PUBLIC NOTICE FROM WINNFIELD FIRE CHIEF BRIAN MONTGOMERY

Over the next three weeks the Winnfield City Fire Department will be conducting fire hydrant flow test.

These tests are done for a couple of reasons:

  1. The test assures that the hydrant is working properly in the event that it is needed for an emergency.
  2. The fire department is required by the Property Insurance Association of Louisiana to ensure that flow test and pressures readings are obtained once a year.

The Winnfield Fire Department appreciates our residents consideration as we conduct these tests.

Thanks,
Chief Montgomery


Winnfield Police Department Arrest Report – UPDATED

City of Winnfield Police Department

Name: Brannon Hayes
Date: 9-20-21
Address: Winnfield, LA
Race: White
Sex: Male
Charge: Illegal Possession of Stolen Things

Name: John Lee Thomas
Date: 9-25-21
Address: Baton Rouge, LA
Race: Black
Sex: Male
Charge: Warrant – Simple Burlgary X 2

Name: Austin B. Lawson
Date: 9-26-21
Address: Winnfield, LA 
Race: White
Sex: Male
Charge: Unauthorized Entry of Inhabited Place


Shop with a Cop Bike Ride and Barbecue Raises Money for Less Fortunate Children Christmas Shopping Spree

By: Bob Holeman

Some 30 motorcyclists from across the region took part Saturday, Sept. 25, when the Winnfield City Police sponsored its fifth annual Shop with a Cop bike ride and barbecue, one of a series of events held to raise money for this event that helps children at Christmas time.

This particular event has grown from its inception five years ago with the exception of 2020 which was lightly attended due to COVID concerns.

Shop with a Cop sees about 100 local children go on a shopping spree at Wall Mart, accompanied by a police officer, without parents to influence what toys to buy or not buy. Local schools select the children most needing of the Shop with a Cop support.

In photo, most of the riders had already walked over to the City Police complex to enjoy their lunch. This group from Jonesboro was still around their bikes when the photographer arrived and agreed to the photo.

Anyone wishing to support this program for kids should contact Michelle Nugent at 318-413-0344.


Winn Parish Sheriff’s Office Arrest Report

Name: Christopher Andrew Harder
Date: 9-22-21
Age: 49
Race: White
Sex: Male
Charge: Disturbing the Peace

Name: Stylen D. Wise
Date: 9-23-21
Age: 18
Race: White
Sex: Male
Charge: Illegal Possession of Stolen things

Name: Marvin Ray Evans
Date: 9-24-21
Age: 38
Race: Black
Sex: Male
Charge: Aggravated Assalt with a Firearm, Resisting an Officer by Flight

Name: Xavier Dandre Wyatt
Date: 9-24-21
Age: 24
Race: Black
Sex: Male
Charge: Stalking


Register Now – Applied Suicide Intervention Skills Training (ASIST) Interactive Workshop in Winnfield Oct. 5-6

SaveCenla, a nonprofit organization focused on providing the public with information and events that will promote mental health awareness and suicide prevention, is hosting a two-day Applied Suicide Intervention Skills Training (ASIST) interactive workshop October 5 – 6, from 8 AM – 4:30 PM both days at CLTCC in Winnfield located at 5960 US-167, Winnfield, LA 71483. There is no cost to register. 

ASIST is a two-day interactive workshop in suicide first aid. ASIST teaches participants to recognize when someone may have thoughts of suicide and work with them to create a plan to support their immediate safety. Although healthcare providers widely use ASIST, participants don’t need formal training to attend the workshop—anyone 16 or older can learn and use the ASIST model.

​Since its development in 1983, ASIST has received regular updates to reflect improvements in knowledge and practice. As a result, over 2,000,000 people have taken the workshop. In addition, studies show that the ASIST method helps reduce suicidal feelings in those at risk and is a cost-effective way to help address the problem of suicide. 

Saving Lives from Suicide

Thoughts of suicide are surprisingly common. At any given time, around 1 in 25 people is thinking about suicide to some degree.

For most people, thinking about suicide isn’t about wanting to die. Instead, it’s the tension between their reasons for staying alive and their desire to escape from the pain that feels unbearable.

