Every year at this time the news media look back on the past 12 months to reflect on those events that affected their communities the most.
Over the course of 12 months there are many important news events, but 12 months of news cannot fit in one article. For that reason, we try to select the 10 most important stories of the year.
In some cases, a “top story” may be a combination of related incidents — such as weather, crime, politics, etc. It can also be a single event.
This year we chose the “related incidents” model for most of the items in this article. Following is a summary of what this newspaper believes were the Top 10 Stories of 2021.
COVID-19 continued to dominate the headlines and people’s lives during 2021. The year began with the “third wave” of the pandemic at its height. Later in the year, the parish endured the “fourth” or “Delta” wave that saw the number of infections and COVID-related deaths escalate at a frightening pace.
The year ended with COVID apparently in retreat, many aspects of parish life returning to normal but with a new threat from a more serious variant of the disease looming.
COVID is once again the No. 1 story of the year because in 21 months it had infected over 7,400 Avoyelles Parish residents, sent many to hospitals and had killed almost 200 of our family, friends, neighbors and co-workers. It affected how we work, how we socialize and even what we wear in public as a mask mandate was in force for much of the year.
The pandemic had a major impact on schools and students over three school years, starting with the 2019-20 year that ended in April 2020 as the first wave of the virus hit the state. The 2020-21 school year saw the integration of virtual education into the schools’ instructional program.
The 2021-22 school year had to resort to the “hybrid” program of having only half of the students in class while the other half learned at home using laptops provided by the school district. As the “fourth wave” receded, all students returned to the classroom.
As of this writing, the Omicron variant had not surfaced in Avoyelles Parish, but only the most optimistic held hope that it would not eventually arrive.
While most eyes were on the rising number of infections and deaths from the disease, another major development in the pandemic was the vaccination program. It rolled out gradually — too slowly in many people’s opinion — starting with the elderly and those with serious health conditions that made them more vulnerable to serious complications from the virus. By the end of the year, everyone but children under the age of 5 were eligible, and being encouraged, to be vaccinated to prevent a dreaded “fifth wave” of the virus.
The local nonprofit Avoyelles Sleeves Up organization mounted a vaccination program that sponsored vaccinations in the communities, with assistance from the National Guard. This complemented the vaccination programs at the Health Unit, several pharmacies and other healthcare providers. The program was recognized by the state as a model for local community efforts to combat COVID and promote vaccination.
Most days in Avoyelles Parish are sunny and pleasant. Most rains are refreshing and make the parish one of the most productive agricultural areas of the state.
Then there are those days marked with torrential rains, high winds, rising waterways and even ice.
While 2020 still holds the record for the most times Avoyelles showed up on weather maps as a projected target, 2021 had its moments during hurricane season.
The year started with a rare significant snowfall followed immediately with an ice storm that knocked power out for thousands of parish residents. Widespread and lengthy power outages led to the use of generators to provide electricity to some homes. At least two people died from carbon monoxide poisoning from an improperly ventilated generator.
In April the parish experienced nature’s power when a thunderstorm ripped through the area, unleashing high winds and spawning two tornadoes. One touched down in Mansura and the other struck in Bordelonville.
The storm also resulted in several lightning strikes around the parish, including setting a house on fire on La. Hwy 115 between Marksville and Hessmer. There were no injuries, but the family lost everything they had in the fire.
As the parish held its breath during hurricane season, storm after storm stayed clear of Louisiana’s shores. Then came Ida in August.
For several days during Ida’s journey to landfall Avoyelles Parish was right in the monster’s crosshairs. It was expected to hit in the center of the state’s Gulf Coast, head due north, rip through Goudeau and the middle of the parish before taking the Mississippi River Road tour all the way to the Arkansas and/or Mississippi border.
Fortunately for us, not for others, Ida changed course and landed at Grand Isle, doing to the Florida Parishes what had been expected to have been done to central Acadiana, Central Louisiana and the Ark-La-Miss parishes.
Instead of hurricane-force winds approaching 100 mph and heavy rainfall, the parish received less than an inch of rain with the highest gust of 24 mph occurring during Ida’s passing many miles to the east of us.
While there were no gale-force winds, widespread power outages, fallen trees and property damage from Hurricane Nicholas in this area, the slow-moving "soaker" made its presence known nonetheless.
Nicholas dropped over a foot of rain in some areas of the parish as it slowly passed through this area in mid-September. In one 24-hour period of almost non-stop rain, the totals ranged from six inches to almost 10 inches.
Schools and government offices were closed at the height of the storm due to the heavy rains.
