By Kenneth Cooper
Maybe the mayor should try another approach. Some sort of scare tactic. Approve the firefighters’ millage or sit back while some of them die waiting on their back pay and pension payments.
Too much? Probably. But what’s the alternative, another rejection like the one voters issued in April? Millage fatigue is real. Citizens are suffering from it. When the mayor holds a press conference, some grip their wallets. Not another dime until you show us where the money’s going. Can you blame them? It seems like everything is going up, sales taxes, parking fees, the school board wants more money, so does the NOPD. But what does the city has to show for it, the same ole pot holes, crime infested neighborhoods, boil water advisories and failing schools? Ambivalence is understandable.
But say you’re on the other side of the equation. Your present boss promises you all sorts of financial incentives, a raise maybe, a nice pension payout, but your new boss comes along and is like, I’m not honoring that. Should you not demand your money?
To be clear, this is not totally mayor Landrieu’s fault. He inherited the drama. But the debt has to be paid. On behalf of the city, he can either oversee a miillage increase that rations a $5 million payment over 12 years or temporarily commit to a staggered plan that ends in a budget altering $17 million annual amount.
But say your heart strings are tugged and you’re like, I’m not about to beat a bunch of firefighters out of their money, there’s still another millage to consider. This one is for the sometimes infamous Sewerage & Water Board. In this case, voters are actually being asked to approve a millage decrease, down from 4.66 mills to 4.46, about a $5-$10 dollar difference depending on your property assessment. If the mayor was smart or if the SWB was held in higher regard, the millage could be marketed as a city department vowing to do more with less. Too bad the SWB doesn’t have a record of doing more with more.
As it stands, the city’s streets remain terrible in certain areas and who knows when another boil water advisory will be issued or citizens will be asked to have patience while the street water takes forever to be drained.
That this millage has been around for almost 30 years may be of little consequence. Millage fatigue just might push citizens to an end game scenario where they reject the millage altogether.
Who’d be to blame for that, irrational voters, a city government that’s at times unproductive or unresponsive, both? Who’s to tell?
What is clear is that this is just another example of how convoluted governing a city has become, to the point that serious proposals don’t get the presentation or consideration they deserve.
Jeff Thomas
Publisher • Opinion Columnist • Licensed General Contractor • Real Estate Appraiser • New Orleans
Jeff Thomas is the publisher of Black Source Media and one of New Orleans’ most direct voices on civic affairs, economic justice, and Louisiana politics. He writes from the intersection of experience and accountability — as a licensed general contractor,a tech company founder and executive with over 30 years experience, and a businessman who has worked across the city’s civic, media, and construction ecosystems for decades.
His Sunday column covers Louisiana legislative politics, insurance discrimination, housing policy, and the forces shaping Black community life in New Orleans and across the state. Thomas writes in the tradition of Black journalists who hold power accountable without apology — building arguments from data, delivering verdicts from evidence, and speaking to Black New Orleans with the directness the moment demands.
He is also the principal of Executive Appraisers Louisiana, an MBE-certified real estate appraisal firm, and EA Inspection Services, LLC, a government inspection services company. Black Source Media is his platform for the civic conversation New Orleans has needed and too rarely had.
Selected Articles by Jeff Thomas
Black Neighborhoods Pay the Highest Insurance Rates in Louisiana. Here’s What They Don’t Want You to Know.
They Didn’t Yell the N-Word. They Went to Law School, Bided Their Time, and Rewrote the Constitution Instead.
Vappie vs. Morrell: Why Does Justice Look Different in New Orleans?
The State Has the Money. New Orleans East Just Needs Them to Use It.
The Failure of Mitch Landrieu
Publisher — Black Source Media
Jeff Thomas
Publisher • Opinion Columnist • Licensed General Contractor • Real Estate Appraiser • New Orleans
Jeff Thomas is the publisher of Black Source Media and one of New Orleans’ most direct voices on civic affairs, economic justice, and Louisiana politics. He writes from the intersection of experience and accountability — as a licensed general contractor,a tech company founder and executive with over 30 years experience, and a businessman who has worked across the city’s civic, media, and construction ecosystems for decades.
His Sunday column covers Louisiana legislative politics, insurance discrimination, housing policy, and the forces shaping Black community life in New Orleans and across the state. Thomas writes in the tradition of Black journalists who hold power accountable without apology — building arguments from data, delivering verdicts from evidence, and speaking to Black New Orleans with the directness the moment demands.
He is also the principal of Executive Appraisers Louisiana, an MBE-certified real estate appraisal firm, and EA Inspection Services, LLC, a government inspection services company. Black Source Media is his platform for the civic conversation New Orleans has needed and too rarely had.
Selected Articles by Jeff Thomas
Black Neighborhoods Pay the Highest Insurance Rates in Louisiana. Here’s What They Don’t Want You to Know.
They Didn’t Yell the N-Word. They Went to Law School, Bided Their Time, and Rewrote the Constitution Instead.
Vappie vs. Morrell: Why Does Justice Look Different in New Orleans?
The State Has the Money. New Orleans East Just Needs Them to Use It.
The Failure of Mitch Landrieu