulations Ordinance including any supplemental or special use criteria provided in Article 8 and the Sign Code in Article 10.

7.5.15.4. Flexible Site Planning.

When considering a Planned District application, the unique nature of each proposal may require, under proper circumstances, the departure from the strict enforcement of certain present codes and ordinances

And then under Commercial Uses:

B-2 Highway Business District, provided, however, that commercial uses designated on a site plan providing for a mix of commercial uses and residential uses shall comply with the requirements of the B-1 Neighborhood Business District.

B-1 should be used for Sucette

What does all this mean?

This looks like Sucette can use B-2 Highway Business District, however, if commercial uses designated on a site plan providing for a mix of commercial uses and residential uses then it shall comply with the requirements of the B-1 Neighborhood Business District.

Whoa!

Does that mean that we are not supposed to use a B-2 highway Business District mentality when there are a mix of commercial and residential and then you must use the B-1 rules instead?

This is kind of consistent with Rule 7.5.9.5. Special B-2 Highway Business District Criteria wherein B-2 districts shall be located on lots with street frontage on major arterial or collector streets only and shall not require travel through existing or proposed residential districts to access the B-2 district.

If Sucette has a mix of commercial and residential, and it is not located on a major arterial or collector street and access would require travel through existing or proposed residential districts to access the B-2 district, then it must be relegated to a B-1 zoning designation analysis.

If Sucette is relegated to a B-1 zoning designation analysis then the maximum size building would be 15,000 square feet, the same as in the B-3 area of old Mandeville. It is almost like there was a consistency of thought to not dump a huge departure in size, scale and density into a residential neighborhood. Who would have thought?

Sucette appears to have articulated uses to Planning that could be satisfied by B-2, highway business zoning. The problem with highway business is that it contemplates a business on a highway and therefore has much larger limits on the size of the uses and access. A business on a highway would be like West Causeway Approach, Hwy. 22, Causeway Blvd. and really East Causeway Approach before it joins Hwy. 190. A highway business will need more space for vehicles, especially large commercial vehicles, to routinely come in and out. Higher traffic is expected. And,… there is a limitation on B2 that shall be located on lots with street frontage on major arterial or collector streets only and shall not require travel through existing or proposed residential districts to access the B-2 district. Was this limitation considered? Even in the no rules arena of “Planned Development” was it contemplated that Sucette would not be on a major highway? Was it also contemplated that access would have to be through existing (unusually narrow) residential streets? Apparently not.

When you try to shoehorn a 100,000+ square foot structure into a residential area of narrow streets you have obvious density, compatibility and scale problems. Is this what was contemplated by the Mandeville CLURO? Is this what was contemplated by the Comprehensive Plan? Is this what was contemplated by the Planned Development idea? It seems to go against everything else in the CLURO about small town atmosphere, at least in our old town. An interpretation that fosters this B-2 development into a residential area is a perversion of the rule and concept. Are we talking strict enforcement or common sense of trying to put a square peg in a round hole?

The real problem

I realized that in reality, what’s causing all of the heartache is density, scale, proximity to residential and access to the site.

Sucette is proposing uses with development regulations for properties that are meant to be on a major artery (highway commercial) with truck access, no residential adjacency, etc. On top of that, they are requesting additional departures…increase in area, increase height, reductions in parking, etc. Unfortunately, they ignored the safety valve of access and proximity to residential areas. Plus, they quickly, and quietly, with virtually no discussion, seem to be on the verge of dispensing with five (5) mature (centuries old) live oak trees with no discussion.

The whole issue seems to me to be caused by requesting (demanding?) uses that can only be shoe-horned into B2 Highway Commercial zoning on that site and applying Highway Commercial site development criteria. This is viewing the rules through a tunnel.

If this is a “no rules football” scenario then there is no reason why a 30-story tower or a creosote plant could not be built on this 15 acres. The rules were not intended to be perverted by half-clever sophistry that might appear to allow such an aberration. Sucette is employing a perverted interpretation of the rules that absolutely ignores the context of Mandeville. and at the same time ignoring the common sense safety valve of access and proximity to residential neighborhoods. If this project were in Destin or Panama City, Florida they would never try to located it in an older, narrow area. They would locate it near the highway for visibility and access, something they do not have at Sucette Harbor.

It is useful to think of outlandish applications because it helps to drive home the point that if Planning believes that they have no say so except that once uses have been identified (by the applicant) they must go with the zoning designation that (they believe) fits the uses. If this is the case then the tail is wagging the dog. There is no place in the CLURO that anyone envisioned that a very dense, very tall, over-developed application could be placed right in the middle of a narrow residential area. I even doubt that such a dense proposal could fit on West Causeway Approach or Causeway Blvd., both serviced by four lane highways with a median.