Within this tension lies the risk of death and the possibility of intervention, hope, and life. This is where someone with the right skills can help tip the balance and change a life forever. This is where LivingWorks training comes in.

For more information on the ASIST two-day training, click here.

Register for the two-day workshop in Winnfield, La here.


Remember This? The General Plot

By: Brad Dison

In 1945, General inherited a large multilevel house which was in disrepair.  The wooden structure was in danger of collapsing and the masonry was crumbling.  The floors creaked and swayed, especially when walked on.  The light fixtures in the lower rooms swayed when someone walked on the floors above.  One light fixture in the house seemed to be lower with each passing day.  General referred to the creaking and moaning of the house’s rotting timbers as ghosts.  General had an architect inspect the house who remarked that “the beams [in the house] are staying up there from force of habit only.”  The house was in danger of collapsing.  The last straw came in June of 1948 when a leg of a piano crashed through an upper floor and through the ceiling of the dining room.  In November of 1949, General moved into a residence nearby so that the house he inherited could be reconstructed.  The house had too much sentimental value for it to be demolished.

Not everyone liked General.  In fact, some people wanted to kill General and he knew it.  For this reason, General surrounded himself with bodyguards, some of which were police officers.

At about 2:15 on the afternoon of November 1, 1950, two men, Griselio Torresola and Oscar Collazo, set a plan into motion to murder General.  They had learned that General had moved into the temporary residence.  Griselio approached the residence from the west side, while Oscar approached from the east.  Police officer Donald Birdzell stood on the front steps of the residence.  Oscar, with pistol in hand, snuck up behind the Birdzell and pulled the trigger.  Snap!!!  Oscar had forgotten to chamber a round in his pistol.  Birdzell turned as Oscar chambered a round.  Oscar fired the pistol and struck Birdzell in his right knee.  As Oscar approached the steps which led to the front door, another bodyguard stepped out of the residence and shot Oscar in the chest.  Oscar collapsed and writhed in pain at the foot of the steps.

Meanwhile, on the west side of the residence, Griselio shot police officer Leslie Coffelt four times at close range.  He turned his pistol on policeman Joseph Downs and shot him three times.  Griselio shot officer Birdzell in his other knee.  Griselio had no more rounds in the gun and stopped to reload.  General, who had been taking a nap on the second floor, peered out of a window directly over the front door to see what the commotion was.  General was a First World War combat veteran and was not frightened by the gunfire.  People yelled for General to get away from the window.  He obeyed their command.  At that moment, Coffelt, though severely injured, fired a single shot at Griselio before falling to the ground unconscious.  The bullet from Coffelt’s pistol struck Griselio in the head and killed him instantly. 

When the shooting was over, three guards were wounded including 40-year-old Leslie Coffelt, who died later that evening during surgery.  Oscar survived and spent the next 29 years in prison.  In an interview with Time magazine about the murder plot, General calmly said, “the only thing you have to worry about is bad luck.”  General grinned and said, “I never have bad luck.”  General remarked that he was unafraid because he “had been shot at by professionals” during the First World War.

Although the shooting lasted less than a minute, General survived a murder attempt in what was described as “the biggest gunfight in Secret Service history.”  You see, the house General inherited was the White House.  General was the Secret Service’s code name for… President Harry Truman.

Sources:

  1. The Philadelphia Inquirer, November 2, 1950, p.1.
  2. Mahan, Sydney. “66 Years Ago Today, President Truman Survived an Assassination Attempt at Blair House.” Washingtonian. November 1, 2016. https://www.washingtonian.com/2016/11/01/president-truman-assassination-attempt-blair-house/
Photo caption:  The entrance to General’s temporary residence (1) where one of the would-be assassins was wounded.  The other tumbled into bushes (2), fatally shot.  Shots were fired from sentry box (3) at the gunmen while two guards were wounded in the other box (4).  A guard on duty at the entrance steps was wounded and stumbled into the street (5). General appeared at window (6).

