Archive Record
Metadata
Accession number |
2011.080 |
Catalog Number |
2011.080.001 |
Object Name |
Audiocassette |
Date |
18 May 2005 |
Scope & Content |
Oral History interview with Mayor of Bossier City, La. George Dement shortly before he left office by Ann Middleton, Director of Bossier Parish Library Historical Center, Louis Covington, Director of Bossier Parish Libraries and Pam Carter (Carlisle), Bossier Parish Library Historical Center staff. Oral History Interview with Mayor George Dement Oral history interview with Mayor George Dement, Mayor's Office, Bossier City, Louisiana, May 18, 2005. Present are Pam Carter, Ann Middleton, Louis Covington. [Ann Middleton] What you've said already has been very interesting, I'm sorry I didn't ask for it earlier. Well, we did an interview in 1998 with you. It appears that it was unfinished, but we did get a lot of information. I have read it several times and enjoy it very much, um, and now that you are, leaving this office any way, we just wanted to know a few questions about the general feelings about the city, where you think it is going, where you think it will develop residentially, future of the boats, just your thoughts on, actually, whatever you would like to say to us, because you are already all over Google (laugh). [Mayor Dement] Let me start by saying and I mean it, I have been blessed, I can't think of a better word, but I have been blessed with this job that I have had these last sixteen years. When I was elected I'd never planned my life to ever be the mayor of Bossier City, but when I was elected, I knew very little about the city, the city government. I had been in business, I have been working in the hospitality business, and hospitality, when I think about it comes from the word hospitable, you look that word up and it means being nice to people, and, uh, I mentioned the fact that I was a submarine sailor once upon a time, and that is one job if you couldn't get along with people they wouldn't keep you long. Kick ya off! I guess you could kind of combine the fact I could get along with people and I was in the hospitality business, hotel, motel, restaurant business, and I enjoyed that very much. I think anyone that can find his niche or her niche in life doing something that she likes to do is a very blessed or fortunate person. It is hard for me to think of anybody spending their life doing something or making a living doing something they didn't like to do or working with people they didn't like. I think that would be a bad situation, if you went to work every day, I just hate to go down there, I don't like those people, they don't like me, and I can't, so, so, I told ya all this so I could say this, the fact I've been in that type business and some people used to tell me because I used to carry on a lot of foolishness, laughing and joking, people would tell me you so full of that bull you ought be a politician. That's, I guess that's what happened. But then, for what, you've heard this expression that money is not everything, you've heard this expression, and I know it's not but I don't know what is second place up there, because the city has been through some times that they did have money, didn't have money, and were fortunate to have a finance director who was here since five mayors. He's been here a couple of times and said you had money and said you didn't have money, didn't have money again. So, if I did anything right, was I recognized the fact that how important those people were that were here, like the finance director, for one thing, and attorney, the city's legal was another thing and I selected Lo Walker as my administrative assistant here. Those three people, and the department heads we had, if I did anything right I kept those people and we worked together and pretty well, we didn't agree on everything, we just worked together. The thing that I've found that, going back to money again, one of the reasons that we have had come through some things in Bossier is that we have had money, and Bossier has never really had any money before like we have, and, um, the thing that when I came in if I get these figures right, and I hesitate here to give the figures because sometimes they say figures don't lie but I do, but I think that $11 million budget for the city, all that $11 million dollars at that particular time they were getting a million and a half from the hospital and a million and a half from the Louisiana Downs race track. So that's three million dollars is being given to the city, well that was through taxes, and then when Governor Roemer decided that the state of Louisiana needed that million and a half from the race track more than the city did, then he took it away, but at this particular time the city they had to terminate 104 employees. They, 25 of them were policeman. The fireman had to take a ten percent or eight percent cut in their salary. We used to have free garbage pick up in Bossier, so we had to discontinue the free garbage pick and had a contract for that, and Mayor Don Jones, and this happened in June, in the middle of year in 1988, and he had to call all his department heads in and said this is how much money you have to run your departments for the rest of the year, do what you gotta do, so, that's what they had to do, police had to make their cuts and they had to do that. Well, when I was telling them about this mayors job that's what the firemen and the policemen, they were real disturbed because this had happened, and uh, they were saying if you are elected will you give us our money back. Well, it was fortunate that the state did return the money to the city and we were able to hire everybody back. Any how, that kind of put us on solid footing, and then we came along with the, we got to the point , that we had to choose about the riverboats, and I was reprimanded for doing this