If it were this simple why couldn’t anyone request a zoning change to planned development multi use? What is the argument against this? According to the Director of Planning there is none. How can that be? Doesn’t that lose sight of the big picture of what Mandeville is? This is not Destin or Panama City, and if it were, it would never be located on narrow back streets.

Sucette made comparisons to event centers, restaurants and B&B’s in the B-3 district. The B-3 designation is more like a B-1 designation where the absolute size of a structure is limited to 15,000 square feet. The Sucette hotel is 108,000 square feet. This was never intended in the big picture of Mandeville building and zoning regulations. It is the antithesis of what was intended. There is no comparison.

Is the situation we are in the result of some clever lawyer’s sophistry?

I’m simply asking, why? Why would we not first make the judgment as to whether or not B-2 Highway Commercial Uses are even appropriate for that site, rather than just say “well those are the uses the applicant proposed so we’re using that as a baseline as long as they comply with those – box checked,” or “here’s the minor deviation from those B-2 development standards that they propose.”

The intent of the CLURO

Sucette should at least be reviewed under the B-1 guidelines.

When you do this it is obvious what the CLURO was trying to do is not create the “high volume” highway businesses that would need to attract a large volume of customers that would come and go at the same time and therefore could overwhelm narrow neighborhood roads and keep those businesses instead at or adjacent to highways like strip shopping centers on Florida Ave. (Highway 190).

The CLURO certainly didn’t contemplate such 100,000-plus-square-foot commercial structures deeply imbedded on a peninsula, isolated by a single access point from/to a two-way residential street like Monroe and then on to unusually narrow streets, Antibes West and East in the middle of residential zoning and co-located with residential units. Hello?

The Council looked (subconsciously at first, then openly) at CLURO to give guidance on the apartments density question and should do the same for the commercial aspects. When they do, they will see the departure requested is not 9,000 square feet but 90,000-plus square feet.

The Director of Planning keeps telling us: Developers can put most any uses in a multiple use zone.

But this is not an absolute. What they should say is that they could put in any use that fits in the application process.

The Planning Department is abdicating their role as gatekeeper and protector of Old Mandeville.

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Kreller amendments will need to be corrected

Editorial

Something’s not quite right when it comes to the wording of the Sucette Harbor ordinance after recent amendments were added in an attempt to join together parcels D and U.

Developers had once hoped to build a sprawling hotel, events center, adult living apartments, and marina on Mandeville’s western lakefront on land donated to the LSU Health Foundation by Al Copeland Jr.

The proposal has run into staunch opposition by some on the council, who passed an amendment cutting the number of apartments roughly in half at a special meeting July 12th. This led to acting Council Chairman Councilman at Large Rick Danielson pumping the brakes on further amendments at the next meeting July 24th when the developer floated the idea of not even building the new marina if the apartment limit stays at 90 units.

Aside from all this fuss, District II Councilman Dr. Skelly Kreller’s amendments July 12th, attempting to join Parcels D and U together after developer Woodward Interests agreed to the move at the July 5th meeting, have created a bit of a technical mess in the wording of Ordinance 23-16.

Kreller used “Whereas” clauses to require or direct action by the City or Planning and Zoning Commission. A “Whereas” clause should only explain a motivation behind an ordinance or cite what gives the City the authority or reason for doing what’s in the ordinance.

Mandeville Daily believes the ordinance has the following problems:

So all in all, Ordinance 23-16 is one hot mess. Maybe things will get cleaned up at the next scheduled special meeting August 15th. But then again, maybe they won’t.

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Danielson halted new amendments and conditions

Effort to ‘filter’ which amendments come to a vote

Previously wanted city attorney, planning director to approve amendments prior to meeting

Afforded developer chance to deliver marina ultimatum to Mariner’s Village residents

Updated July 27, 2023, at 5:40 a.m.: Cleans up language for clarity; Adds artwork for agendas from July 12th and July 24th.

Editorial

The surprise change of format at Monday night’s special meeting (July 24th) on Sucette Harbor was designed to do two things — to provide a filter for which amendments can make it to the floor, and to allow the developer to deliver an ominous warning to those pesky and intractable property owners in Mariner’s Village: Give us the 120 units we want, or you don’t get your marina.

The property owners in Mariner’s village, particularly those along the body of water, would naturally welcome the installation of bulkheads and dredging to stabilize the shoreline, hence protecting their investments.

Woodward Interests President Bill Hoffman seemed to be counting on that as a means hopefully to peel away at least one vote from Los Tres Amigos — council members Jason Zuckerman, Rebecca Bush and Jill McGuire, who have formed quite a beachhead against what they characterize as high density development.

“We said from the beginning we thought the marina was an amenity… We would request some consideration on this,” Hoffman said.