My Opinion – Let’s Not Abandon Our Constitution to The Administrative State

The U.S. Constitution is the rarest, most extraordinary governing document of all time and, with the exception of the Bible, has had the greatest impact of any written work in human history.   That’s because it contains the formal enshrinement, guarantee and protection of the precious rights and liberties we hold and cherish as individuals and citizens.  Perhaps most importantly, it stands as the bulwark of freedom against any and all encroachments and infringements by government upon those sacred rights.

Our Constitution is premised upon the transcendent belief that these unalienable, fundamental rights flow from natural law and do not flow from—are not given or bequeathed to us by—government.  Rather, they are God-given rights and, as such, we view them as intrinsic to and inherent in every human being.  We possess them merely based upon the fact of our birth (many of us believe deeply they should be extended to unborn babies, as well).

Further, as we know, the Constitution prescribes both the explicit powers and express limitations of government.  And, one of the painstakingly crafted provisions is found in Article 1, Section 1 which clearly states that “all legislative Powers herein granted shall be vested in a Congress of the United States, which shall consist of a Senate and House of Representatives.”  Another carefully written provision involves Article 1, Section 7 which mandates that “every bill which shall have passed the House of Representatives and the Senate shall, before it become a law, be presented to the President of the United States.”

That, in summary form, is how laws are legitimately made in this country.  Well, that began to change dramatically with the start of massive federal spending and accompanying massive government programs.  Franklin Roosevelt’s New Deal was the beginning of this change but LBJ’s Great Society also sparked enormous growth of federal government spending and the creation of equally enormous federal programs.  This unprecedented federal spending and these huge programs had to be administered and this is what gave rise to the oppressive administrative state we live in today.

Well, this expansive administrative state—and the huge federal agencies that comprise it—are unconstitutional.  Why is that? Because these agencies and the career bureaucrats who run them are unknown, faceless and were never elected to anything.  Yet, they are making and enforcing laws upon the American people!  They make policy decisions every day that affect millions of Americans.

The issue is well stated here: “The Founders understood that there are two fundamental ways in which government can exercise its authority.  The first is a system of arbitrary rule, where the government decides how to act on an ad hoc basis, leaving decisions up to the whim of whatever official or officials happen to be in charge; the second way is to implement a system grounded in the rule of law, where legal rules are made in advance and published, binding both government and citizens and allowing the latter to know exactly what they have to do or not to do in order to avoid the coercive authority of the former.”  (Heritage Foundation, Ronald Pestritto).

Well, we chose the second way!  We opted for the rule of law which affords guarantees like notice, due process and equal protection of the laws to every citizen—a process designed to insure what we have come to call “fundamental fairness.”  Further, we govern ourselves in an equally predictable manner: we elect our President and our U.S. Senators and U.S. Representatives to implement in policy and law the will of the American people.  These elected officials are accountable to us because their every official action is heavily and constantly scrutinized and, in the next election, we may throw them out of office (of course, this assumes we have free and fair elections) and elect someone else when we feel our political will is not being honored.

There is no place in our constitutional scheme for powerful federal agencies who decide what the laws applicable to their agencies mean—they interpret statutes for themselves—and, unfortunately, the U.S. Supreme Court and lower federal courts, through the ill-advised legal doctrine of Chevron Deference, have given up their most important role—interpreting statutes and adjudicating agency disputes—instead choosing to defer to “agency expertise.”  The reason this is so dangerous is because a federal agency—like, for example, the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA)—has often abused its authority and been dictatorial in its view of its own power while being largely unaccountable to the Congress.

For example, the EPA, in conjunction with the Army Corps of Engineers, has jurisdiction under the Clean Water Act to regulate “navigable waters” which are defined as “the waters of the United States, including the territorial seas.”  (The Rivers and Harbors Act is often dubiously used also).  The dispute is almost always about what qualifies as “navigable water.”  Well, in the past, unsurprisingly, the EPA and the Corps have tried to expand their authority by implementing an agency rule that would define “navigable waters” as even including all ditches—any ditch, even a man-made ditch—in a farmer’s field, for example.  It even includes depressions or low points in a field that are dry most of the time except when it rains.  (Heritage Foundation, Daren Bakst).  This is insane.

