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Interim Mayor Dusty Yates says the St. George government has adopted most of its ordinances and appointed a planning and zoning commission, board of adjustments, emergency management team and a home rule charter commission.
Yates, speaking at Monday’s Press Club meeting, highlighted the city government’s work over the last two months as a fully operational entity.
“One of the things that we believed in from the beginning of St. George was that we wanted a different governing structure,” Yates says. “We wanted to be different from not just what exists in the city-parish but also in many places in Louisiana. We must go through the home rule charter process.”
The Home Rule Charter Commission has met a few times and will work on the city’s constitution over the next several months before presenting it to the City Council. Once the council approves it, Yates says the home rule charter is expected to be placed on the same ballot in March along with the municipal races.
City officials are looking to develop a council-manager form of government, different from the mayor-council form of government in East Baton Rouge Parish and many other municipalities.
In a council-manager form of government, the manager is the chief administrative officer for the city. Yates says the council would appoint a city manager to handle the city’s day-to-day operations. He says the process of bringing in a city manager would likely start after the spring municipal elections.
The St. George Council selected a demographer who determined the city will have five districts, although it still needs to be determined whether the council will have at-large members. Numbers from the demographer, based on the 2020 census, put St. George’s population at 80,600. The city’s makeup is 68% white and 32% minority, according to Yates.
The city is also nearing the completion of an RFP for government services.
Yates says the parish is unique in that residents are already paying for BREC, EMS and library services through property taxes.
“All those services will continue, and the sheriff’s office and fire department will continue. The bulk of the services that we’ll take over from the city-parish are DPW related; street maintenance, road maintenance and things like that.”
St. George’s first planning and zoning meeting is tonight at 6. The council meeting is scheduled for Tuesday at 5 p.m. at City Hall, 141000 Airline Highway.