So it now appears that Hoffman’s highly anticipated countermove to having been pelted with conditions and a near-fatal-blow from an amendment that cut the apartment number in half, was to get Councilman at Large Rick Danielson to surreptitiously change the format of the meeting, halting all new amendments and conditions, and holding all public comments until the end.

Pushback to meeting format change

The only clue that something was going to be different this meeting may have been signaled in the subtle yet significant differences in the published agendas from July 12th versus July 24th. (See images below.)

Not everyone was peachy with the change of format. Councilman at Large Jason Zuckerman voiced his objection right away.

“I’m not in favor of sort of taking a pause and backtracking. … I’m ready to keep moving forward with discussion on amendments, so that we can send the developer on their way to get a site plan together that reflects that and can be attached to an ordinance. That’s my two cents.”

Danielson replied that he thought if there could be a meeting where they simply discussed potential amendments with the developer first so that they could come back later and let them know if they were workable, it would be a more efficient way of proceeding instead of just voting the same night.

“Part of the reason for the discussion this evening is, for possible amendments or conditions that would be proposed, that the applicant and the council and the planning department could look at those things to look at what the different impacts could be before a vote is taken on those items,” he said.

Ad hoc ‘veto’ power over bad amendments

This retort revealed that Danielson had simply found another way to accomplish a tactic he had floated at the end of the July 5th special meeting when discussing how amendments and conditions would be handled at the upcoming July 12th special meeting.

He had suggested that council members should submit their potential amendments to City Attorney Elizabeth Sconzert and Director of Planning and Development Cara Bartholomew in advance so that they could reduce the list down to only those amendments they deemed as workable. District III Councilwoman Jill McGuire shot down that idea almost immediately.

On July 5th Danielson suggested, “Any possible conditions or amendments that we want to make need to be submitted for review to make sure they can be voted on. So if we have something we need to send it through Ms. Scherer (council clerk) so it can get through Ms. Bartholomew and Ms. Sconzert before the next meeting so if it’s applicable…”

McGuire interjected: “I’d rather do it in the public.”

But Danielson kept trying: “We’d be doing it in the public, but if there are some things like, no, no, no, you can’t even talk about that, then we don’t need to bring it up.”

Thankfully, McGuire prevailed.

There’s a reason for Robert’s Rules of Order when it comes to members of a body — the elected City Council members — being able to exercise their authority to offer amendments without having them, for lack of better term, censored first.

There’s no issue with a city attorney checking amendments for legal purposes when they’re offered, but that must happen in view of the public. It is part of the deliberative process which the Louisiana Open Meetings Law says is open to the public.

Sconzert has been seen by many thus far as being very pro-developer in this case. Having all amendments go through her first — privately and before a meeting occurs — would have been beyond the pale.

Only elected council members have the authority to offer and vote on amendments. Danielson’s tactics — both what he floated at the July 5th meeting and what he ended up doing July 24th — attempted to insert a “veto” step into the process. In the case of the former, it would have given an appointed official — the city attorney — a veto over potential amendments. The latter — what happened July 24th — was intended to hand that same ad hoc veto power to the developer instead.

Tactics out of order

These tactics are out of order and there is a strong case to be made they are an outright violation of Robert’s Rules, the city charter, not to mention state law. There is no provision in state law that says an appointed official or an applicant before a municipality gets to pick and choose which amendments come to a vote. This would be a usurpation of the authority vested in these council members by the people.

At the close of the previous special meeting on July 12th, the plan was to pick right back up with more amendments and conditions. In fact the last act Danielson did during that meeting was to defer a condition Zuckerman was trying to add that night until “our next meeting on July 24th.”

The presumption was that we had entered the final phase of the process, and amendments and conditions would lead directly to a final vote. Up or down, this long nightmare of a process would finally come to an end.

Nope. Not when you’re the acting council chairman. Pick your metaphor. Standing eight-count. Moving the goalposts. Hand on the scales of justice. It happened. More accurately, nothing happened at the meeting. It was all filler to allow Hoffman to unload about the marina having always been expendable, and to hopefully pare down potential amendments to only those favorable to the developer.

Adding insult to injury was Danielson at times stepping on his fellow council members, stopping them mid-sentence to allow an already filibustering project attorney Paul Harrison to continue. Danielson never seems to cut off Harrison when he interrupts Zuckerman or McGuire.

He never seems to show frustration when Sconzert or Bartholomew roll their eyes and make faces at elected council members when forced to answer contentious questions.

Danielson never showed any angst at the May 25th meeting when Harrison threatened to sue anyone and everyone “the next day” if they make an “insinuation” about his integrity. Not a peep. Just a sheepish “Thank you, Mr. Harrison.”