This also means that if the EPA and Corps are not checked and reined in but continue to expand their authority over more waters, property owners will have to secure additional permits to use their own land!  They will have to get permission from federal bureaucrats to use and enjoy their property because of the presence of so-called “navigable waters” that were never intended to be regulated under the Clean Water Act.  If property owners don’t comply with the law, they can even face civil penalties as high as $37,500 per day per violation, or even criminal penalties. (Id.)

This is what is most concerning about the burgeoning growth of the administrative state in our country.  There is no accountability.  Ultimately the Congress is going to have to stop deferring—whether due to laziness or timidity—to these powerful federal agencies (who often have their own agendas) and reassert its authority to define what terms like “navigable waters” mean.  One of the most hallowed rights of all—private property rights—are at stake.  Congress must act to correct these kinds of agency abuses and, in the meantime, the federal courts—whose duty and province is emphatically to “say what the law is” (Marbury)—must stop deferring to these agencies and interpret these statutes for themselves.  Otherwise, we are not adhering to the rule of law in our constitutional scheme.

The views and opinions expressed in the My Opinion article are those of the authors and do not necessarily reflect the official policy or position of The Winn Parish Journal. Any content provided by the authors are of their opinion and are not intended to malign any religion, ethnic group, club, organization, company, individual or anyone or anything.


Notice of Death September 28, 2021

NATCHITOCHES:
Deborah Rikard Gay
August 13, 1950 – September 27, 2021
Arrangements TBA

Williw Lee (Moody) Taylor
September 19, 1945 – September 23, 2021
Service: Saturday, October 2 at 11 am at the North Star Baptist Church, located at 734 Hwy. 485 in Powhatan

Cedric Glynn Lonadier
July 14, 1955 – September 25, 2021
Service: Wednesday, September 29, 2021 at 10 am at St. Maurice Cemetery in St. Maurice

Charlotte Walraven Constable
November 5, 1951 – September 24, 2021
Service: Wednesday, September 29 at 10 am at Warren Meadows Funeral Home Chapel

Linda Marie Willis
May 26, 1957 – September 19, 2021
Service: Saturday, October 2 at 9:30 am at the Baptist Cemetery in Allen

Detre Willis
March 28, 1972 – September 22, 2021
Service: Sunday, October 3 at 11 am in the Winnfield Memorial Funeral Home Chapel, located at 318 North Street in Natchitoches

Joseph Lynch
September 20, 2021
Service: Saturday, October 2 at 2 pm at the Winnfield Memorial Funeral Home Chapel, located at 318 North Street in Natchitoches

James Clark
September 21, 2021
Service: Saturday, October 2 in the Winnfield Memorial Funeral Home Chapel, located at 318 North Street in Natchitoches

Felenn Sowell
September 08, 2021
Arrangements TBA

Minnie Johnson
September 04, 2021
Arrangements TBA


Register Now – Applied Suicide Intervention Skills Training (ASIST) Interactive Workshop in Winnfield Oct. 5-6

SaveCenla, a nonprofit organization focused on providing the public with information and events that will promote mental health awareness and suicide prevention, is hosting a two-day Applied Suicide Intervention Skills Training (ASIST) interactive workshop October 5 – 6, from 8 AM – 4:30 PM both days at CLTCC in Winnfield located at 5960 US-167, Winnfield, LA 71483. There is no cost to register. 

ASIST is a two-day interactive workshop in suicide first aid. ASIST teaches participants to recognize when someone may have thoughts of suicide and work with them to create a plan to support their immediate safety. Although healthcare providers widely use ASIST, participants don’t need formal training to attend the workshop—anyone 16 or older can learn and use the ASIST model.

​Since its development in 1983, ASIST has received regular updates to reflect improvements in knowledge and practice. As a result, over 2,000,000 people have taken the workshop. In addition, studies show that the ASIST method helps reduce suicidal feelings in those at risk and is a cost-effective way to help address the problem of suicide. 

Saving Lives from Suicide

Thoughts of suicide are surprisingly common. At any given time, around 1 in 25 people is thinking about suicide to some degree.

For most people, thinking about suicide isn’t about wanting to die. Instead, it’s the tension between their reasons for staying alive and their desire to escape from the pain that feels unbearable.

