Another Shreveport Bond Issue! Does This One Have a Chance?

Councilwoman LeVette Fuller details the Mayor's new, $242 million, five part bond proposal. The council voted unanimously on Tuesday to send Mayor Adrian Perkins third bond measure directly to the citizens of Shreveport.

In November of 2019, voters rejected three measures totaling $186 million. In January of this year, the council turned down Perkins second proposal, this one with a $207 million price tag.

Here's what Fuller told KEEL about Tuesday's Council vote to move ahead:

"There was some discussion from Councilman Boucher and Councilman Nicholson that it was bigger than they wanted," Fuller says, talking about the measure, by far the largest of the Mayor's three, "But there are things that we know we need, so let's just go ahead and put it on the ballot."

And is the lack of specificity in the five part proposal a problem? "There's still time to that together," Fuller says, "And the other thing is, the community should watch. There's still time (to be more specific) and people should watch to see that we do."

And what about the amount of the bond request, markedly larger than Perkins' previous bond proposals. "It's what we have. And I think that there's something to what my colleagues said about, 'This might not be the way I would go about it, but we have these critical needs,' so, let's put it forward and le the voters decide.

"When we talk about what's happened here, It's really unlike any other time we've had an opportunity to do something that wasn't status quo, actually pushing the envelope, take a risk that might make us uncomfortable for a while, but might have a really good good outcome and a greater reward at the end. But the thing is, the voters have to decide whether they actually want us to have that money and if they want to have to pay it back."

And what are Fuller's first thought about the possibility of supporting the issue? "What I am for is looking at what the proposal's are, line-by-line, for using that funding. The truth is, our job is to be fiscally responsible, but before we can get there, I think it's going to come down to, do the citizens trust us on these bond proposals."

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