By Leonard Gray / L’Observateur / March 21, 1998

VACHERIE – St. James Parish is taking aim at the future of economicdevelopment with the organizing of its Workforce Development Task Force.

At Wednesday’s meeting of the St. James Parish Council, District 6Councilman Elton Aubert reviewed activities of the task force’s organizational meeting on March 9.

The following committees were formed: Citizens Survey Committee, to determine what people want in future parish development; Education Committee, to review current educational resources and develop new ones; and Parish Development, to seek out more businesses and industries with jobs local workers can qualify for.

Named to the Citizens Survey Committee were Elwyn Bocz, Edie Michel, Tom Watson and E.J. Dumas. Named to the Education Committee wereGerald Falgoust, Elton Aubert, Willis Octave and Huey Stein. Named to theParish Development Committee were Earl White, Jody Chenier and Edie Michel.

The next meeting will host Dennis Murphy, director of Louisiana Technical College, River Parishes Campus. It will be held April 9 at 9 a.m.In other activity at Wednesday’s meeting, the Parish Council introduced an ordinance to add criteria for construction of cellular telephone towers within the parish.

Currently, with no such criteria in place, construction of such towers has been done in residential areas without official knowledge or permission.

District 7 Parish Councilman Jimmy Brazan objected at first and said he wanted two public hearings on the matter to make sure West Bank residents had a chance to voice their opinions.

District 1 Parish Councilman Elwyn Bocz argued against that and emphasized the towers are erected too quickly and that two public hearings would delay passage too much to do any good. Brazan withdrewhis objection.

Also, a presentation was made to Earl Joshua, who operated an ambulance service in the parish from 1965 to 1982 and served as a District 5 Parish Councilman from 1988 to 1991.

In addition, the parish purchased a new pickup truck for the Department of Operations, Recreation Division. Bid price was $20,701 from CazenaveMotor Company of Vacherie.

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