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The following are the radio dispatch logs from the Morgan City Police Department. To report unlawful or suspicious activity, call the police department at 985-380-4605.
Monday, March 2
8 a.m., 600 block Aucoin, animal.
8:17 a.m., Morgan City Junior High, juvenile problem.
8:42 a.m., 200 block of Onstead, animal.
8:47 a.m., 800 block of Youngs, alarm.
9:42 a.m., Morgan City Police Department, complaint.
9:54 a.m., 5000 block Railroad, animal.
10:05 a.m., 1500 block Sixth, abandoned bike
10:33 a.m., U.S. 90 West, cones in road.
10:40 a.m., 3000 block Catherine, theft.
11:39 a.m., 300 block Egle, theft.
11:4 a.m., 500 block Brashear, disturbance.
1:05 p.m., Florida Street, suspicious person.
1:29 p.m., Duke and Seventh, medical.
1:39 p.m., U.S. 90 West, debris in road.
1:44 p.m., 200 block Arizona, standby.
2:22 p.m., First and Freret, suspicious person.
2:28 p.m., Dale and Amber, abandoned bike.
3:31 p.m., 300 block Franklin, standby
4:16 p.m., Amelia, medical
4:25 p.m., 1000 block Chennault, removal of subject
4:43 p.m., 1100 block crash.
5:22 p.m., 7200 block La. 182, complaint.
6:51 p.m., 2300 block Federal, removal of subject.
7:34 p.m., 1400 block Sandra, alarm.
7:40 p.m., 2400 block Apple, medical.
8:11 p.m., Sixth, complaint.
11:24 p.m., 700 block Sixth, complaint.

The St. Mary School Board’s addition of a five-year term on a half-cent sales tax proposal might not be enough to ease the concerns of state Sen. Bret Allain.

Allain, R-Franklin, is a member of the State Bond Commission, which must approve the sales tax proposition’s inclusion in the May 9 ballot. At a St. Mary Chamber breakfast Wednesday, Allain said he isn’t sure whether he will support the tax after the School Board added the sunset provision at a special meeting Tuesday.

He said he’ll decide what to do about the amended resolution’s call for a tax vote after talking with the treasurer and the School Board.

“Will I stop it from being [placed] on the ballot? I haven’t decided yet,” Allain said.

A quarter-cent tax that limits the proceeds to use for teacher pay, or even employee pay, would win support from the people who now oppose it, Allain said after the meeting.

“They chose to ignore that and go for the half cent,” Allain said after the meeting.

In December, the School Board passed a resolution calling for a May 9 vote on the new half-cent sales tax, which would raise about $4 million a year. The resolution called for the tax to continue “in perpetuity” and said the money would be used for teacher and staff raises and technology enhancements. There was also language allowing use of the money for other purposes determined by the board.

The State Bond Commission deferred action on the School Board’s resolution at a Feb. 20 meeting. At the same meeting, the commission approved a Lafourche Parish School Board proposal for an election on a half-cent tax that includes a term of five years, after which voters would be asked to renew the levy.

At a St. Mary Industrial Group meeting Monday, Allain said he was concerned about enacting the tax in perpetuity. If the School Board insisted, the senator said, he would push for election to be held Nov. 3, when the presidential election is likely to generate a much bigger voter turnout than a proposition-only election May 9.

The School Board responded by amending the resolution to add the five-year limit. The May 9 vote election could still be approved by the State Bond Commission’s three-member Ad Hoc Subcommittee next week.

Proponents say the proposed raises, $3,000 annually for teachers and $1,500 for other staff members, are needed to help the district attract and hold on to teachers. At Tuesday’s School Board meeting, they pointed to the Lafourche school tax election and said St. Mary competes with that parish when it recruits Nicholls State graduates.

School Board President Michael Taylor said the district has maintained a good accountability rating while learning to operate more efficiently.

But the tax proposal has also drawn opposition from those who say it is the wrong move at a time when St. Mary’s economy is trying to recover from a five-year slump.

At Wednesday’s Chamber breakfast, Allain said he has supported teacher raises in the last two legislative sessions.

But he also said the district’s enrollment has dropped by 1,000 students in the last decade.

And the district received ample money for teacher raises from an increase in state Minimum Foundation Program funding, which rose from $5,530 per St. Mary student in 2018-19 to $5,972 in 2019-20, Allain said. That’s $11,000 per classroom.

“If they wanted to give pay raises to teachers, they could have done that,” Allain said.

