By Rita Shirley LeBleu
Three people spoke out against the Black Bayou Gas Storage Hub tax exemption at the Thursday, Aug. 13, Cameron Parish Police Jury special session. One of the individuals was a Cameron Parish resident.
The meeting was held at the new Emergency Operations Center in Grand Lake, and called the day after Monday’s voting meeting in Cameron.
Police Jury President Michael Fewell said he and Parish Administrator Katie Armentor had considered putting the resolution on the Aug. 10 agenda. It didn’t go on the agenda because jurors wanted information. Three are experienced in the oil and gas industry. They had a hard time wrapping their heads around why a gas storage facility was being classified as a manufacturing facility. It is only to manufacturing facilities that exemptions are granted.
Thursday’s special session also gave Armentor the opportunity to explain the local Industrial Tax Exemption Program (ITEP) process. She was appointed by the Police Jury to vote on their behalf. Charley Lemons votes on behalf of the School Board. Sheriff Chris Savoie does not have to reach a consensus within his department or require a vote from any group to cast his vote. Port Director Kim Montie and Tax Assessor Scott Lavergne are also on the committee, but in an advisory capacity. They do not vote.
ITEP Applications Do Not Start – Or End – At the Local Level
The Governor solicits input from parishes, according to Armentor. However, he has the full authority to grant the exemption if he thinks it’s best for the state – or not.
General discussion at the meeting implied that Landry can vote in the way that he chooses regardless of the local vote.
LED, the Louisiana Department of Revenue and the Louisiana Workforce Commission review the application simultaneously. The Louisiana Board of Commerce and Industry reviews the project during a public hearing.
Then the application goes out to the Local ITEP Committee. This Committee has to submit its decision within a 45-day window, according to Armentor. That’s 45 days to conduct research the Police Jury needs to inform their vote, have a Police Jury meeting and have the committee meeting during which the vote takes place.
The Black Bayou salt dome will store natural gas from two regions, Permian Basin and Haynesville Shale. The state considers it a manufacturing process because gasses with two different nitrogen levels will be blended, creating a gas with a third nitrogen level to be pushed to the LNG plants, District Attorney Tom Barrett explained at a School Board meeting Aug. 10.
“How many people have been putting gas in a pipeline all these years and getting taxed,” McGee said during Thursday’s special session, acknowledging that it is not the parish who decides who can apply for the exemption or the final outcome of the application.
Jurors had asked Armentor to look into other companies getting manufacturing exemptions for “blending.” She started going down a list that included oil and gas companies, a fish fry company and a coffee company.
Grand Lake resident Tanner Helms said he wanted to know why the Police Jury would grant an exemption to Black Bayou when money was needed to rebuild the Grand Lake Recreation Center, and other Parish projects. The Rec. Center was destroyed by Hurricane Laura. In its place is a small weight lifting facility in a temporary trailer.
Mark Daigle said regardless of whether the local vote carries weight or not, he thought all the jurors should vote against the exemption, to show local citizens “we care about them and hear them.”
James Hiatt, Lake Charles resident and founder of A Better Bayou, spoke against the exemption for Black Bayou.
He said ITEP is to lure companies to Louisiana to do business. This company is different. The salt domes are already here. It is the geology that is luring in the companies.
Like some of the jurors, Hiatt didn’t see how the company could be qualified as a manufacturing company. Natural gas in. Natural gas out.
If this company is saying to you, we need this tax exemption so we can come here, what are they going to do in 10 years after the exemption period comes to a close, Hiatt said in response to last week’s Cameron Pilot School Board article about the Black Bayou ITEP vote.
“Can you imagine what we can do for Cameron if we didn’t give away the farm,” he said.
He urged jurors to vote against it and “let the Governor do what he’s going to do.”
Taxes Cost of Doing Business
Alyssa Portaro lives in Vinton, and works with the Cameron Community on the Habitat Recovery Project. She is also a landowner whose farm will be impacted by pipelines that might connect to this or other hubs. She said she has encountered difficulty in getting information about plans even though agencies have acknowledged that her property will be affected.
She noted that the destabilization of salt domes in the area came up at the 2024 FERC Scoping Meeting for the Black Bayou project. Portaro described a “yes” vote for the tax exemption as “socializing the risk while privatizing the profit.” Cameron Parish already provides land, infrastructure, pipelines and is sharing space with the workforce, she said. Why give them an exemption as well.
“Taxes are not a punishment for doing business here,” she said. “It is the cost of doing business here.”
Sam Bordelon made the motion to approve the resolution. Wendell Wilkerson seconded the motion. Mark Daigle and Sonny McGee voted against. Johnny Watkins, Ronald Nunez, Wilkerson and Bordelon voted in favor of the ITEP. Fewell did not vote, as is the CPPJ President’s right except in matters of breaking a tie, according to Police Jury Administration Secretary Mary Carroll.
Based on the Police Jury’s vote, Armentor will vote in favor of the ITEP at next week’s committee meeting. At the Aug. 10 School Board meeting, the Board voted for Charley Lemon to also vote in the affirmative for the Black Bayou 80/20 ITEP.
An 80/20 ITEP means that Black Bayou will keep 90 percent local property tax exemptions. The Parish will receive 20 percent for the next ten years.
To read the rest of this story, please see page three of the print edition of The Cameron Parish Pilot.