VILLE PLATTE CHAMBER OF COMMERCE

SEPTEMBER 17, 2014

     The Ville Platte Chamber of Commerce today (Wednesday) voted to extend an invitation to Ville Platte Police Chief Neal Lartigue to attend the next chamber meeting to address concerns raised by Chamber members. Mark Buller announced that his office was broken into a few weeks ago for the third time where his office computers were stolen. His neighbor, Dr. Phillipe Vidrine office was burglarized just last week. Chamber members were notified that other offices  including pharmacies were burglarized. Buller said “I have the utmost respect for our police” but he feels more could be done. The chamber agreed to invite the police chief to express their concerns over the rash of business burglaries.

    In other business, the chamber received a report from Col. Mike Borrel on the Louisiana National Guard Education Program. Col. Borrel said there are three Youth Challenge Camps in the state at Camp Beauregard, Carville and in Minden. He said these are not boot camps or prisons. They are targeted to  assist at -risk 16-18 year olds. The camp lasts 22 weeks and the goal at the end is to have the youth join the military, get a job or go back to school.

    Louisiana is the only state that has three such youth challenge camps. He announced that 1400 students from the program  graduate out of a total of 8000 dropouts. Louisiana has one of the highest drop out rates of students in the country(over 8000) and one of the highest rates of juvenile incarceration.

     The camp teaches 8 core components including leadership, citizenship, academics, job skills, life coping skills, health and hygiene, community service and physical fitness.

     Chamber of Commerce Executive Director Camille Fontenot told chamber members:

--the Dirt Cheap will have its grand opening and ribbon cutting Wednesday Sept. 24 at 8:30am at the old Ville Platte Wal-mart location;

--announced the new library facility will open for business Monday Sept. 22 with a grand opening Friday Sept. 26;

And reported that the Mamou Cajun Music Festival is planned for this weekend at the Mamou Recreation Center.