Keeping the rowdy folks in check

We wish Danielson would keep in mind that the “rowdy” people in the back of the room are the important ones. They are some of Mandeville’s most successful, most established, best and brightest. It’s not a good look when he snaps at them like a seventh-grade math teacher — “No clapping!” — or lectures them on social media civility or has a Mandeville police officer threaten and warn them.

And the final blow — at least to the spirits of those who thought this was nearing an end — came when Danielson announced the next scheduled meeting wouldn’t be until August 15th, more than three weeks away. Maybe they’re hoping that the extra time will soften the aforementioned beachhead of resistance.

Will Danielson allow any amendments or conditions from fellow council members at the next meeting?

Will we get another surprise announcement as the meeting starts, perhaps that the public won’t be allowed to speak at all? Remember, according to state law, they are not obligated to let the public speak unless there is an actual vote on the agenda item in question. Just saying.

So who knows. Stay tuned. It’s bound to get worse.

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Sucette meeting #147?

By Ernest A. Burguières

July 25, 2023

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Ernest A. Burguières is a Mandeville attorney who formerly served as District III Councilman. Mandeville Daily is honored to publish Mr. Burguières’ column with permission which is a combined reporting of the goings on in Mandeville government with his personal commentary.

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This is starting to seem like the movie “Groundhog Day.” It seems like week after week it is the same story.

There was one citizen comment that neatly summarized what was happening in a joke that I will try to paraphrase:

A man was going to have a party in which he requested that his guests bring a dish. One guest brought a beautiful roasted turkey. Unfortunately the host was a vegetarian and explained this to the guest. The guest responded that it was one of the finest turkeys around. But the host said he was a vegetarian. The guest then said the turkey was prepared by one of the city’s most famous chefs. But the host said he was a vegetarian. The guest then said he had sliced off a small portion of the turkey to make it all right. But the host said he was a vegetarian.

It does not matter how you dress it up or how you cut it, it is still a turkey and it is unacceptable.

Indeed.

What got us here?

Discussions of how and why the city should try to jam a highway zoning designation into a residential area that is hidden in a labyrinth of narrow streets far away from a highway.

The usual legal and intellectual gymnastics proliferated from the city attorney and director or planning. They were talking a different language and were apparently immune to the fear and loathing that has become a regular feature of citizen comments about this project.

An attempt was made to equate the 4,000-square-foot or 10,000-square-foot Sucette “event center” or “ballroom” (I don’t know what the functional difference is.) with the less than 2,000-square-foot Maison Lafitte on Lafitte St. How does this compare?

Then Sucette attorney, Paul Harrison, tried to equate local one or two bedroom B&B / VRBO short term rentals in the old town with Sucette’s 80-room hotel. Why, it’s almost identical! What’s the fuss?

Councilwoman Rebecca Bush then lamented how the magical (my word) traffic studies did not seem to take in to account the effect of frequent weddings or other events that could bring 100-200 cars into this tight area all at one time. The traffic study is an academic tool that amortizes traffic over a large period of time, years, which minimizes the effects of potentially frequent big events. It is a flaw in the study that because it is an unknown methodology we are likely powerless to criticize, despite the reality of events.

When asked by Councilman Jason Zuckerman if the reduction of the apartment units from 178 to 90 would correspondingly reduce the height of the building Sucette responded, “we don’t know”. Really? A 50-percent reduction in the number of apartments might not affect the height of a building that is almost twice as high as anything for miles around. Oh, and then what appeared to be a veiled threat that if Sucette is frustrated on height they may have to pull the marina portion of the project. That threat almost sounds like a virtue.

Sucette appears to want to view each component of its project separately when it suits their analysis involving density and scale but falls back to the big picture when they want to talk about the need to look at the big picture that they have divined through the CLURO.

The room was packed as usual and while there were many familiar faces there were also many new ones. Many were wearing red in solidarity with the No Sucette movement. I only counted one citizen that I know was a Sucette proponent although she made no comments. In fact no one but Sucette representatives spoke in favor of Sucette.

Another citizen rhetorically wondered how anyone could sit in judgment over this issue week after week and watch scores of citizens plead with their elected officials to protect them, and not do anything to hurt them.

The vice president of the New Golden Shores neighborhood association who lived on Dona Dr. (a neighbor of Councilman Skelly Kreller) shared the results of a poll on Sucette in which there was a ratio of 12-to-1 against Sucette. I wonder if Kreller participated in the poll?

The public comments wrapped up with citizen Pat Rosenow commenting on the difficulty in being a judge (which he is or was) and how delaying a difficult decision is death by a 1000 cuts. He, like several others, implored the council to separate the re-zoning issue from the conditional use and vote on the re-zoning. Very logical. Re-zoning would be forever. If you think re-zoning is in the best interest of the health, safety and welfare of the citizens of Mandeville, then vote to re-zone. If you cannot honestly say that re-zoning helps anyone but the developer, then vote no.

