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S u n d ay, M ay 18, 2025
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Escape shines spotlight on jail’s issues
THE RIVER’S RECKONING
The Mighty Mississippi created louisiana, but the state and nation are struggling to contend with its challenging new era BY MIKE SMITH | Staff writer First in a series ABOARD THE HURLEY — Mayo Broussard is back at a familiar bend in the Mississippi River, looking over its deep, muddy currents, helping solve a problem. The world is depending on it. The 78-year-old, with a bushy white beard and a pack of Marlboros in his pocket, is maneuvering across the deck of an Army Corps of Engineers dredge ship downriver from Baton Rouge. Barges and tugboats are lined up nearby like STAFF PHOTO By CHRIS GRANGER an armada of commerce. Loui- ABOVE: Mayo Broussard, with the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers, siana’s State Capitol building shimmers in the far-off dis- takes a break on the Mississippi River near Baton Rouge. ‘The river’s constantly trying to change itself. We’re trying to control it,’ he said. tance. Broussard has been up and TOP: The Mississippi River looking upriver with New Orleans toward down this stretch of the Missis- the right, with lake Pontchartrain in the background. sippi, watching it and measur- STAFF PHOTO By DAVID GRUNFElD ing it, clearing out the muck buried deep below its surface so the giant vessels stacked “Bottom line — and whatever that vital mission is colliding with freight from across the it takes, we do it,” Broussard with new realities on the river globe can pass safely. For him, said. that hold profound consequencthe calculation is simple: The But along the Mississippi es for everyone living beside it. goods must flow. from Baton Rouge to the Gulf, And as the new era emerges,
Louisiana and the nation are struggling to contend with it. Broussard recalls his early years in the industry, doing the dirty work of managing the mud being dug up from the depths. There were goods to be shipped and money to be made, and the river, despite all its twists and turns, provided a direct path to prosperity. That’s even more true now, and underneath the ship, the Hurley, is one of a dozen curves in the river between Baton Rouge and New Orleans that stack up with mini-mountains of mud, threatening navigation. It can take more than a month to finish the job here, even for the Hurley, the largest dredge of its type in North America. A giant dustpan-like machine drops down from the ship, vacuuming sediment and spitting it back out from a long pipe to be swept downriver with the currents. When it’s deep enough for vessels the size of three football fields to pass, the work is done. For now.
ä See RIVER, page 10A
ä For an interactive version of this story with a video and map, go to nola.com
lengthy stays, lack of nighttime security checks among stark signs of troubles
BY JILLIAN KRAMER, MISSY WILKINSON and JOHN SIMERMAN Staff writers
Three of the 10 men who joined in a brazen jailbreak Friday morning in New Orleans sat inside the lockup for nearly two years or longer before their run for freedom, records show, a duration that is common in Orleans Parish, where a spotlight now hovers over Sheriff Susan Hutson and an understaffed jail stretched to capacity. The length of jail stays among violent offenders in New Orleans and their impact on the population and climate inside the jail was among several issues drawing Hutson concern Saturday as the sun set on the second day of a massive law enforcement search, with seven of the escapees still on the lam. The brazen escape unfolded after midnight Friday from a unit staffed by a single deputy reportedly on a meal break, according to authorities. The breakout went unnoticed for more than seven hours, until a routine head count exposed the missing inmates. It was the largest escape ever at the 9-year-old lockup, where longstanding, documented problems at the troubled facility faced mounting scrutiny. Many of the issues that may have contributed to the jailbreak — including overcrowding, defective cell doors and lax security — have been well-documented and the subject of urgent warnings. Attorney General Liz Murrill was among those who pointed to prisoners who have remained in the jail for years as a contributor. “Long stays certainly increase the likelihood of danger and
ä See ESCAPE, page 4A
Progress slow to come on Louisiana home insurance rates lative session has put the focus homeowners with legislature stays the on auto insurance rates, many fortified roofs. A homeowners in south Louisiana broad tax break course on current bills still face the threat of losing their for homeowners
BY SAM KARLIN | Staff writer
homes over high property insurance bills. With homeowners’ A year after Republican leaders insurance rates ticking upward ushered in a series of pro-industry for most homeowners since the changes in a bid to alleviate the changes the Legislature adopthome insurance crisis in Louisi- ed last year, lawmakers appear ana, officials are confronting a poised to stay the course on a prohard truth: there are few immedi- industry strategy. They’ve rejected bills this sesate signs of relief. Insurance rates are not likely to sion that would require insurers come down dramatically, at least to reveal more information about in the near term. their finances and to mandate And while the ongoing legis- certain levels of discounts for
WEATHER HIGH 90 LOW 77 PAGE 8B
paying high premiums appears unlikely. The lack of progress has frus- Landry trated Gov. Jeff Landry, who is at odds with fellow Republican Insurance Commissioner Tim Temple, the architect of the insurer-friendly plan. But industry groups and Temple say they are starting to see signs of improvement. A handful of
companies have won approval to start writing home insurance policies in the past year. And a handful of companies have filed rate decreasTemple es, though an analysis of state data from The Times-Picayune | The Advocate shows that rate increases are outpacing the declines. Those illustrate an uncomfortable reality for Louisianans: Rates are not expected to go back to what they were before the crisis
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began in 2022, which Temple acknowledged. “It’s not going to come down as sharply as it increased,” he said in a recent editorial board meeting with the newspaper. Regulators believe many insurers in Louisiana were underpricing their products before a series of hurricanes wiped out a host of companies in 2022 and 2023. And the state is increasingly reliant on the global industry of reinsurance that has seen prices soar every year since 2017, in part because of
ä See INSURANCE, page 6A
12TH yEAR, NO. 279