Within this tension lies the risk of death and the possibility of intervention, hope, and life. This is where someone with the right skills can help tip the balance and change a life forever. This is where LivingWorks training comes in.

For more information on the ASIST two-day training, click here.

Register for the two-day workshop in Winnfield, La here.


Rotary Club of Winnfield Learns About Suicide Prevention and Intervention

“On the night of January 31, 2018, I climbed to the top the Purple Heart bridge [over the Red River between Pineville and Alexandria] and stood there for nine minutes, telling myself if one person stops and tries to help, I won’t jump. But over 100 cars crossed the bridge and no one stopped to help.” The personal testimony of Kyah Iles is dramatic and heartbreaking. No one stopped to help; someone did call 9-1-1, and a police officer came to the scene. His method of intervention was to leave his patrol unit, run toward her as fast as he could as she stood poised to jump, and yell “STOP!” She jumped.

Fortunately for Ms. Iles, her husband and young son, and the citizens of Central Louisiana, her outcome was different from the outcome of 98% of all people who jump off bridges to end their lives. The 98% succeed in ending their lives—Ms. Iles did not; she fractured a wrist and suffered hypothermia, but she was rescued from the frigid waters and lived to give her testimony about her struggle with mental illness to help others suffering from similar mental health disorders.

The guest speaker of Rotarian Lee J. Taylor, Ms. Iles, at the age of 27, is a suicide survivor, a suicide interventionist, a suicide prevention and intervention trainer, and a crisis intervention trainer. Today she trains law enforcement officers NOT to run toward and yell at a person poised to commit suicide. She works for the Central Louisiana Human Services District, which provides mental health treatment, treatment for substance abuse disorders, and support and services for those with developmental disabilities.

Iles related the story of her youth, when she had a good home life, made good grades in school, was heavily involved in school activities as well as extracurricular leadership activities, such as RYLA [Rotary Youth Leadership Awakening]. On the surface, she appeared to be a well-adjusted, happy, and productive teenager, always smiling and cheerful, but she was not. She was in pain psychologically because she had a mental illness called bipolar disorder with psychotic features.

She was 16 when first hospitalized for treatment of her condition at Brentwood Hospital in Shreveport. She perceived that, in contrast with the other teenagers in Brentwood at the time, she had no reason to have mental health disorder, because she was raised in a happy well-ordered family by Christian parents. When she was discharged and returned to school, she covered up her problem and said she had been “on vacation with her family.”

Ms. Iles went on the graduate from high school and attended NSU in Natchitoches. At this time, although she had been prescribed medication to help control her brain chemistry and her mental health disorder, she was not taking her meds because, as she told herself, she “didn’t need them,” she was “trusting God to take care of her.” Little did she know at that time that, although she seemed to be functioning well and had almost completed the requirements to obtain her bachelor’s degree, her mental health disorder was worsening. One day as she was walking across campus, she suffered a mental breakdown, was detained by campus security, handcuffed and removed from campus in a patrol unit. Northwestern administration sent a letter to her which said she could not return to campus without written clearance to do so from her doctors. Her doctors would not provide the required written clearance, so she left school.

Kyah started her own business and got married. After giving birth to a son, she suffered from severe postpartum depression. During this time, she had electroconvulsive therapy (ECT), which is much changed from the way “shock treatment” was performed in latter part of the 20th century—the late 1900’s. However, it did not improve her condition significantly.

On January 31, 2018, when her son was two-years-old, Ms. Iles was still suffering from pain due to bipolar disorder, she went about her day as normal until that night when she went to the bridge. At that time, all she could think of was the need “to stop the pain,” the same motivation as any other suicide victim. She said someone ends his life by jumping from the Purple Heart Bridge across the Red River every two years, although the public rarely learns of it. Indeed, although her jump from the bridge was publicized, she was not identified, and her friends were unaware of her suicide attempt.

