Attorney claims School Board erred in renewing lease

With the duck season just five weeks off, a Lafayette attorney is questioning policies of the St. Martin School Board regarding hunting rights on two of its 16th Section properties.
Cecilia native Dean Guidry appeared at the board’s Oct. 1 meeting and told members of problems that have arisen among hunters frequenting the board’s 16th Section property located in Henderson Lake north of I-10, an area commonly referred to as the “North Flats” or the “Collette Property.”
And he contends that the board’s awarding of a 10-year renewal of an agricultural lease of another 16th Section of land to James B. Bulliard Jr. that also grants Bulliard “exclusive hunting rights” on the property violates the public bidding law regulating agricultural and hunting leases and is “a serious breach of public responsibility” which “could be considered malfeasance.”

Guidry says the Henderson hunting area is the site of 24 permanent blinds that have been used by the same families for the past 40 to 50 years. But as hunting pressure mounts the location of these blinds has become a cause of confrontations between those claiming the blinds as their own and younger hunters trying to hunt the area.
He said there were some problems during the recent teal season “... and it’s just going to get worse.”
Guidry is suggesting the board adopt a policy prohibiting permanent blinds in the area, either requiring those with the owners to remove them before the 2014-15 season or allowing the use of the blinds for this season but requiring they be dismantled within 10 days following the end of the season.
Patterned after regulations in force for the Indian Bayou Wildlife Management Area, the proposed policy would allow only portable blinds that would have to be removed from the site at the end of each day.

The Bulliard lease dates back to September 1994 when he was granted a 10-year agriculture lease on the 640-acre section for the purpose of crawfish farming. The lease called for payment of $2,576 per year ($4 per acre).
The lease was amended in January 1999, extending the term to September 2014 in consideration of improvements costing $12,405 that Bulliard had performed on the property.
At the same time the lease was amended (in 1999), a clause was added giving Bulliard exclusive hunting rights on the section.
The extension was done without any public bidding.
In January 2001 the board adopted a resolution prohibiting the leasing of 16th Section property for hunting purposes.
Last month the board, without public bidding, approved the renewal of Bulliard’s lease for another 10 years – to September 2024 – at the same rental fee of $2,576 per year and continuing the exclusive hunting rights. Board officials contend that the agricultural lease could be renewed without public bidding and the hunting provision was “grandfathered” in because it was made before the board’s 2001 resolution regarding hunting leases.
Guidry concedes that the board is not required to advertise and receive bids for the granting of agricultural leases but says that the granting of hunting rights must proceed through the application and bid process detailed in Louisiana statutes.
In correspondence to Superintendent Dr. Lottie Beebe, Guidry argues that the board should take immediate action to rescind the lease provision granting hunting rights without public bidding.
“Failure to do so might be malfeasance ... given that the board is now on notice of the irregularity,” Guidry told Beebe.
He has asked that both hunting issues be placed on the board’s Nov. 5 meeting agenda and that he, and other interested parties, be allowed to address the board on the two matters.