For a reason that is not clear Councilman Rick Danielson announced that there would be at least two more meetings on Sucette, August 15th and August 23rd. To discuss what that we haven’t heard already? A turkey is still a turkey.

-30-

By Ernest A. Burguières

July 23, 2023

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Ernest A. Burguières is a Mandeville attorney who formerly served as District III Councilman. Mandeville Daily is honored to publish Mr. Burguières’ column with permission which is a combined reporting of the goings on in Mandeville government with his personal commentary.

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Residents of Mandeville were treated to a new salvo being hurled in the battle over Sucette. Beyond the retort that the opposition represents only a few disgruntled people is evidence of a slick mail-out piece opposing Sucette. I can tell you from personal experience that the artwork, printing and mailing represents several thousand dollars of disgruntlement. That citizens in a small town should have to expend such resources to get the attention of their elected officials is in itself remarkable. It make me wonder how an elected official can seriously ignore this effort.

Rumors are swirling about what to expect. Will Sucette succeed in trying to get a do-over of the 90 apartment limit? Will Sucette make substantial concessions on height? Will the event center survive? Will we be forced to tear up tiny little Antibes St. so the Sysco tractor trailer trucks can lumber back to the Sucette pavilion? What will be the tipping point to get that third council vote to approve? Will the out of town interests prevail in ripping the heart out of the quaint coastal village that has endured so far without any high-rise packed apartments or hotels in the middle of their sleepy lakefront enclave? Remember, once you re-zone this to commercial (Planned Development Multi Use in Planner speak), it will forever be commercial.

The money quote on the mailer by Nicole Stanley of Old Golden Shores (Councilman Skelly Kreller’s district and neighborhood):

We bought our property in Mandeville for the ambiance and the quality of life. This project would set a precedent for us becoming exactly what we moved away from in New Orleans. Mandeville has nothing to gain and everything to lose if this development goes through.

— Nicole Stanley, Old Golden Shores

Will we all be able to lay our heads on our pillows if we allow this to go through? Would this be fair to the hundreds of people that would be affected?

If you oppose this, the least you can do is email your elected official. Their names and email addresses are on the flyer. The next meeting is tomorrow night, Monday, July 24th at 6:00pm at the Spitzfaden Center.

Make a difference, it is worth it, if not just for yourself, then for your neighbors.

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Where is the real line in the sand for the developer, council members?

Editorial

And just like that, the once ambitious plan for a hotel, events center, apartments and marina at the west end of the Mandeville lakefront came crashing down to the reality that three of the five City Council members are having nothing to do with a development with the density proposed by the Sucette Harbor team.

The revised site plan presented at the July 5th special meeting signaled what was in the eyes of Woodward Interests President Bill Hoffman and many others a monumental concession that just weeks earlier he had insisted was not viable.

However, to their credit, Hoffman and his team scaled back their proposal to address concerns expressed by Councilman at Large Jason Zuckerman, District I Councilwoman Rebecca Bush and District III Councilwoman Jill McGuire. Bush had even directly appealed to Hoffman to cut the number of apartment units, which he did, from 201 down to 178, along with other modifications.

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We’re back to the blank slate. I’ve seen all of this. If you don’t like my analysis, I’m sorry. I don’t like yours.

— Councilman at Large Jason Zuckerman to Sucette Attorney Paul Harrison

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But everything changed in one fell swoop at the July 12th special meeting. An amendment proffered by Zuckerman to limit the number of apartment units to an astonishingly modest 90 actually passed when swing vote Bush sided with project skeptics Zuckerman and McGuire.

Surely Hoffman didn’t see that coming.

Most observers in the room were confident that Bush’s concerns had been allayed by Hoffman’s July 5th concessions where he found a way to cut 23 units. Just two weeks earlier, he winced and bemoaned Bush’s repeated queries about a reduction in units, making it sound like such a request bordered on the impossible:

“So we struggle with some of the same things you do. From day one we feel like we played by the rules as has been written by the CLURO. We did it with density. We did it with all the other issues. And I’m certainly hearing that there’s questions about what the CLURO meant of is it still valid today, but it kind of leaves us hanging because we were presented with ’these are the rules you have to follow’ and that’s what we’re following… We will look at size (density question) but it does have an impact on everything else because we look at the whole development as one, not by pieces.”

Audible gasps could be heard in the Paul Spitzfaden Community Center July 12th when those in attendance suddenly realized Bush had voted in the affirmative, in effect choking down a major feature of the current site plan to half of what it was.

