May 31, 2024
ALEXANDRIA, LA—Mayor Jacques Roy opened his weekly briefing talking about the summer camps avaIlable for kids with the city.
A camp on Journalism will be the first to kick things off June 17th through the 21st. He then spoke about how to complete a public records request on the city’s website.
Next he thanked his team for a successful “River Fete.” He says only one event in his tenure matched the attendance of the recent event which was “Que’n on the Red” with an attendance of 18,000 saying “River Fete” is a solid second place.
Roy says the dragon boat races were completed on Buhlow Lake because of the danger of the Red River at this time which is high and fast due to all the rain the country has gotten lately.
The Army Corps of Engineers had been in charge of safety on the Red when the event was held there saying he is encouraged by the way the whole Alexandria / Prineville community came together to support the event.
Roy then defended his administration about Bringhurst Park.
People have expressed disappointment at the fact that it is in the process of being demolished. Roy said that they tried to get a baseball team or find a way to preserve the park.
He said the council took a look at all the proposals and at the end of the day decided on a mixed use area.
Roy said the data show that Bringhurst could not support a minor league team or be exclusively a baseball park, either semi-professional or a college team, saying each year the deterioration of the park continued to happen.
Ultimately, the council decided on it’s present course of action—an option to play baseball at the park but to also use the area for other activities.
The mayor said that it would have cost the city a minimum of $6 million to bring Bringhurst back to life purely as a baseball park.
Roy said that lots of Alexandrians have commented on how they love going to games but says the numbers of those in attendance said otherwise.
“They weren’t going to games. You have to go all the time. And so while you may have a fond memory of one, that’s different than the commitment of going over and over again.”
Roy said that the park was a drain on the city’s finances costing hundreds of thousands of dollars to simply maintain it in its aging state and keep it safe.
“When I came into office (there was) a huge investigation. (Bringhurst) was plagued with problems, and they continue.” He said the idea that the city did not exhaust every avenue of saving the park “just isn’t true at all.”
“Back in 2012 and 2013 the superstructure (of Bringhurst) just was not going to survive.”
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