Once or twice a decade, the Avoyelles Parish School District says goodbye to one superintendent and appoints a new chief administrator. Usually the new superintendent is a familiar face who, if not a parish native and/or resident, has risen through the ranks in the parish school system with appointment as superintendent being the crowning achievement and final promotion before retirement.
When Superintendent Blaine Dauzat announced his decision to retire, one observer of the process wrote a letter to the editor noting that all previous superintendents had three things in common. They had all been “local, white and male.”
After making history once by appointing Assistant Superintendent Thelma Prater to serve as interim superintendent, becoming the first African-American to sit in the superintendent’s seat, the School Board launched a multi-state effort to find a new superintendent.
Prater decided at the last minute to put her hat in the ring, which would have postponed her planned retirement in three years, but reconsidered and withdrew from consideration prior to the board choosing finalists for the position.
When the dust cleared after interviewing the three finalists — a black man, a black woman and a white woman, all from outside the parish — the board selected Karen Tutor from Mississippi to serve as the first woman appointed to lead the parish school system.
The district had been led by a woman on an interim basis twice before, but Tutor is the first to be handed the reins for a full term.
Tutor retired from the Mississippi public education system after serving as superintendent of Pontotoc School District in northeast Mississippi in 2016. She moved to the Natchez, Miss., area to be closer to her son and grandsons in St. Francisville. She worked as an education consultant for school districts from 2016 until taking this position.
Her first day in the new job was a “rain day” with schools closed due to Hurricane Nicholas.
High school sports is an important part of communities in this parish — especially the “big three” of football, basketball and baseball.
Fresh on everyone’s mind at this time is the success of the Avoyelles High Mustangs, who came two points shy of beating the reigning 2A champion Many Tigers, 40-38, in the semifinals. Many was upset by the Amite Warriors, 17-6, In the title game on Dec. 10 in the Superdome.
This was the first time in its 33 years of fielding a football team that Avoyelles High had gotten past the second round of the playoffs. It was also the first time in 10 years that a parish team had gotten to the semifinals. The Mustangs ended the regular season 8-2. After the playoffs they were 11-3.
While the Mustangs football team’s school history-making season was something to be proud of, it wasn’t the only success story of the year.
The Avoyelles Public Charter Lady Vikings basketball team dominated their opponents during the season and continued their winning ways through the quarterfinals of the state playoffs.
It wasn’t until the semifinals against No. 1-ranked Doyle that the No. 5-seeded Lady Vikes’ championship quest was halted, falling 65-61. Doyle was edged by No. 3 Lake Arthur, 62-61, in the title game.
Several other boys and girls teams made it to the basketball, baseball and softball playoffs but were eliminated in the first two rounds.
The parish did have one individual champion this year, with Bunkie Magnet’s Kaylen Rabalais taking 1st place in the girls’ javelin throw at the state 2A meet. Fellow-Panther Daysha Cooper finished 4th in the discus throw.
Avoyelles High had two athletes in the 2A boys’ meet. Carlos Bazert Jr. placed 4th in the shot put and Travon Prater was 5th in the javelin. If the names are familiar its because they also excelled on the football field this year.
In girls’ tennis, Avoyelles Charter’s Peyton Hines advanced to the second round of the Class IV tennis tournament singles competition. If that name is familiar, it’s because she also excelled in basketball and softball this year. The doubles team of Rylie Bailius and Bailey Armand qualified for the state tournament but was defeated in the first round.
Not all of our youths’ athletic achievements are associated with their schools.
The Louisiana Blue Hawks youth basketball program sent a boys team and a girls team to the USSSA National Tournament in Orlando over the July 4th weekend. Think of that organization as a “Little League” for basketball.
The boys’ team won the national championship in the under-15 division, taking a two-point overtime victory over Bo Bell Basketball Academy of Atlanta, Ga., to win the title. The 9th grade girls were runner-up in their classification, falling by 7 points to a Miami, Fla., squad in the championship game.
The Avoyelles American All-Stars 13-14 team won the state Little League championship. However, due to concerns over the COVID pandemic, there were no regional or national tournaments for this age group.
There was a time over 20 years ago when the Paragon Casino Resort — then known as Grand Casino — was known as the first, and for a while only, land-based casino in the state. The casino, owned by the Tunica-Biloxi Tribe, fell on some economic hard times due to increased competition and a generally sour economy.
The tribe sought help from a fellow Native American tribe with extensive and successful experience in the gaming industry, the Mohegan Tribe of Connecticut.
After five years of managing the Paragon, the Mohegans turned management back over to the Tunica-Biloxi in considerably better shape than it was when they started the management contract.
The quarterly distribution of gaming funds resumed this year. There had been only a few quarters in the past five years when the casino made a net profit that would require a distribution of a portion of profits. For most quarters, the casino operated at a net loss.