This was a watershed moment as it signaled Bush’s true position. It also revealed that two other council members — Councilman at Large Rick Danielson and District II Councilman Dr. Skelly Kreller — have no problem with a high-density development on Mandeville’s lakefront and south of Monroe Street.

And it was Kreller himself who during his election campaign promised to be the vanguard against a high-density development on the LSU Health Foundation land. “I’m going to be in there controlling it… I don’t want any high-density stuff,” he told the Times-Picayune/Nola.com in 2020.

It’s worth noting that Danielson and Kreller have remained mostly silent when it comes to asking the developer critical or probing questions throughout any of these special meetings.

If Bush had only hinted at her position on June 20th, she spelled it out in no uncertain terms July 12th by voting for the Zuckerman amendment.

Before the vote, Zuckerman explained that his amendment came out of his frustration with the density calculation from the CLURO being used by the developer, which merely says the calculation is based on the total parcel size, regardless of what else is planned to be built on it. In this case, there would be a hotel, restaurant, events center, parking and more.

City Attorney Elizabeth Sconzert backed up Zuckerman’s position by saying, “Because this is a ‘planned district’ you are allowed to make modifications to it, and what I’m hearing from Mr. Zuckerman … is that he’s wanting to potentially modify the site plan to address some of his concerns about the density under that, and then he’s comparing it with the applicable regulations of R3 but that he feels that it’s not appropriate there.”

According to the Sucette team, using the R3 calculation, the density is only about 12 units per acre. Zuckerman said he agrees the density should be 12 units per acre, but the calculation should be based on roughly 7.5 acres and not 15, which is what he claims is all that’s left after you exclude everything related to the other buildings and facilities.

This was how Zuckerman came up with his 90-unit figure. To say Sucette attorney Paul Harrison did not agree would be putting it extremely mildly as the two men had an often heated exchange before the amendment was adopted 3-2.

“We comply with your laws. So you personally had an opinion and you used this forum to make a motion which has not been voted on. You asked if the developer was in favor of it… No! For reasons I articulated,” Harrison insisted.

Zuckerman concluded by telling Harrison, “Was it not discussed during the entire — and this is a question for the planning director and I guess the city attorney — planned district. Planned district. It’s a blank slate. We get to set the rules for what’s appropriate. That was discussed every step of the way. I hear ya. You’re wanting to apply B3, B1, R3, R-this… this is planned district. We’re back to the blank slate. I’ve seen all of this. If you don’t like my analysis, I’m sorry. I don’t like yours.”

So was 178 units really Hoffman’s line-in-the-sand, so to speak? How far is the developer really willing to bend without breaking?

It’s hard to believe that an organization like Woodward Interests doesn’t have contingencies for the curveballs they surely knew they would encounter during this process.

Is the developer really tied to any of the four components of this proposal — hotel, events center, apartments or marina — so tightly that the Zuckerman amendment would cause them to pack up and head straight to court?

Doubtful.

Don’t be surprised if at the next meeting the developer pushes forward with the 90-unit limit as if it were part of the plan all along but then floats some poison pill as a way to force the Council to reconsider the Zuckerman amendment and bring that number up to somewhere in the middle.

Even though it’s entirely possible the developer will accept a steady chipping away of the once ambitious project until it’s a shell of its former self, don’t bet on it. The next special meeting scheduled for July 24th is sure to see more amendments intended to reduce and set conditions on Sucette Harbor. How will the developer react this time?

Stay tuned.

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By Ernest A. Burguières

July 13, 2023

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Ernest A. Burguières is a Mandeville attorney who formerly served as District III Councilman. Mandeville Daily is honored to publish Mr. Burguières’ column with permission which is a combined reporting of the goings on in Mandeville government with his personal commentary.

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Another wild night. A packed house. Two TV cameras. These events really deserve popcorn and wine. And maybe a cigar.

There were several big issues.

First, there will be another Sucette meeting on Monday, July 24th, at 6:00 p.m. at the Spitzfaden Center.

The drama: A night for amendments and conditions

The chair told us that we would discuss amendments to the ordinance and conditions on the property. The Sucette representative provided a few new slides that purported to clarify certain features. For example, we saw a new slide that revealed that the absolute height would be 72′, a figure that some still disagree with. But at 72′ this makes it about double the height of surrounding buildings. Zuckerman believes it might be more.

Sucette made a request that Parcel U, the defunct former marina, be re-subdivided and incorporated into Parcel D, the main Sucette focus.

In what would be a harbinger of future actions Councilman Kreller made a motion that the Sucette Ordinance 23-16 be amended to re-subdivided the property and incorporate Parcel U into Parcel D. Despite a citizen’s question regarding how the addition might affect all of the various previous calculations that only focused on Parcel D, which was kind of sloughed off. It was approved 5-0 by the council despite the fact that Planning and Zoning never looked at Parcel U, I believe because they were told not to.

