Stage set for parish to sue BP

The St. Tammany Parish Council has agreed to sue BP and any other parties responsible for damages related to last April's oil spill in the Gulf of Mexico.

The council voted unanimously, with Chris Canulette and Ken Burkhalter absent, to file the lawsuit late Thursday night following an executive session with Kelly Rabalais, legal counsel to President Kevin Davis, council administrator Mike Sevante said.

Rabalais told the council that the parish primarily wants to preserve its right to sue for damages related to the spill that it could incur in the future, Sevante said. Should the parish fail to file suit before the one-year anniversary of the spill -- April 20 -- it could forfeit its right to do so later, Sevante said.

Rabalais deferred comment Friday afternoon to Suzanne Parsons Stymiest, the parish's spokeswoman. Stymiest said the parish has directed its outside counsel -- Walter Leger Jr. and Tom Thornhill -- to litigate the matter as necessary to protect St. Tammany Parish and its people.

She noted that the suit likely would be consolidated with hundreds of other lawsuits filed in the wake of the spill as part of the multidistrict litigation to be heard in U.S. District Court in New Orleans.

The suit will attempt to assess the economic issues related to the spill, such as the cleanup costs and the damage to the parish, as well as any health issues, particularly those involving mental health, Stymiest said.

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Jindal, congressmen call for delay of remap

With just days remaining in the Legislature's post-census redistricting session, five Republican members of Louisiana's congressional delegation and Gov. Bobby Jindal are calling for state lawmakers to postpone drawing new U.S. House districts until 2012.

The request for postponement first became public Saturday in a letter from the congressmen to the governor. Jindal's chief of staff, Timmy Teepell, said the governor also supports waiting until next year.

The development increases the likelihood that the Legislature will conclude the session, which by law must end by Wednesday, without reaching a resolution on how to realign the state's current seven congressional districts into six.

The letter also ratchets up the tensions in a process already fraught with competing regional, party, racial and incumbent interests, and featuring rare public spats among the state's GOP congressmen, who often walk lockstep on questions of policy.

The five congressmen -- Rodney Alexander, R-Quitman; Bill Cassidy, R-Baton Rouge; John Fleming, R-Minden; Jeff Landry, R-New Iberia; and Steve Scalise, R-Jefferson -- did not mention in their letter the increasingly acrimonious debate over how to redraw the district boundaries.

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Will redistricting be postponed?

BATON ROUGE — With less than 72 hours remaining in the Legislature’s special redistricting session, five of the state’s seven congressmen have asked the governor and state lawmakers to give up on attempts to redraw Louisiana’s congressional boundaries for at least a year.

Now is not the time to rush through a congressional plan with so many fiscal issues waiting to be addressed,” the congressmen wrote in the letter dated Friday and obtained by The Courier and Daily Comet. “We also feel that the people of Louisiana should have more time to think about their future and their needs and how those needs could be affected by congressional redistricting.”

Terrebonne and Lafourche’s congressman, U.S. Rep. Jeff Landry, R-New Iberia, signed the letter, along with U.S. Reps. Bill Cassidy, R-Baton Rouge, Rodney Alexander, R-Quitman, Steve Scalise, R-Metairie, and John Fleming, R-Minden. State lawmakers will weigh the request when they reconvene Monday, the Associated Press reported.


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