because they said I should, you know, let these gaming boats come into the city. But at this particular time we had Louisiana Downs Racetrack for the purpose of betting. We already had betting going on, and any how when they asked me if ______________________ several people that should not have done it but for the money that we would be able to receive from the boats we could do good things that the city has never had the opportunity to do, streets and drainage, and CenturyTel, and Parkway, of course, all the things we have been able to with money that we didn't have before. Stop right along there and you can ask me some questions. [Ms. Middleton] Um, how soon do you anticipate that more of the parish will be incorporated? [Mayor Dement] This is something that we have to be careful. Not everybody wants this to happen. You do, you do, you do, and I do. Everybody wants the best deal. And the builders is the people who are the developers, they build these subdivisions and to be a lot of fault going in to this subdivision to provide for everybody, for everything they need. And one of the most important, most precious commodity, that anybody could have is water, and Bossier City is blessed because of, I keep using that word, that's the way I feel, that we get our water out of the Red River. And it is plentiful and since the locks and dams are here the water is a better quality, but the thing that limits the expansion and annexation is, you've heard this, cost benefit ratio, what does it cost to annex another development in your city and what is the benefit. You hope it wouldn't cost the city more, because the city taxes built the water plant down there, and the water towers and the sewer distribution, the city of Bossier taxpayers have already provided this and an annexation, the kind to annex a piece of property which we did do or are doing this piece of property out here, I can't pronounce the name, Tuberon, down here off of Swan Lake, we have to provide police protection, ambulance service, fire protection, water, sewerage, all these things and the cost benefit ratio, the city doesn't want to lose money, if we just take on more people, but it cost us more, it cost the city taxpayers more to go out and take in another subdivision, it wouldn't be the right thing to do. So, if the subdivision is willing to pay more, pay more for their water, pay more for their services, pay for their streets and grating and sewerage and all that well it's something. But we just annexed this place about to, but we gonna be, we're gonna take more care before we annex anything else. It has got to be in the cost benefit ratio system, because we would have to buy, we're building a new water tower up there by Cash Point, which will, and you can imagine how much is involved in providing water with water pressure, it's like we get complaints in parts of the city, I wanna water my lawn, well, if you wanna annex and be part of the city and you can be able to water your lawn and have water pressure, and this is, I hope I'm not just rambling… [Ms. Middleton] No, not at all. [Mayor Dement] I'm telling ya what ya want to hear. But these have got to be considered before any more annexation. And of course for them to be annexed it's gotta be built to city standards, because streets and gutters have to have paved streets and curbs and gutters. This is some of the times that a subdivision outside the city limits start and of course it goes back to the developer, he wants to go in and get out with the least he's got in it or he might leave and, up at Lakewood, which is a beautiful subdivision, when they first went in, they didn't have any streets, curbs or gutters there. [Ms. Middleton] You're kidding me. [Mayor Dement] They just have big lots, and that makes up for it, but to tell you what I can see for the annexation in the future, if and when they do annex, and I imagine they will, whatever they annex will be able to pay its way, it would be a benefit to the city. [Ms. Middleton] That answers my question. I have a personal interest in that. [Mayor Dement] We aren't, you know, being big is not being the best. Some people want to be the biggest, we're bigger, we're best, you know, that's not exactly the only thing being our motive over here trying to be the biggest city in the state of Louisiana. What we like to say is that we are the fastest growing city in the state of Louisiana, we are the safest city the state of Louisiana, and we are the cleanest city in the state of Louisiana. We say that and you say that we say that loosely, but we're not saying that loose. We have statistics that can show we have the less crime in Bossier City and we compare ourselves to Monroe and Alexandria there, we're all the same size. In our crime rate and all is so much smaller here, as far as the cleanliness, we are real proud of that. We have an organization, I know Louis remembers Diane Chandler, out at, remember Diane? Diane was sort of, came with the package when I came in. I didn't know what to do with her, you know, people saying you got someone down there on the payroll who's not doing anything. Well, she did some things and what she did was right. She joined this Keep America Beautiful, and the Clean City Campaign, and we have these contests when we were having the ________________ I think they have been discontinued now, but eight out of the ten years we have won the Clean City Contest. But Diane would nurture that along, warn everybody and to get everything looking nice. But the cleanest, safest, fastest growing that is sort of a motto and we'd like to keep it this way. [Ms. Middleton] So that's what you would like to see happen? [Mayor Dement] Yes, I will… [Ms. Middleton] Or to keep going in that direction? [Mayor Dement] and careful annexation and then we have a police department and a fire department. One of the requests when