So now, we have Parcel U in the mix and something called a “Planned Marina District” which I assume brings a host of new issues.

Then Councilman Jason Zuckerman made what at first appeared to be a motion, but upon reflection, was an invitation for a motion. Zuckerman noted that the prior ordinance that governs Parcel D was Ordinance 98-40 wherein Al Copeland Sr. obtained approval for a Planned District Residential zoning for 10 single family homes on the 15 acre plot. In that ordinance was language about how and why the residential designation was in the best interest of the city and its residents. Zuckerman asked if any of the other councilmen wanted to offer a “Whereas” statement in Ordinance 23-16 (the current Sucette ordinance) to the effect that a commercial focused multi use was now in the best interest of the city and its residents. There were no takers. I wonder why (he said rhetorically)? Nobody wanted to openly admit that they supported changing this zoning from residential to commercial. No surprise here.

So, implicit in the fact that there were no takers to Zuckerman’s request was the fact that there was no one on the council willing to openly admit that they favored to endorse an emphasis on the commercial desirability of Parcel D.

The attorney for Sucette, Paul Harrison, commented that such a move by Zuckerman was somehow unfair, that it was pre judging the project and that the 1998 ordinance was flawed. Somehow the desire to maintain a residential zoning and atmosphere is now unfair. I will have more to say on this later.

Councilman Zuckerman then offered a slew of conditions that he wanted placed on the project should it be approved:

• no boat or trailer storage in the marina
• sunken vessels would have to be moved within 10 days
• provisions for an effluence pump out for the boats in the marina
• lighting on the dock at dock level in an effort to minimize the effects of the light on nearby residences
• disallow living on a boat
• violations if not resolved could result in the loss of their conditional use permit which would shut down the operation
  

Local citizen Terri Hamilton made a few additional suggestions:

• all electrical work related to the marina would have to be marine grade
• Dockside electrical connections would have to be between 2′ and 4′ above BFE flood level
• the marina would have 90 days to remove a sunken boat
  

These were all new ideas, much of which was foreign to those not involved in active boating activities. One citizen asked if anyone passing through Mandeville on a boat stayed a few days, a week or a month was violating the living on board idea. No one knew. Another citizen asked in commercial fishing boats like shrimp boats could use the marina. No one knew. What about in-slip boat repairs? No one knew. What about noise? I reminded people that Al Copeland, Sr. was a devotee of offshore power boat racing in boats that used to be called cigarettes. These boats often had one or more large V-8 engines with open exhaust. Very, very loud. Another resident, who was a sailor, shared his experience with the silting problems this marina has always suffered from which may have contributed to its lack of success in what ought to have been a prime area.

Tops’l resident, Tom Whalen, questioned the proximity of a dozen feet or less to a residential area and asked, “why re-zone this property”?

At this point Councilman Kreller made a kind of incredible statement to the effect that if Sucette was going to invest $100 million into this marina project we should trust them to do the right thing. An astute comment I guess,…not.

In somewhat of a surprise to me the council voted 5-0 in favor of these marina conditions.

Then Zuckerman moved onto his next set of motions. Density.

Zuckerman opined that half the property was residential (that is if rent paying apartments is residential as opposed to commercial) and half the property was commercial (hotel, restaurant, marina, event center, restaurant). He then proposed that the 200 unit apartments (which were voluntarily reduced to 180 last time be Sucette) be further reduced to 90 units. This resulted in another round of spirited discussions. The director of planning said the CLURO designation R-3 covered this, but that the council could put any condition they wanted. Sucette objected to the analysis and muttered under his breath that they were told they complied with all the requirements. WHAT? Who told you that? Which prompted Zuckerman to remind everyone that this high density was not in the spirit of the CLURO or what Mandeville has consistently promoted with respect to its residential atmosphere. Local landscaper and former professor, Buck Abby (who was a consultant for Sucette) appeared to try and support Sucette by asking that the whole project be looked at and not just components. This was not a popular opinion.

During this discussion on the 90 apartment unit reduction one citizen asked what the mix would be (1 bedroom, 2 bedroom, 3 bedroom). Another resident, Ralph Whalen, stated that he lived in the Tops’l apartment complex which had 37 units which would still be half the size of the proposed 90 units. A little variance in the scale?

This prompted Paul Harrison, local attorney for Sucette who by this point was visibly angry, to make what appeared to be a veiled threat of litigation by accusing the city of being “arbitrary”.

The vote on the reduction to 90 apartment unit limit was approved by a vote of 3-2 with Chairman Danielson and Councilman Keller being the lone votes to maintain the high density.