Since 2014 the casino has distributed $1.42 million to the parish government entities and municipalities. Most of that — $1,034,796 — was this year in three quarterly distributions. Tribe officials project a “healthy” fourth quarter distribution, which will be issued in early 2022.
A tribal spokesman said that “investing in our community is a top priority.”
During those five years, Paragon’s debt was reduced by over two-thirds and the remaining debt was refinanced on very favorable terms.
Casino officials are optimistic that the tribe will be debt-free within seven years.
“The Tunica-Biloxi Tribe is grateful for the management and leadership Mohegan Sun has provided the Tribe,” Tunica-Biloxi Tribal Chairman Marshall Pierite said, referring to the name of the Connecticut-based tribe's casinos in Connecticut and Pennsylvania.
One new potential gaming resource for the casino is sports betting, which began this year. The Paragon was the first casino in the state to open a sports book in October.
This year started off with a murder and there were a few more during the year. Again, it was not nearly as bad as the previous year.
But it was bad enough.
The first murder of the year occurred in Cottonport, when Lamarin Jaquan Hayward was shot and killed in February. Curtis Bradford, 17, was arrested and charged with murder. Bradford was ordered to stand trial as an adult.
In April, Stephon Moore was shot and killed in Cottonport. There had been no arrests in that case as of the writing of this article.
For the next seven months there was an uncharacteristic lack of murder.
Then in early December Michael Malbrough, 36, of Mansura was stabbed to death in a residence on Large Road, a road that runs between Mansura and La. Hwy 115. Justin Gaspard, 30, of Mansura and a 17-year-old juvenile were arrested immediately after the incident. Investigators said there could be additional arrests as the investigation continues.
In addition to the murders, there were several shooting incidents in which people were wounded and others where there were no injuries. We will not try to note all of them, but will mention a few.
One of those shooting incidents involved murder victim Moore, who was arrested in January in connection with a non-injury drive-by shooting in Simmesport. Moore had
A non-injury shooting incident at the Marksville ballpark while Little League games were being played sent children and parents diving for cover. Counselors were on hand at the elementary school the next day to help children and staff members cope with the trauma of the event. Safety concerns forced the Marksville City Council to ask the School Board to allow the Little League to use the high school’s baseball fields.
It wasn’t just the crimes committed during the year that captured headlines and the public’s attention in 2021. Crimes from the past also earned a place in the Top 10 list.
In April David Anthony Burns, previously of Boyce, was arrested for the October 2004 murder of Courtney Coco. Coco was a 19-year-old college student living in Alexandria when she was killed and her body dumped in a Texas warehouse about 200 miles away. Burns was arrested after witnesses came forward concerning comments he made that revealed details of Coco’s death that had never been made public.
In a case that many believed was a tragic suicide, Dustin Parra was arrested and indicted in October for the June 2014 murder of his wife, Megan Ducote Parra.
Parra, 37, of Pineville, was indicted on a count of 2nd degree murder and a charge of obstruction of justice in connection with the shooting death of his wife. Her death had originally been classified as a suicide, but family members never gave up trying to prove it was murder. He pled not guilty on Dec. 21.
Two individuals were convicted and sentenced to prison for manslaughter in the May 2019 death of Kasey Bigum. Her son, Tristin James, was sentenced to 40 years in prison in February His girlfriend, Hannah Desselle, was sentenced to 24 years in prison in June.
A U.S. Supreme Court ruling that non-unanimous verdicts of major felonies is unconstitutional resulted in a court order to give former Evergreen Police Chief Charles Mayeux a new trial.
Mayeux had been convicted of the March 2015 murder of his wife, Shelly Mayeux, on a 10-2 verdict in September 2017. That conviction was set aside by the U.S. Supreme Court in October 2020. His trial was set for September 2021, but postponed.
The last action in the case was a “show cause” hearing on Dec. 14 as to why charges of aggravated arson and obstruction of justice should not be dismissed. Defense attorney Chad Guillot argued those charges were never prosecuted and should be dismissed due to the length of time since the indictment alleging those offenses was handed down. The purpose of the move was to reduce Mayeux’s bond in hopes that he might be able to be released on bail while awaiting his new trial on the 2nd degree murder charge.
Guillot won his argument. The two charges were dismissed. However, Judge William Bennett ruled that the original bond of $250,000 for the murder charge was too low for the offense and raised it to $500,000.
Mayeux’s retrial is scheduled for Aug. 29.
The “silver lining” of the COVID cloud has been the influx of millions of dollars to keep the economy from collapsing during the depths of the pandemic.
