St. Martinville mayor denied request to monitor police cameras

The Saint Martinville’s City Council tracked city problems and their own mayor’s behavior in Monday’s city council meeting.

On four agenda items in a row councilmen put Mayor Melinda Mitchell on blast.

She eventually called out her fellow leaders for the attacks, “I understand it. If I have to go through the council with it, I have no problem with it, but the way it was presented was totally disrespectful.

Mayor Pro Temp Craig Prosper, “It’s not disrespectful, mayor. I’ll be honest with you. It’s not disrespectful”.

Back and forth in St. Martinville city hall meeting, some councilman fired at the mayor and the mayor fired back.

“It’s always about the mayor this the mayor that. Literally, that’s all it’s been”, Mayor Mitchell said during the meeting before accusations turned into a shouting match.

Four back-to-back line items devolved into critiques of the mayor.
The first, a complaint from a citizen whose power was cut off for an unknown, unpaid late fee.

Even though citizen Blake Douet said he was just trying to initiate a policy change, not make a political statement, District 1 Councilman Mike Fuselier and Mayor Pro Temp Craig Prosper made the political statement for him.

“We have someone up here who has never paid that $25 fee the last eight times they were on the list”, Prosper said referring to Mayor Mitchell.

Next on the agenda was amending the mayor’s travel policy. The council voted now any out of state trip she takes, must be approved by the council, including a national mayor’s conference the mayor planned to attend in San Antonio

“There’s actually nothing, we’re going to take back from that, except maybe a free vacation”, Prosper said.

Mayor Mitchell disagreed. She said she will still attend the council and pay for it out of pocket because she wants to see the city succeed.

Third, councilmen used staffing public works to point out at least $93,000 of mismanagement costs since the mayor took office.

And finally, the mayor wanted to monitor security cameras at the Public Works Department and police department after they were granted access to city hall cameras at the last meeting on October 7.

Mayor Mitchell said the move was for transparency, but Councilman Prosper admitted he believes it was retaliation.

Ultimately, Mitchell will get access to public works cameras once they are upgraded with internet connectivity. Police cameras access was not given for security reasons.

After the meeting concluded, Mayor Mitchell said every meeting has become more about her and not the districts the council represents, and she thinks the council’s efforts would be better spent elsewhere.

“If they can take that energy and put it toward economic development and moving the city forward together with myself and my experience, we would be sitting on top of the world in a positive way and not in a negative way”.