The Jefferson Parish Council will hear from representatives from Entergy and the Louisiana Public Service Commission next week regarding a slew of major power outages that have afflicted the parish this year.
At-large Councilman Scott Walker announced on social media Tuesday that an Entergy representative will appear at the next council meeting scheduled for Wednesday, Aug. 7. Also in attendance will be Public Service Commissioner Davante Lewis, who represents portions of the West Bank including Westwego.
Walker also reached out to Public Service Commissioner Eric Skrmetta, who represents most of the parish, but is awaiting response. Skrmetta did not respond to requests for comment from The Times-Picayune on Wednesday.
I invited an Entergy representative to appear at our next council meeting on August 7. He accepted. I also invited PSC Eric Skrmetta and am awaiting a response.
The council doesn’t regulate Entergy Louisiana, but we intend to get some answers.
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— Councilman Scott Walker (@ScottWalkerJP) July 30, 2024
“The council doesn’t regulate Entergy Louisiana, but we intend to get some answers,” Walker wrote in a post.
While New Orleans City Council has the power to regulate the electric utility within city limits, Jefferson Parish cannot impose regulations on Entergy Louisiana. That responsibility lies with the state’s Public Service Commission.
In the hours before Walker’s announcement Tuesday, Entergy’s outage map reported more than 14,000 Metairie residents without power for nearly an hour, which the company said was caused by an equipment issue at the substation.
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More than 14,000 Entergy customers are without power in Metairie
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It was the third day in a row of widespread outages in the parish, as the West Bank saw 2,300 outages the day before and the east bank experienced 6,300 outages Sunday.
Walker tallied 14 outages in the parish so far this year that each affected anywhere between 795 to over 30,000 residents. He attributed the outages to weather-related events or “random” causes.
Five of those outages took place in July.
“Right now we can’t make it through a sunny day,” Walker said in an interview, calling Tuesday’s outages the “tipping point” for him to call the hearing.
Entergy spokesman Brandon Scardigli said in a statement Wednesday that crews were working to identify the cause of recent outages, install new equipment and upgrade existing systems. He added that projects under the company’s new grid-hardening plan would start in the parish “imminently.”
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Gripes with the electric utility company aren’t unique or new — Entergy Louisiana ranked last among large utilities in the South in a recent customer satisfaction survey conducted by J.D. Power, and Kenner’s City Council has hosted multiple discussions with Entergy representatives regarding problems.
The New Orleans City Council held its own hearing with Entergy New Orleans on Tuesday to discuss spikes in outages there, as the city has seen 1,600 outages so far this year.
“Entergy owes the people of Louisiana much more answers than what they’ve given about these challenges, especially with the amount of increasing they’ve been asking the commission to apply to customer bills,” said Lewis, the commission’s newest member who’s vowed to be aggressive with utilities.
Lewis said he’s been “very frustrated and upset” by the lack of information he’s gotten as to where, why and how long outages have occurred. Walker theorized the parish’s energy infrastructure is outdated and needs major upgrades to better withstand inclement weather.
“We keep replacing wooden poles with wooden poles, which seems like an exercise in futility,” Walker said.
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Jefferson Parish customers pay about $13 per month in storm restoration fees to repair the grid from previous disasters.
Terry Almon, president of the Bonnabel Civic Association — one of the neighborhoods hit by Tuesday’s outages — said frustrated residents want better communication from Entergy on why the power goes out, especially when it’s not weather- or accident-related.
“They need to be upfront no matter what, whether it’s good news or bad news,” Almon said. “Any time a public entity is transparent, it serves them well.”
WASHINGTON (AP) — Louisiana voters will participate in a revamped and stripped-down state primary Saturday and decide the political fate of an embattled Republican U.S. senator targeted for defeat by President Donald Trump.
Sen. Bill Cassidy is running for a third term but first must overcome a Republican primary field that includes state Treasurer John Fleming and U.S. Rep. Julia Letlow, who was endorsed by Trump in January.
WATCH: Amy Walter and Jasmine Wright on Trump’s control of GOP lawmakers
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The primary is the president’s latest opportunity to exact retribution from his perceived political enemies, including fellow Republicans he considers disloyal. Cassidy has been near the top of that list since his vote more than five years ago to convict Trump in his second impeachment trial following the insurrection by his supporters at the U.S. Capitol on Jan. 6, 2021. Trump was acquitted.
Louisiana is not among the states Democrats are targeting in their effort to retake the U.S. Senate. A Cassidy defeat in the primary would likely result in a Senate GOP caucus even more unified behind Trump and further demonstrate the strength of the president’s grip on the party.
Voters will also decide primary contests for state Supreme Court, Public Service Commission and state school board, along with five proposed state constitutional amendments.
Louisiana’s primaries for U.S. House were postponed after the U.S. Supreme Court struck down the state’s current congressional map, which includes a majority Black district that favors Democrats. U.S. House races will still appear on ballots, but any votes cast in those contests will not be counted.
WATCH: Louisiana’s redistricting rush ignites debate over race and representation
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In another key departure from previous Louisiana primaries, contenders in Saturday’s contests will run in separate party primaries, rather than in one jungle primary in which all candidates appear on the same ballot. State lawmakers adopted the new system for certain offices in 2024, but the law didn’t go into effect until 2026.