I was campaigning for this job one of the request, the fire department said we need three new fire stations and we need a fire training center. And of course I was campaigning and I said yeah, I'll do it, I'll do it, I didn't know how, yeah we'll do that. And, sure enough, we've been able now, we have five new fire stations and we have a fire training center and we have adequate ambulances and EMS emergency medical service that this is what we have to offer. Now, our police we have, and my slogan, if I'm allowed to have a slogan, I like to have the best trained, best equipped, best paid employees that I can possibly get and this prevents turnover. If you've got a poorly trained, poorly equipped, poorly paid person, they are looking for another job, and the most expensive thing you can do in any operation is train new people, train new people. So, we have very little turn over. I haven't had the same department heads that I haven't had but two in the sixteen years, the same one, and we all pretty much recognized that we work together. We had something, now if I'm rambling, tell me you rambling too much…. [Ms. Middleton] No, not at all. [Mayor Dement] in any kind of an operation you have a little jealousy, it is only human nature that you have a little jealous, he or she is getting more attention that I am, and we had some people that worked on the Board Walk, that was, you can imagine, 56 acres, changed from a place that wasn't developed for anything, really, what the 56 acres was originally supposed to be, when I was a delivery boy and worked for a drug store for all the people that used to live down there, but to change to the 56 acres, change the streets, water, lights, everything into what is there right now, it took some planning, it took some guidance, it took just some pure thinking to see what makes it work. Different people have different obligations, one of them takes the water, one of them takes the sewer, one of them takes the lighting, take care of the landscaping, take care of the streets, and you would think there would be some jealousy, animosity between them. We had a staff meeting the other day and they were bragging on each other, saying he ought to be recognized for what he did, or he ought to be recognized, or Pam, Pam said I should recognize them, instead of being mad at each other, they are talking to each other. Before you leave remind me to show you something, and I guarantee, scouts honor you won't be able to put it down. [Mr. Covington] Talk a minute and tell them about the deal making chair. I told them about it. [Ms. Middleton] Oh, yes, we have that on our list. [Mayor Dement] _______________________________________. That was that little chair, that's where most of the deal making is right there in that little chair. ___________________. Oh, thank you. [Ms. Middleton] ____________________________________________________. [Mayor Dement] If you wanna make a deal with someone you wanna look them in the eye, get 'em up there. We've had some pretty hot discussions right there in that chair. They might want to give me that when I leave here. Or I might steal that. Let me, I'm gonna ramble some more. [Ms. Middleton] Please. [Mayor Dement] They told me when I thought about this, running for this job, that you can't win unless you get some savvy political advice. I didn't know anything about politics whatsoever, and I said where do I get that, and well, Elliott Stonecipher, ever heard of him, you have, Elliott Stonecipher, he's from around here, he's the most renowned, I see his picture in the paper all the time, where he's advising, making comments on politicians, and um, you know one of the freest things in the world is advice. You can get free advice, everybody wants to tell you something, give you advice, and it lasts about that long, but there is advice you can pay for and you can keep it. So, I went to Elliott Stonecipher, and said you know we can do it on $5000, but he gave me four _____________ that I could always plan on, could always speak on it, could always have an answer and some of it seemed kind of silly to start with but it's not. He says in politics there will always be changes. Sure, you know that, get to thinking about, it has been vague, you know you gotta change in, you gotta make a change in a highway meeting, a road that you didn't expect, changes continually, that is the one thing. And the next thing he said always there always will be a need for community involvement, well, that doesn't sound like much, but it is, continually community involvement, that you need to be involved with. And then there will always be a need for balance. That's, uh, that word means so much in any of our lives, balance. If you wanna brag on somebody you say he is a well balanced ole boy, or that ole boy has got an out of balance thing, but uh, what he was talking about was don't favor one part of the city or one project over another, try to keep it balanced, and the way this government runs it works real well. And then the fourth thing was revision. You need to be planning what's next, what's next, what we did and what we have with this twenty year plan, whoever follows me, it looks like Mr. Walker, we will work together and we've thought about this and it has been evident it is a twenty year plan, where we're going, the thing that I would be for, that is, that would be against limited terms. Now, for us elected two terms cannot do much in four years, as far as changing, can't do too much in eight years, but to really get some kind of achievement because every time you put a new administration in there will be some changes made, and we have been able to stick with our plan for sixteen years, whereas Mr. Walker is going to continue with what we're doing, but that's an advantage, over in Shreveport where they have to change every eight years, well you don't know who