Surviving her attempted suicide was a turning point for Kyah. She was tired of being in pain, covering up, smiling and pretending to be alright, so she shared her story on social media, got it out into the public eye, and it was shared over 1000 times. “I turned my mess into a message,” she says, and she began to feel better, to acknowledge she had a brain disorder and would not get better without taking her medications. She began taking her medication as prescribed and devoting herself to trying to help others in the same situation. She acknowledged that a mental health disorder is the same as any other chronic disease like diabetes, high blood pressure, arthritis, requiring medication to ease the pain, and started working to get this message to others who are in pain due to mental health disorders.

Suicide is the second leading cause of death of persons between the ages of 14 and 24. Ms. Iles urges everyone to recognize that mental health problems stem from physical imbalances in the brain, that many people suffer pain from such illnesses, and that we should all think of and treat such disorders in the same way—they are a normal part of life for many people, and we must all understand this and acknowledge it in the way we treat those around us who are burdened with mental health disorders, by treating them the same as we do those who have other chronic diseases. We must look beneath the superficial appearance and masks people wear and try to discern if the person who tells us he or she is fine, okay, alright, really IS alright. We must stop viewing such illnesses as if they are something of which the patient should be ashamed, so as to eliminate the need to hide it and cover it up.

If a mental health disorder goes untreated, the person suffering with the disorder is at high risk of suicide, and we must see depression, bipolar disorder and other mental illnesses as common, not shameful. We must encourage those around us who are struggling with mental health disorders to speak up about it, to get treatment and to reach out for support from those around them.

Ms. Iles spoke to the Rotary Club to publicize the suicide prevention and intervention workshop she will be leading here in Winnfield at the Central Louisiana Community and Technical College on October 5 and 6, 2021. The local training was inspired by recent events in this community resulting in the deaths of two teenagers at their own hands; concerned citizens in the parish recognized that the people of our community need to learn how to identify or recognize signs and symptoms of mental health issues, suicidal thoughts and plans, prevention of both development of suicidal thoughts and attempts, and how to intervene in such plans and actions.

The Applied Suicide Intervention Skills Training [ASIST] course is a two-day, two-trainer training program that teaches participants in the course how to assist those at risk for suicide. There will be no charge for taking the training, and anyone can get more information or sign up for the course at CLTCC or on the website.

The resources available for suicide prevention and intervention as developed to date should be in our schools, our churches, extracurricular and civic organizations. Every effort must be made to get the information and resources out to all parents, grandparents, teachers, mentors, club and team leaders, church leaders. Moreover, the stigma and shame attached to mental health problems must be eliminated from all cultures.

After audience questions were answered by Ms. Iles, the meeting was adjourned with the Rotary motto, “Service above self!”

Pictured above: Rotarian Bob Holeman, Kyah Iles, Rotarian Kim Nation


Know Before You Vote – Constitutional Amendments on November 13th Ballot Explained

Winn Parish voters will go to the polls on November 13 to cast ballots on four statewide constitutional amendments.

Gov. John Bel Edwards signed an executive order on Sept. 9 formally delaying the upcoming fall elections in Louisiana, following severe damage from Hurricane Ida in southeast Louisiana, which would make holding the election difficult and could lead to challenges for displaced voters.

According to the Secretary of State’s office:

  • The deadline to register to vote in person or by mail is Oct. 13. 
  • The deadline to register to vote through the GeauxVote Online Registration System is Oct. 23. 
  • Early voting is Oct. 30 through Nov. 6 (excluding Sunday, Oct. 31) from 8:30 a.m.-6 p.m. 
  • The deadline to request an absentee ballot is Nov. 9 by 4:30 p.m. You can request an absentee ballot online through our Voter Portal or in writing through your Registrar of Voters Office (other than military and overseas voters). 
  • The deadline for a registrar of voters to receive a voted absentee ballot is Nov. 12 by 4:30 p.m. (other than military and overseas voters).

The four amendments on the ballot are:

Proposed Amendment No. 1 (Act 131 of the 2021 Regular Session of the Louisiana Legislature proposing to add Article VII, Section 3.1 to the Louisiana Constitution.) 

“Do you support an amendment to authorize the legislature to provide for the streamlined electronic filing, electronic remittance, and the collection of sales and use taxes levied within the state by the State and Local Streamlined Sales and Use Tax Commission and to provide for the funding, duties, and responsibilities of the commission?”

