As if the tinted windows were thrown open to let in sunshine and fresh air, the Bossier City Council with its new membership took the first steps towards hauling city governance into the 21st century – and promising more to come, which may lead to a showdown, whether visible, with Republican Mayor Tommy Chandler.
Four new councilors took over from the graybeards that had practiced financial profligacy and insider politics to the hilt. They joined reformist holdovers Republicans Chris Smith and Brian Hammons, leaving only former graybeard ally Vince Maggio as the lone representative of the old guard that had dominated Council proceedings for decades.
The vibe was noticeably different from the start. Over the past term, tension typically hung over Council meetings; replete with instances where Republican former Councilor David Montgomery would launch into an opinionated-drunk-at-the-end-of-the-bar rant when graybeard actions were questioned by citizens or reformist councilors, or votes were taken representing obvious power plays against reform measures that in some instances ended up costing hundreds of thousands of dollars for nothing, or there occurred councilor behavior designed to avoid criticism that bordered on the illegal or unconstitutional -- all of which put both councilors and citizens viewing on edge.
By contrast, the ethos now present was infused with a sense of liberty and inclusiveness that governing would become more participatory and solicitous of the public instead of monopolized by a few. A new frontier seemed on the horizon where governance would occur with public interests first, and not subsumed to private interests.
One immediate clue came from the newly-reappointed Council Clerk Phyllis McGraw’s reading of the public comment preamble, where Council rules had been changed at a second-try special meeting Apr. 17 in order for the graybeards to try to avoid legal consequences attendant to a free speech lawsuit brought by SOBO.live website operator Wes Merriott. In the past, McGraw read the entire relevant part of Council rules. But at this meeting, she read only part of it, leaving out the contentious content of questionable constitutionality. The Council would do well to revise and excise where needed this content immediately to prevent any attempted exercise of the existing language that would subject it to further legal woes.
As well, the Council should act upon a suggestion made by frequent commenter Cassie Rogers, who said the Council could set aside a short portion of time at the start of meetings to allow for citizen comment on matters not on the agenda. This is a common practice among municipalities; in fact, Shreveport’s council has administrative meetings a day prior to its official meeting at which citizens may address any subject they like not on the agenda. Installing a version as Rogers recommended also should be a posthaste rules change.
And few items of business signaled this new direction. One action set up a mechanism to create Council committees, a common practice among municipal plenary bodies, with their meetings in full public view, to replace the graybeard system of informal singular consultations that avoided open meetings law and kept reformist councilors in the dark, to report recommendations for Council actions at its meetings.
Another launched an investigation into perhaps the most public and notorious example of graybeard insider politics to the public’s detriment, for no legitimate reason steering public money to pay for private parking lots. An allied measure would require Council president approval of expensive legal actions that could have prevented that suspect behavior.
As part of that, Hammons got it amended to drop the trigger to require approval to $50,000, in line with state procurement law that municipalities may choose to follow. Bossier City doesn’t currently do this while many political subdivisions do, but that would be the next logical step for it when under the graybeards’ thumbs competitive bidding was disdained in favor of no-bid arrangements.
Another indicator that a new and better day had dawned came in Council debate. While votes ended up unanimously as they almost always did since the start of the century save for the past four years, on a few issues debate from questioning to full-scale articulation of positions – most visibly on an ordinance to allow electronic signage in neighborhoods that passed after lengthy assurances of concerns were met by Metropolitan Planning Commission Executive Director Carlotta Askew-Brown – at a degree or robustness rarely seen over the past quarter-century. In fact, every councilor, and all rookies, engaged in at least one substantive exchange in the meeting – except for Maggio.
Maggio, of course, has a history of speaking little at meetings, perhaps given his lack of articulateness, so perhaps this was unsurprising. And also revealing, in that at the Apr. 22 meeting Maggio voted against a motion just like the one Hammons had amended to require Council vetting of legal expenses, but then on Jul. 1 he voted for it. This suggests that Maggio either is a tool for whichever way the wind blows, which means if traditional political city insiders that the graybeards had represented were counting on him as an entry point to cling to hopes of influence they might be mistaken, or he recognizes his impotence and, after coming extremely close to losing reelection, will go along with the now-solid reformist majority in order to preserve his job.
Yet perhaps the greatest clue as to whether the Council will set off definitively in a direction of reformist change will come in its consideration of appointments by Chandler. As by the city Charter, except for public safety executive branch appointed department heads have terms that begin and end with the mayor’s, requiring new confirmations. The burning question behind all of this is with a new Council which Chandler will citizens see?
Chandler came into office professing reformist sentiments but did next to nothing to put them into action except for articulated support of term limits. This could be explained one of two ways: either Chandler was hamstrung, if not neutered, by the power held by the graybeards and so deferred from making any real policy-making attempts; or, Chandler was only a glad-handing, baby-kissing mayor unable in abilities or unwilling by temperament to exert policy-making influence. Thus, for the next four years is it a matter of a freed Chandler now in a position to join with the Council in policy leadership, or just a business-as-usual tagging along?
One glaring omission to the Council’s meeting this week was no mayoral appointments on the agenda. This is in great contrast to 2021, where at the Council’s first meeting of the term Chandler offered up his (subsequently never acted upon) chief administrative officer – months later, his second choice Amanda Nottingham finally was confirmed – and his city attorney, Charles Jacobs, although it took an additional special meeting days later to work out Jacobs’ confirmation.
Neither act appeared in 2025’s first meeting. While Nottingham’s performance has been uncontroversial, Jacobs’ has attracted heavy criticism for his being involved in every black eye the Council has suffered over the past four years both legally and in publicity, including the parking lot fiasco, costly legal actions that ended in defeat and waste of taxpayer money, he and his assistant Richard Ray backing a widely-loathed and contentious charter review process thinly disguised as an attempt to stave off restrictive term limits trounced eventually at the polls, and displaying a pattern of deception and unfortunate remarks made that the Council shouldn’t tolerate.
Jacobs deservedly should not be reappointed, but if Chandler had had that intent, surely that would have appeared on this week’s agenda which invalidates the “Free Tommy” scenario. That it didn’t hints at some friction between the Council and Chandler, where at least a core amount if not a majority of councilors don’t wish to see him (or Ray; the city attorney appoints his assistant) back. This dynamic may play out with other appointments, with some department heads clearly favorites of the graybeards that the new Council may not be all that jacked about. Indeed, it’s interesting that, after five years of not having one and defaulting all such responsibilities to contractor Waggoner Engineering, after elections but just prior to a new council coming on boards Chandler appointed and the Council confirmed a city engineer.
So, this sets up potential conflict that may not break into open conflict as it did over the CAO selection in 2021, but the presence of which will become obvious if a few appointee changes are made over the coming weeks, and especially if Jacobs receives his walking papers. New faces would signal a Council, and perhaps a mayor, very openly headed in a new and better direction.
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