Live oaks have a strong history in the Gulf South. Before steel, bronze and aluminum alloys were used, U.S. naval ships were built from the strong wood of live oaks. They produce wood that is close-grained, hard and durable, and is one of the heaviest woods that grows natively in America.
This durable wood made it a suitable material for building warships for the Navy. According to the Gulf Islands National Park Service, the U.S.S. Constitution’s inner hull (1795) was built from live oak lumber. And because of its proven resilience in the War of 1812, it earned the name “Old Ironsides.”
The first national tree farm was established in Pensacola, Florida, by President John Quincy Adams and Samuel S. Southland, secretary of the navy, for building and maintaining navy warships. The areas were called live oak tree reservations, and they now remain as national parks. One such national park is the Naval Live Oaks Reservation in Pensa-cola, Florida.
Metal began to replace wood after the American Civil War. Today, oaks still hold an iconic status for resilience in the Gulf South. After devastating hurricanes and floods, it is often our live oaks that remain standing.
A slight controversy surrounds the live oak, however. Is it deciduous? Is it evergreen? Is it semi-evergreen or semi- deciduous? Consult any number of reference books, and you will find it called all of the above.
Live oak (Quercus virginiana) is a very large, slow-growing, long-lived tree. The largest live oak specimen in Louisiana is located in Mandeville and has been named the Seven Sisters Oak. It has a whopping spread of 132 feet and a trunk 37 feet in diameter. One of the oldest live oaks in the South, the Angel Oak, is located in Charleston, South Carolina. It is said to be between 400 to 600 years old.
Many of the plantations in the South and especially in Louisiana, date back to before the American Civil War and have alleyways lined with oak trees that still live today.
William Guion, a natural landscape photographer, documented and wrote a book “Quercus Louisiana: The Splendid Live Oaks of Louisiana.” In the book, he references Edwin Lewis Stephens, the first president of the University of Louisiana at Lafayette.
Stephens created the Live Oak Society and was responsible for planting oak seedlings at the intersection of University Avenue and Johnston Street that are now known as the Century Oaks. He believed the live oak should have been named Quercus louisiana, not virginiana because of vast number of live oaks found in this state.
Back to our controversy — are live oaks evergreen or not? They do keep their leaves year-round, except for a short couple of weeks in late winter or early spring when they shed all of their leaves from last year’s growth and then re-grow their entire canopy.
Simultaneously, as the leaves fall, live oaks produce male flowers called catkins, which produce copious amounts of pollen. The pollen turns the tops of cars, houses and any surface it can stick to a yellow-green powdery mess and creates headaches for allergy sufferers.
The flowers then die back, turn brown and fall to the ground, releasing yet another assault on the ground and surrounding area.
So, yes and no, live oaks are evergreen. They do keep their leaves year-round except for a small window. The leaves that are dropped make a great mulch. Rake them up and put in your compost or recycle them and use them for mulch.
The best time to plant live oaks in fall or winter. The trees have a massive surface root system, so be sure to plant live oaks far away from houses, sidewalks and driveways. The root systems can break foundations as well as concrete sidewalks and driveways. Additionally, live oaks can grow to a substantial height, so also consider overhead power lines.
Another gorgeous characteristic of live oaks is their natural low, sweeping braches that sometime touch the ground. Keep this in mind when planting. They will need lots of room. Try to plant away from streets to prevent having to trim low-growing branches, forcing the trees to grow in an upright, unnatural way.
When they are full grown, live oaks will create a great deal of shade. This will cause an issue for plants and turfgrass growing underneath trees that cannot tolerate shade. St. Augustine and centipede turfgrass are the most shade tolerant.
The shade provided by oak trees can help save cooling energy costs in the summer. Not much maintenance is required. Small trees will take years, maybe your lifetime, to grow to their full potential. It is a wonderful thought to consider leaving a legacy of such a fine oak to be enjoyed in your family generation after generation.
Live oaks are so unique and such an important part of our history. These trees hold human stories connected to the families they have outlived. And some have been here since before the arrival of the first Europeans. Don’t you want to continue that legacy?

Tim Matte, executive director of the St. Mary Levee District, updated Franklin Rotarians Wednesday on current and prospective levee district projects underway in the parish.
Matte first explained the roles of the levee district in conjunction with local drainage districts.
“Our primary responsibility is to keep flood water and storm surge from entering into the system,” he said. “We share the total flood protection responsibilities with drainage districts. The drainage districts’ responsibility is going to be to manage, either on a gravity or a pumping basis, getting the water from rainfall out of the systems. Because once you levee things off, you are creating basins that you cannot naturally drain.
“There is some shared responsibility in that the levee systems and flood protection projects do get constructed with pumping stations, and so we have some shared responsibilities there.”
Matte went on to discuss two particular projects in the west side of the parish.
First, he spoke of the Bayou Teche Closure at Charenton Canal.
He said that when storm surge flows up the Charenton Canal, it floods the Bayou Teche, which in turn breaches its banks.
There is to be installed at the intersection of the Teche and the Charenton Canal a floating barge floodgate to stop the storm surge from intruding on inland property, and will tie-in to a levee accessible from La. 87.
The project is reported to prospectively protect 3,000 structures; prevent damages totaling $98,000,000 in residential, commercial and public structures; and protect $1,000,000 in agriculture.
With a grant from a statewide flood control program, along with bonded funds, the levee district has secured in good faith the project’s total cost of $12,000,000.
Work has begun, according to Matte, and will take place all at once, instead of in phases.
The second project Matte touched on was the Yokely Levee Extension project.
He described Yokely levee as “the federal levee that ends at Industrial Road, at the Charenton Canal, at the South side.”
Matte said the project intends to take earth from high ground, and tie together an existing gap in the levee to the high ground.
This project, like the Teche closure project is designed to stop storm surge from coming up the Charenton Canal, but this time, near the Metal Shark Boats site, to keep the surge from flooding that site and the land beyond, even prospectively down into Franklin itself.
The Yokely is projected to protect 13,489 people in 4,742 households, as well as prevent damages totaling $42,000,000 in residential, commercial and public structures.
Matte also touched on last October’s levee slide, saying that it needed action from the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers, as they are obligated to handle what he called, “big maintenance,” on the levee systems, but they said they would not be able to take any more action other than tarping the affected area until the surrounding water levels go down.
He closed by expressing that the second phase of the Bayou Chene project in Morgan City is being advertised now, and is expected to go out to bid as early as April.
For more information on the St. Mary Levee District, visit www.smld.org.