ERIK SANZENBACH / L’Observateur / January 22, 2000

LAPLACE – The St. John Parish Housing Authority is on solid financialfooting, according to Thomas Golsen, new executive director of the authority.

“We have been paying the sheriff’s officers that work in the developments, and we have been paying off our bills,” Golsen told the Board of Commissioners Wednesday. “And we still have some money in reserve.”This is good news considering a lot of the past year’s financial records have either been lost or deleted by the former housing administration headed up by Patrena Ester.

However, there is one financial item troubling Golsen, and that is the $106,000 the Housing Authority is paying to the Sheriff’s Office for security within the parish’s housing developments.

“This is over 15 percent of the housing authority’s budget,” reported Golsen. “We are paying a considerable amount of money for baselineservices.”According to Golsen, there are two agreements the housing authority has with the Sheriff’s Office. The first is a special grant from the Departmentof Housing and Urban Development for anti-drug enforcement. This grant,which lasts until October 1, 2000, pays for three police officers for the LaPlace Oaks Development and is worth $27,000.

The second agreement is an oral contract agreed to in 1995 where the Housing Authority would pay the Sheriff’s Office $106,000 for security that went over baseline services.

Golsen said when he contacted Chief Deputy Harold Kliebert about the agreement, Kliebert said he couldn’t find a written contract and said it was probably an arrangement agreed upon orally between Ester and Sheriff Wayne Jones.

Kliebert also told Golsen that if the housing developments really needed security, it would need to be a 24-hour-a-day effort, and that $106,000 was a good price for that.

Golsen did say he was getting invoices from the Sheriff’s Office for overtime services from officers working in all four of the parish’s housing developments.

However, Golsen wants to re-negotiate the amount of money they pay the Sheriff’s Office.

“The sheriff should provide us with details on what we get for $106,000,” Golsen told the Board of Commissioners. “They should show us asubstantial reduction in crime for that amount of money.”Board Chairperson Sheila Morris agreed. “We should look at this closely,”she said.

Commissioner Yeulah Young wanted to know why the sheriff was charging so much money.

“We elected the sheriff to protect the citizens,” said Young. “Does thismean I have to pay him to come to my house to protect me? Are they doing anything special here?” Walter Willard, counsel for the Board of Commissioners, said the very nature of public housing demands extra security.

“Every parish and county housing authority in the country gets extra police protection,” Willard told Young and the board. “This costs the sheriff more,so he has to charge you more.”Morris suggested the board approve a resolution asking the sheriff to the February board meeting to justify the expenditures to his department. Theboard agreed.

In a related matter, Golsen reported that he has received a letter from Andrew Cuomo, secretary of HUD, asking all housing authorities in the country to participate in a national gun buy-back program. Each housingauthority is to put up a certain amount of money to buy guns back, no questions asked, from residents. The St. John Public Housing Authority hasbeen instructed to put up $5,000.

The board then agreed to form a coalition with the Sheriff’s Office to help in the buy-back program.

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