Councilwoman Jill McGuire then stepped up to the plate with a motion to limit the gross square footage of the hotel (excluding the square footage of the rooms) to 8,900 square feet. This sought to limit the size of the event center / ballroom. McGuire also made a motion that the impervious portion (that water could not flow through like concrete) would be limited to 61%.

These were both approved by a 5-0 vote.

Councilman Zuckerman then got into the location of the event center which was presently sited on the edge of the entrance jetty to the marina which was about 100’+ from the Mariners Island condos. Thoughts of loud music and wedding revelers filled people’s minds. This prompted the Sucette representative to again object to the notion that this was a “blank slate” project that the council could impose any conditions they wanted because they (Sucette) were told that the plan complied with everything. What? Who told them that?

Another citizen stated that she moved to Mandeville in 1966 when the population was less than 2,000. She asked, why do we have to appease Sucette? Indeed, why?

The architect hired by Sucette then got into a discussion with Zuckerman about why the event center was on the west side of the property so close to Mariners Island and why it should not be moved closer to the lake. Interestingly, she looked visibly shaken and upset.

The vote on this motion to move the event center failed 1-4 with Zuckerman casting the only vote to move it.

Then Councilwoman McGuire made a motion to revise Table 1 in the ordinance which listed all of the limits to apartments, rooms, square footage, boat slips and parking spaces which would bring it in to conformity with changes Sucette had previously made but which did not reflect the changes made by the council that evening.

This vote passed 5-0.

This again prompted the Sucette representative to disapprovingly mutter, rules don’t mean much.

At this point you should be getting a sense that not only did things not go well for Sucette, they were also getting visibly angry. There was a sense that they felt betrayed in their comments.

The final issue was traffic and who would bear the cost of any road projects that might be required as a result of the operation of Sucette. Councilman Zuckerman moved to require that Sucette pay for any required road work. Sucette responded by saying that The Traffic Study (with words written in gold) did not contemplate road work for 20+ years. This prompted me to remind everyone that on day one of operation there were going to be Sysco Foods tractor trailer trucks that would have to make the right turn from Monroe onto Antibes West to service the restaurant, hotel. The turn is too small to accommodate a 60′ long vehicle. This prompted the mayor to state that (I believe) the city could not force Sucette to pay for road reconstruction like was done in the Port Marigny case. In Port Marigny the owner offered to pay for the road work, they could not be required to may for it. This issue was put off for the next meeting.

The conclusion: What happened and why?

Wisdom is a thing that involves time and experience. We see the issue of wisdom crop in the Titanic submarine tragedy. There were reports that the Ocean Gate CEO, Stockton Rush (who died in the accident) once explained how he didn’t hire “50-year-old white guys” with military experience to captain his vessels because they weren’t “inspirational.”

Unbelievable. Does anybody think that is an astute statement?

Talk about ignoring the value of experience and wisdom.

In the case of Mandeville, it has been involved in three prior controversial real estate projects that resulted in litigation; Abraham v. City of Mandeville (1986), et al; Our Lady of the Lake v. City of Mandeville (2011); Port Marigny, et al v. City of Mandeville, et al (2017). All three involved an applicant who tried to push the envelope with a development that caused the community to rise up in an uproar. Port Marigny is an anomaly for reasons that have to do with the details of that case. The common thread with these cases is the consistent resistance by the community to out of scale developments. Al Copeland, Sr. should be added to this as well because Copeland’s original application, Ordinance 95-36 in 1995 was denied. Look at why. It took Copeland three years to gain approval of Ordinance 98-40 in which the city, and the public, fought every inch of the way. Copeland is an example of how the process should work.

This brings up the question; what institutional knowledge do our city attorney and director of planning have with respect to projects like this? Do they know about these historical matters? What did the city learn from these past experiences? Was that experience passed on to our city attorney and director of planning? I don’t know.

Looking over the past 35 years should we as citizens hope that our government officials have a sense for what is possible in this community? Has the City learned anything from these experiences? Should our government officials encourage applicants with projects that might be popular with planners, but not with the citizens and are therefore risky? If Sucette was encouraged to believe that his application was all in order and would be approved, but ignored the known will of the people and the desire of our elected officials to represent what the citizens want, is that a good thing?

Sucette keeps stating that they were misled and that the opposition is only a handful of people. I can’t disagree with this statement because I don’t know what they were told and by whom. What I do know is that the city attorney and the director planning repeatedly told Planning and Zoning and the Council that they had discretion to approve, disapprove or approve with conditions, that they had choices and yet in the next breath they said you must approve this because that is the law. This is a non sequitur. If you have a choice, then, you have a choice. As Councilman Zuckerman said in response to Paul Harrison’s similar admonition, if we don’t have a choice, then why are we here? And the emperor has no clothes.

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