U.S. House races were originally slated to use the new primary system under the 2024 law, but state Republicans on Thursday adopted legislation to reinstate the jungle primary for U.S. House races, citing a compressed schedule after the Supreme Court decision. Just as in previous cycles, the jungle primary will be held on Nov. 3 alongside the general election.
East Baton Rouge Parish, home to Baton Rouge, and Jefferson and Orleans Parishes in the New Orleans area are the most populous in the state, but St. Tammany Parish, north of New Orleans along the Mississippi border, contributed the most votes in the 2016 and 2024 Republican presidential primaries.
Caddo Parish in the northwest, home to Shreveport, and Lafayette Parish also tend to play a bigger role in Republican primaries than in Democratic ones.
Trump narrowly won a four-way primary in 2016, powered in part by a large margin in Jefferson Parish and overcoming losses in East Baton Rouge and Caddo Parishes to Texas U.S. Sen. Ted Cruz. He swept the state eight years later in the 2024 primary against former United Nations Ambassador Nikki Haley, who had dropped out of the race by the time of the primary but was still posting stronger-than-expected showings in other states.
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Cassidy’s previous victories in 2014 and 2020 were under the old primary system, in which his main opposition on the ballot came from Democrats.
Here are some of the key facts about the election and data points the AP Decision Team will monitor as the votes are tallied:
When do polls close?
Polls close at 8 p.m. local time (CT), which is 9 p.m. ET.
What’s on the ballot?
The Associated Press will provide vote results and declare winners in contested primaries for U.S. Senate, state Supreme Court, state Public Service Commission and state school board, as well as five statewide ballot measures.
Who gets to vote?
Registered party members may vote only in their own party’s primary. In other words, Democrats can’t vote in the Republican primary or vice versa. Independent or unaffiliated voters may participate in either primary. Voters registered with other parties may only vote on nonpartisan contests.
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How many voters are there?
As of May 1, there were about 3 million registered voters in Louisiana. Registered Democrats and Republicans numbered about 1.1 million each, with registered Democrats at a slight advantage. About 813,000 voters were not registered with any party. The remainder were registered with other parties.
How many people actually vote?
Louisiana’s new primary system is closer in format to the 2024 presidential primaries than to previous state primaries. About 192,000 votes were cast in the Republican primary and about 167,000 in the Democratic contest. Each primary represented about 6% of registered voters.
How much of the vote is cast early or by absentee ballot?
About 41% of the Republican primary vote and about 45% of the Democratic primary vote in 2024 was cast before primary day.
As of Thursday, about 255,000 ballots had already been cast in Saturday’s election, about 44% from Democrats and about 41% from Republicans.
When are early and absentee votes released?
Results from early and absentee voting are usually released by each parish in the first vote update, as separate totals from in-person Election Day vote results.
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How long does vote-counting usually take?
In the 2024 general election, the AP first reported results at 9:32 p.m. ET, or 32 minutes after polls closed. The last vote update of the night was at 11:56 p.m. ET, with more than 99% of total votes counted.
When will the AP declare a winner?
The AP does not make projections and will declare a winner only when it’s determined there is no scenario that would allow a trailing candidate to close the gap. If a race has not been called, the AP will continue to cover any newsworthy developments, such as candidate concessions or declarations of victory. In doing so, the AP will make clear that it has not yet declared a winner and explain why.
How do recounts work?
There are no automatic recounts in Louisiana, but a candidate may request and pay for a recount of absentee and early votes. The AP may declare a winner in a race that is subject to a recount if it can determine the lead is too large for a recount or legal challenge to change the outcome.
Are we there yet?
As of Saturday, there will be 42 days until the June 27 primary runoff if needed, 171 days until Nov. 3 general election and the rescheduled U.S. House jungle primaries and 210 days until the Dec. 12 runoff.
— Robert Yoon, Associated Press
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Oil and natural gas companies are lining up behind Louisiana Republican Sen. Bill Cassidy as he fights an uphill primary battle.
Cassidy, a senior member of the Energy and Natural Resources Committee and outspoken ally of oil, has gotten about $120,000 in campaign contributions from donors and political action committees in oil and adjacent industries since the beginning of last year, a review of his campaign disclosures by POLITICO’s E&E News shows.
Rep. Julia Letlow got about $43,500 from industry sources since entering the race in January, disclosures show. Louisiana Treasurer John Fleming got $12,750 from oil and gas.
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Cassidy took in $14,500 from oil and gas in the same period, though many of his donors had already given the maximum allowable amount by then. Fleming got $3,500 of his total in that time period.
NEW ORLEANS (WVUE) – Louisiana will receive $18.9 million in federal grants for hurricane recovery, Sen. John Kennedy announced Thursday (May 14).
Funding from the Federal Emergency Management Agency will support disaster recovery efforts and repairs in communities impacted by Hurricanes Ida and Francine.
Kennedy said the funding will support Lafourche, Jefferson and Terrebonne parishes, as well as the Louisiana Department of Transportation and Development.
The grants include $8.8 million to the Greater Lafourche Port Commission for permanent repairs from Hurricane Ida.
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Jefferson Parish will receive $5.3 million for management costs from Hurricane Ida.
Terrebonne Parish will receive $2.6 million for debris removal operations from Hurricane Francine.
The Louisiana Department of Transportation and Development will receive $2.2 million for debris removal operations from Hurricane Francine.
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