the next mayor will be, he might want to go in some different direction. I know when I came in, Don Jones, not that it was wrong or that it was right, but he had Cane's Landing down here was his big project. They were going to develop Cane's Landing, that old land fill down there, they had big plans down there. Well, I didn't even think about wanting to do that, I just, I didn't know what I wanted to do but I knew I didn't want to do that. And I changed in another direction. But these are the things I think are _______________ I think is real important, of course it may not work for everybody but a little city government this size. I think what they are afraid of someone who empowers, is so powerful that he's got big machines and favoritism whatever goes along with that. [Ms Middleton] Would you compare the Bossier City of the 1950s and 60s to the Bossier City of today, the reputation of the city today. [Mayor Dement ] Well, I've lived here all my life. I was born about nine or eleven miles down in Preston, that's where I was born, 84 years ago. And uh, I've had an opportunity to see all this growth, I remember what my daddy said when he got here, he got here about 1919, so, several of the things he said, that was then and ___________ til today, um, what happened in those years that you were talking about Erskine Caldwell, who is known for writing stories about the south , and he had at one time he wrote a book about Bossier city and Macon, Georgia, were two of the sin cities of the south, and uh, because of , both of them were around these large military installations, and it is natural and normal around these military installations for these places of entertainment to pop up all over around them. Some of them are not so nice and some of them are all right, but that's exactly what happened. At that particular time, the strip down here was real popular, when I say popular I mean people would come in from out of town, to go out here on that strip. I know, I had a little restaurant right up here on the corner called the Kickapoo. I was one of those who could enjoy the fruits of that prosperity, if y'all excuse me one minute, don't run off. Break in conversation/taping [Mayor Dement] Want me to read it to you? [Ms. Middleton] Please. [Mayor Dement] I'll tell ya how this happened. I don't know, I'm not a preacher, but I do believe in my Lord Jesus Christ, I really do, sometimes, I guess everybody does the same thing, I'm not a writer, but I just go tup one morning and I was sitting there and I had a yellow tablet, and I was sitting there thinking about Irish McNeal and it tht my booys he taught them how to fight, he taught them all these things, and I just started writing this, because he was just an old man, and he was taking care of boys before I came along, and given well he did more than that he had a girl there and he was real sick come up this girl came and said I was a nurse, and I didn't have money and I needed a watch and he bought him a watch, he used to buy 'em shoes and that was Irish McNeal. I wrote this one morning on this yellow tablet and these words came to me and its a ballad of Irish McNeal if you lived here long enough you know of bill hanna. He had Hanna Ford . did you live here? [am] No, sir, I didn't. [mayor dement] the water company used to Hanna Ford Co. Ken Hanna he was one of our good supporters he was playing _______ guitar and he made this song up. [am] I see his name up there. [mayor dement]Anyway the ballad of Irish McNeal It's easy to love a lovable kid One with all the manners and poise Poor little ones who have no friends Are Irish's kind of boys. He ahs a special way with them He didn't learn this at school You don't kid a kid as Irish says Has always been my rule Be honest with them when you begin and let everything you say be true Because it's not what you've got when you start that counts It's what you've got when you're through. They come to help from everywhere Looking for his helping hand Time after time and time again He sent a boy to become a man I like to be where the action is The fighting the racket and all There ain't much noise in a prison cell And in a grave there's none at all. It's this kind of wisdom he passes on And his lists continues to grow What good this does is hard to tell And may be we'll never know If you ever spend time talking to Irish About all the things of his past Someone will say ina solemn way That this question will be asked What do you expect to gain from this? What will you get in the end? If I can help one boy become a good man I have been paid in full, my friend. [am] That's lovely [mayor dement] I kind of had this…. [am] Was Irish McNeal from Ireland? [mayor dement] M'am? [pc] Was Irish McNeal from Ireland? Did he come here from Ireland? [mayor dement] Did he come here from Ireland? Oh, no. I'll give you that. [am] Thank you very much. This is what I have been looking for. [mayor dement] I don't know ___________________ is in that or not. Let's see if it is. [am] When did he die? [mayor dement] Several years ago, I think. I don't exactly know what year it was. I can make you a copy of that if you like. [am] I would love to have a copy of it. [mayor dement] let me go run you a copy. [am] thank you. [mayor dement] that's aabout the gymnasium that we built. Thatmy baby boy and that's Irish's picture there. [am] it's wonderful. Do you know sometimes I think when your children are involved from somewhere you get the ability to write something like that. |
People |
Dement, George Elyott, Jr. Dement, Tim McNeel, Irish |
Search Terms |
Oral History Mayors |
Interview date |
2005-05-18 |
Interview place |
Mayor's Office, Bossier City, La. |
Interviewer |
Middleton, Ann; Covington, Louis; Carlisle, Pam Carter (Carlisle) |
Length of Interview |
approx 2 hrs |
Recording media |
Cassette Tape |
Inventoried date |
2025-06-12 |