ABITA SPRINGS • BARKER’S CORNER • BUSH • COVINGTON • FOLSOM • LACOMBE MADISONVILLE • MANDEVILLE • PEARL RIVER • SLIDELL
Farmer The St.Tammany
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S T TA M M A N Y FA R M E R.N E T
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W e d n e s d ay, O c t o b e r 8, 2025
50¢N
151ST YEAR, NO. 52
Borchert, Fandal face off in Oct. 11 vote BY ANDREW CANULETTE Staff writer
The two candidates in the special election for Slidell Mayor have campaigned for the job longer than a victory on Oct. 11 will guarantee as the city’s chief executive. But that’s done little to dim the competitive fire between current Slidell Mayor Bill Borchert and Slidell Police Chief Randy Fandal as they battle to finish the incomplete term of former Mayor Greg Cromer, who resigned in January
ELECTION 2025
to take a job in Gov. Jeff Landry’s administration. Cromer was elected to a second term as the Camellia City’s mayor without opposition in 2022. After running unsuccessfully for St. Tammany Parish President in 2023, Cromer traded the remainder of his mayoral term for the job as liaison between the Governor’s Office and the Department of Transportation and Development. As the City Council member at large with the most votes in the 2022 election, Borchert was
SLIDELL MAYOR named mayor in January when Cromer stepped down. Whoever wins the Oct. 11 election will be mayor through June 30, a run of approximately 8 1/2 months that would complete the four-year term Cromer won in 2022. Regardless of Saturday’s victor, another mayoral election will take place April 18 with a runoff, if necessary, scheduled for May 30.
Both Borchert and Fandal would be eligible to run for a full fouryear term in the 2026 Municipal Primary. New candidates could qualify for the office, as well, though all talk in Slidell has been on the special election that finally will be decided Oct. 11. Borchert, a local businessman, served two terms as the District G Council member before twice winning city-wide at-large seats. Fandal, a lifelong police officer, was elected Slidell’s Police Chief in December 2016 following former
chief Randy Smith’s election as St. Tammany Parish Sheriff. Fandal finished Smith’s term and twice more was elected chief — without opposition in 2018 and with 82% of the vote in a head-tohead race against Rhett Rodriguez in 2022. Registered voters from Wards 8 & 9 (Slidell proper and surrounding areas) also will decide if they want to extend a $39 annual parcel fee to benefit the St. Tammany
ä See VOTE, page 4A
Cooper, Library Alliance balk at job posting for new library system director Woman who lodged 150+ complaints created job posting at request of board chair BY WILLIE SWETT Staff writer
When the St. Tammany Library Board of Control shared the job posting for a new parish library director last week, it raised some eyebrows at Parish President Mike Cooper’s office. The formatting of the job posting seemed off and it was unlike that of similar parish job postings, according to Cooper’s spokesperson, Michael Vinsanau. The job posting, it turns out, was generated with Perplexity artificial intelligence software by Connie Phillips, a St. Tammany Parish resident who helped found the St. Tammany Library Accountability Project and, at one point, had lodged more than 150 challenges of material in the parish’s public library. Cooper called the job posting “unprofessional” and an “embarrassment.” The library director will oversee a budget of more than $13 million and direct 113 full-time and 41 part-time employees. “The drafting of the job description by an outside source is inappropriate, and whomever allowed this to occur should be removed from the (Library Board of Control) for this obvious lapse in judgment,” Cooper said in a statement.
STAFF PHOTO BY SOPHIA GERMER
The St. Tammany Parish Fair is a multiday event, and it’s sometimes necessary to take a little break. Jaxtyn Walters and Wyatt Oubre, both 11, take theirs on a couple of accommodating cows as they munch hay on Oct. 3.
IT’S ALL FAIR!
ä See LIBRARY, page 3A
Night Out
PHOTO BY MATT DOBBINS
Makaylah Dowell sits on a Slidell Police motorcycle with an assist from SPD’s Chris Sevin during the National Night Out hosted by Slidell Police. ä More photos. PAGE 4A
There’s just something about the colors, the tastes, the sounds and the smells of the midway that puts the ‘fair’ into the annual St. Tammany Parish Fair in Covington. ä More photos. PAGES 2A AND 3A
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