St. Tammany Parish - Community Involvement

Executive Summary

The St. Tammany Long-Term Community Recovery (LTCR) planning team has engaged the leadership of St. Tammany Parish with task force meetings each Wednesday morning. During the process the sector team leads have visited with the city and parish planning departments, engineering departments, cultural arts department and elected leaders in the community. The LTCR planning team members are engaged with the executives of the St. Tammany Economic Development Foundation, public and private hospitals, educational leaders and housing advocates.

The team developed an email distribution list of more than 75 people to disseminate information as the LTCR team receives the information, resulting in an average of 35 attendees at the Wednesday morning task force meeting.

Housing advocates meet at least once per week on Thursdays to discuss housing needs and the possible sources of viable funding options.

The St. Tammany LTCR staff has been engaged in an average of ten meetings per week with the stakeholders to develop project summaries for the Long-Term Community Recovery Plan. All sector leads have interacted with the department heads of both parish and city governments to present the best project plans. Every elected official in St. Tammany parish has been visited at least once over the past month to discuss their vision for the future of St. Tammany Parish.

Stakeholders  
St. Tammany Parish

• president, chief administrative officer, parish engineer, planning director
• St. Tammany Parish School District superintendent
• Sheriff and communications director

City of Covington

• mayor, city council, director of administration, director of economic development

City of Slidell

• mayor, city council, planning director, city engineer, director of public affairs and cultural affairs, police department,

City of Mandeville

• mayor, assistant to the planning director, planning director, chief of police, city council

Madisonville

• mayor, town clerk

Town of Folsom

• mayor

Town of Abita Springs

• mayor, city engineer

Town of Pearl River

• mayor

 Business, Health, Education

• Delgado Community College--dean and assistant dean of students
• Slidell Memorial Hospital--administrator and marketing director
• St. Tammany Parish Hospital, administrator
• St. Tammany Economic Development Foundation executive director and board of directors
• University of New Orleans--vice chancellor, assistant
• all Louisiana State Senators and Representatives are on the email address distribution list.

Local Committee/Task Force

• St. Tammany Parish Long-Term Recovery Task Force
• St. Tammany Parish Housing Advocates Task Force

Input Events

• Government Workshop (December 2005)
• Louisiana Recovery Planning Day (January 2006) Approximately 78 people attended the open house to provide their input to the parish plan. About half of them were from the Mandeville area.
• St. Tammany Parish Plan Charrette (February 2006) Extension of the “New Directions 2025 Plan,” was conducted by the parish.

Day-to-Day interaction with local decision-makers, general public

Whenever possible the LTCR staff attends local council meetings, but mainly each member engages public officials and planning directors on a regular basis, if not daily to exchange ideas for projects and programs. The LTCR storefront functions as a meeting place, but its location in the old Mandeville neighborhood makes it difficult for people to stop by.

Local leadership of implementation

No plans have been developed with the local stakeholders for the implementation phase, since the LTCR team is currently involved in the receipt and writing of project summaries and plans.
The office of the parish president and the offices of the mayors of the municipalities should be the natural points of contact for the implementation phase with assistance from one or more LTCR team members.

View the Parish Summary Page from Louisiana Planning Day (PDF)