Individuals and families received federal “stimulus” checks. Businesses received financial assistance to enable them to continue hiring employees and to compensate for a loss of business.
The largest single lump sum of this “found money” was in government allocations to the Police Jury, School Board and municipalities.
The American Rescue Plan appropriated $7.5 million to the Police Jury and over $6.1 million to the nine municipalities. The allocation is broken into two parts, with half received by the government entities this year and the other half to be received in 2022.
There are specific conditions on how the money can be spent. For example, much to chagrin of the Police Jury, the money cannot be used on public works projects such as road, bridge and drainage improvements. However, there are several rural water departments’ projects, a sewer improvement project for the Tricia Park subdivision and a program to improve access to broadband internet in rural areas of the parish expected to be funded through the ARP program.
An even larger COVID-related appropriation is the almost $40 million in the Elementary & Secondary School Emergency Relief Fund (ESSER). This federal grant is intended to address learning needs of students caused by the gap in learning due to the COVID pandemic.
It has been used to provide virtual instruction and computer devices for all students when schools were closed or reduced to only half of students on campus at a time. It will also fund summer and Monday academic remediation programs — students are off on Monday in the 4-day school week.
The money is also being used to pay for additional sanitization services, materials and supplies, permanent water stations and several other programs related to bridging the learning gap caused by COVID’s impact on education systems.
Local governments routinely receive grants — sometimes even large grants of $1 million. In addition to any normal grant receipts, there were two more large appropriations out of the ordinary.
One is a $326,000 a year federal grant to the School Board to fund the AWARE program, which will focus on improving mental/behavioral health of students in the school system. This is a five-year program.
AWARE is an acronym for Advancing Wellness and Resiliency in Education.
The other is a lawsuit settlement of $100,000 a year for 18 years, which is the parish’s share of the state’s settlement of its opioid abuse lawsuit against some pharmaceutical companies.
Attorney Derrick “Digger” Earles, who represented the Police Jury and Sheriff’s Office in the suit, said there are other parties who are not included in this settlement. If they settle, or go to trial and a jury orders a judgment, the parish will receive even more money.
Like the ARP funds, though, the settlement money is not a no-strings gift. The money must be used to combat or prevent opioid abuse or treat those affected by opioid abuse.
Stanley Celestine Jr. became the first African-American — and the youngest — School Board president when he was elected on a 5-4 vote in January. Jill Guidry became the first interim board member to be elected a board officer when she became vice president by the same 5-4 vote.
Celestine is 21 and a student at McNeese University. Guidry was appointed to the board in 2020 after Van Kojis resigned for health reasons. She was elected without opposition in a special election earlier this year to finish Kojis’ unexpired term.
The Police Jury broke this particular “color barrier” several years ago when Charles Jones was elected as president. Jones served in that capacity until late 2019 when he gave up the position due to health issues.
Unlike the Police Jury, whose president and vice president can be re-elected for as long as a majority of jurors wants them to, the School Board prohibits presidents and vice presidents from serving consecutive one-year terms.
The U.S. Census was taken in 2020, but the results of that once-a-decade process were reported this year.
The parish population fell to 39,693, down from 42,073 in the 2010 Census. That puts the parish’s population just above where it was in 1940, when there were 39,256 living in the parish.
Most of the parish’s municipalities lost population according to the Census. Many say the Census numbers are wrong, that there were many residents who were uncounted due to the effects of COVID, hurricanes and people just not taking the time to answer the Census survey either by mail, phone or online.
Regardless of whether the numbers are accurate or not, these are the official population figures for the next 10 years.
The “big winners” in population growth were Moreauville, with a 56-resident gain that almost brought the village to the magic number of 1,000 that would allow it to be a town. Cottonport gained 17 in its population count, to 2,023, to cement its place as the parish’s third-largest municipality.
On the other end of the Census numbers, Bunkie dropped from 4,171 to 3,346, a 19.78 percent decline. Although Bunkie still refers to itself as a “city,” it is far below the 5,000 threshold for that designation.
Marksville came very close to dropping below the 5,000 population mark to retain its standing as the parish’s only city, falling from 5,702 to 5,065 residents.
Simmesport had always been in contention with Cottonport for the No. 3 position, but a 32-percent drop in population left the river town’s official count at 1,468, down from 2,161 it had under the 2010 Census.
In addition to changing the ranking of No. 3 and No. 4 among the nine municipalities, the 2020 numbers also changed the order of No. 8 and No. 9.
Evergreen, one of the parish’s oldest incorporated municipalities, lost 95 residents to post an official population of 215. Plaucheville lost only 22, which put its Census count at 221. 10. POLITICAL SPATS
Avoyelles Parish has always had more than its fair share of politics, but for the most part elected boards take care of the public’s business in a cordial, businesslike manner.