House Speaker Clay Schexnayder spoke to the Rotary Club of Winnfield earlier this year regarding  Proposed Amendment No. 1. If passed, he said the amendment would create a State and Local Streamlined Sales and Use Tax Commission to “provide for the streamlined electronic filing, electronic remittance and the collection of sales and use taxes levied within the state,” according to the bill.

Proposed Amendment No. 2(Act 134 of the 2021 Regular Session of the Louisiana Legislature proposing to amend Article VII, Section 4(A) of the Louisiana Constitution.)

“Do you support an amendment to lower the maximum allowable rate of individual income tax and to authorize the legislature to provide by law for a deduction for federal income taxes paid?” 

Proposed Amendment No. 3(Act 132 of the 2021 Regular Session of the Louisiana Legislature proposing to amend Article VI, Section 39 of the Louisiana Constitution.)

“Do you support an amendment to allow levee districts created after January 1, 2006, and before October 9, 2021, whose electors approve the amendment to levy an annual tax not to exceed five mills for the purpose of constructing and maintaining levees, levee drainage, flood protection, and hurricane flood protection?” 

Proposed Amendment No. 4(Act 157 of the 2021 Regular Session of the Louisiana Legislature proposing to amend Article VII, Section 10(F)(2)(a) and (b) of the Louisiana Constitution.)

“Do you support an amendment to increase the amount of allowable deficit reductions to statutory dedications and constitutionally protected funds from five percent to ten percent?”

To find out more about each amendment and what a yes or no vote means click below.


Winn Parish School Board Committee Meetings Today

Winn Parish School Board Committees will meet Monday, September 27, 2021, at 5:00 p.m. in the meeting room of the Winn Parish School Board. 

Executive

Todd Matin
Matt Walton
Joe Lynn Browning

Academic and Instruction

Joe Llaine Long
Leah Clingan
Patrick Howell
Harry Scott
Brandon DuBois

Finance and Budget

Christy Harrell
Michelle Carpenter
Patrick Howell
Joe Llaine Long
Brandon DuBois

WINN PARISH SCHOOL BOARD
Committee Meeting Agenda
September 27, 2021

Academic and Instruction– Long, Clingan, Howell, Scott, DuBois
1. Louisiana Comeback

Finance and Budget – Hanell, Carpenter, Howell, Long, DuBois
1. School Lunch Prices

Executive – Martin, Walton, Browning
1. Contract for Demographic Services
2. Set Agenda


Notice of Death September 26, 2021

NATCHITOCHES:
Linda Marie Willis
May 26, 1957 – September 19, 2021
Service: Saturday, October 2 at 9:30 am at the Baptist Cemetery in Allen

George Harold Puryear
March 10, 1931 – September 17, 2021
George will be laid to rest alongside several generations of the Puryear family in Mt. Pleasant Cemetery in Holly Springs, MS on Saturday, September 25, 2021 with a graveside ceremony. There will be memorial services at the First Baptist Church of Marrero, LA (his home church) and Trinity Episcopal Church in Natchitoches, LA at a later date.

Lomma Peter Sarpy, Jr.
June 08, 1954 – September 21, 2021
Service: Monday, September 27 at 7 pm in the chapel of Blanchard-St. Denis Funeral Home

Detre Willis
March 28, 1972 – September 22, 2021
Service: Sunday, October 3 at 11 am in the Winnfield Memorial Funeral Home Chapel, located at 318 North Street in Natchitoches

Joseph Lynch
September 20, 2021
Service: Saturday, October 2 at 2 pm at the Winnfield Memorial Funeral Home Chapel, located at 318 North Street in Natchitoches

James Clark
September 21, 2021
Service: Saturday, October 2 in the Winnfield Memorial Funeral Home Chapel, located at 318 North Street in Natchitoches

Felenn Sowell
September 08, 2021
Arrangements TBA

Minnie Johnson
September 04, 2021
Arrangements TBA

SABINE:
Rickey Lane Malmay
January 17, 1970 – September 23, 2021
Service: Tuesday, September 28 at 10 am at St. Ann Catholic Church