On March 20, 2025, St. Bernard Parish President Louis Pomes sealed the deal to have the parish forfeit $3.3 million to protect himself, Bourgeois, and other high-ranking Parish employees who violated the terms of the Buy and Build Program.
If you are just joining us, you should probably start with our article “Council forfeits $3.3 million to protect Pomes and Bourgeois“.
How did Pomes seal the deal?
Let’s take a look at the ordinance and walk through this step by step.
The President has three options when the Council passes an Ordinance:
- Approve the ordinance so that the ordinance becomes law.
- Veto the Ordinance so that the ordinance does not become law unless the Council votes with 2/3’s in favor to override the veto .
- Take no action and the ordinance automatically becomes law by the passage of 10 days after the submission to the President.
Pomes knew he would personally be receiving a substantial benefit by the passage of this ordinance.
Pomes knew several high-ranking employees and his most trusted allies would be receiving a substantial benefit from the passage of this ordinance.
Pomes knew that this ordinance would cause the Parish to lose out on the return of $3.3 million in property.
So what did Pomes do?
Let’s take a look.
Pomes took the benefit for himself and his allies by not vetoing the ordinance. Not vetoing the ordinance had the same effect approving the ordinance: Pomes and his allies win and the Parish loses out on $3.3 million.
The only way for Pomes to take the high-road would have been to veto the ordinance. The ordinance was veto proof as 6 of the 7 council members had already voted for it to begin with. Pomes could have vetoed the ordinance and required the Council to override his veto. If Pomes wanted to put the Parish’s interests above his own, Pomes would have vetoed the ordinance. But Pomes took the benefit and avoided embarrassing the Council by requiring them to override an ordinance which seemsto have been introduced to benefit Pomes and his allies.
The only benefit to not taking any action whatsoever seems to be that Pomes could claim that he had nothing to do with the passage of this ordinance – as if none of us are smart enough to see through that one. That shows you what your Parish President thinks of you.
If you would like a copy of the full ordinance, you can download a copy below.
What could the Parish have done with $3.3 million?
The Parish could have taken that money and used it to fund the Port litigation. The Parish has already admitted that it does not have the money to fully fund the Port litigation. And what that really means is that the Parish doesn’t want to fund the Port litigation. Governments always find the money to do the things they want to do!
Just one month ago, on February 18, 2025, the Parish was trying to pass a sales tax on the people to fund the Port litigation. In case you missed that, take a look at our article “Pomes, Randall join Everhardt to defeat the sales tax proposal.” If the Parish did a better and more honest job at managing its finances, the Parish would be able to fully fund the Port litigation without any new taxes.