Occasionally they don’t. Like the saying goes, “‘Dog bites man’ is not news; ‘Man bites dog’ is.” So when the route of local government takes a detour, it can find its way to the Top 10 list.
The Avoyelles School Board started the year exposing what appeared to be a 5-4 split with the election of officers and a few other issues.
There was never any outspoken animosity between board members, but the emergence of a fairly consistent quintet had observers wondering what the “Gang of Five” might propose and in which direction it would lead.
Then Superintendent Blaine Dauzat retired and left office to use accumulated leave until June 30. Some say the factionalization of the board played a role in his decision.
Dauzat didn’t stay retired long. His retirement took effect June 30 and he accepted the position of St. Mary’s Catholic School’s new principal the same day.
Later in the year there was a shift of factions to the 6-3/white-black split common on past boards. When the new superintendent was appointed, the six white members favored a white woman for the job while the three black members supported a black man for the position.
Since then there has been some disagreements — such as whether to sell undeveloped property at the former Bunkie Middle School or to keep it as part of a package with the remaining unsold buildings on the campus — but no major conflicts along the 5-4 or 6-3 lines.
Whether there will be one or more issues that cause a revival of one of those splits is one thing that will keep people watching the School Board proceedings in 2022.
The Police Jury has had its fair share of juror-on-juror conflicts over the years, but has not been prone to factional politics.
In fact, for most of this past year the parish government was routine and boring. When there were financial problems or issues to be addressed, jurors moved in one accord to seek a solution.
That united front fell apart in October when Juror Bobby Bordelon proposed a resolution declaring Avoyelles Parish a 2nd Amendment sanctuary. The resolution failed on a 4-3 vote with one juror absent and the president exercising his right as chairman not to cast a vote.
Juror Charles Jones became the face of the “anti-2nd Amendment” group. Bordelon labeled Jones and the other three jurors who voted against the “sanctuary” item as “traitors” and called Juror Jacob Coco — who had to be absent due to work obligations — “spineless” for not coming to the meeting.
Jury President Kirby Roy did not cast a vote because the motion would still have failed on a 4-4 vote. He figured he would be able to propose a revised resolution at the next meeting if he were not on the losing end of the vote.
Jones opposed the resolution because of the term “sanctuary.” He said that implies the parish was saying it would not enforce laws that jurors felt somehow infringed on an individual’s right to own firearms. Jones said that would be wrong on principle and would also be merely symbolic because the jury does not have authority to allow individuals to disobey certain laws.
The next month, Coco proposed a revised resolution that eliminated the word “sanctuary” but expressed jurors’ support of the 2nd Amendment rights guaranteeing private gun ownership.
Jones, as a member of the prevailing side in the October vote, made the motion and Coco seconded it. The resolution passed unanimously.
The most long-running political spat of the year was between three Bunkie City Council members on one side and Mayor Bruce Coulon and Police Chief Scott Ferguson on the other.
The issue centered on whether City Council members were entitled to have access to all of the information in the applicants’ applications or if that would be an invasion of the applicants’ privacy. Three council members said they needed that information to make a decision on hiring the individuals while Ferguson and his attorney, Kirk LaCour, argued that vetting applicants is an administrative duty of the police chief and mayor and not within the council’s scope of responsibilities.
For several months, Council members Brenda Sampson, Lem Thomas and Kendricks Johnson refused to approve Ferguson’s recommendations. Coulon would grant an emergency hire of the individuals, which allowed them to work police shifts in between the City Council meetings. At the next meeting, Ferguson’s recommendations would be rejected and individuals would be hired on an emergency basis until the next council meeting.
In November a compromise was reached in which the complete application form would be available in City Hall for council members to review. The information could not leave the building. Council members also have the opportunity to interview job applicants a week before the council meeting to have any questions they may have answered.
That seems to have resolved that issue.
In Marksville the City Council was unable to adopt a new reapportionment plan for the five single-member districts, deadlocking 3-3 on four proposed plans in late 2021, and was facing the possibility of missing a Dec. 23 deadline to have an adopted reapportionment plan to the Secretary of State’s office before qualifying for the March municipal elections opened in January.
Two weeks before that deadline, the council endorsed a fifth plan that was drawn by demographer Mike Hefner less than an hour before the December council meeting.On Dec. 13 it was officially adopted.
Plan 5 satisfied District 5 Councilman Clyde Benson’s desire to have a specific neighborhood remain in his district while also meeting other council members’ desire that the districts use as many visible boundary lines as possible, such as streets and natural boundaries.
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