N O L A.C O M
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M o n d ay, o c t o b e r 27, 2025
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KELLY FIRED
NEW ORLEANS
RTA pays $750K to settle lawsuit
Decision to part ways with LSU coach finalized Sunday following embarrassing loss to Texas A&M
Payment to construction firm follows dispute over ballooning costs BY BLAKE PATERSON | Staff writer
STAFF PHOTO By MICHAEL JOHNSON
LSU coach Brian Kelly listens to a question following the loss to Texas A&M at Tiger Stadium in Baton Rouge on Saturday. BY WILSON ALEXANDER | Staff writer LSU has fired coach Brian Kelly, The Advocate confirmed on Sunday with a source familiar with the decision. The decision was finalized after the eighth game of Kelly’s fourth season with the Tigers turned into a 49-25 home loss to No. 3 Texas A&M. With that defeat, LSU fell to 5-3, losing whatever was left of its already faint College Football Playoff hopes. Kelly was owed a roughly $54 million buyout, the second-largest in college football history, according to his contract. That could be reduced by any “footballrelated employment” he has next, per the contract, including in coaching, admin-
ä Kelly’s buyout: A look at how much LSU would owe him. PAGE 1C istration or media. Kelly’s buyout must be paid in equal monthly installments through 2031. On Sunday, LSU leadership held discussions about Kelly’s future, sources said, including talk of a potential negotiated buyout. Those conversations will continue into the Tigers’ open date as the two parties work toward agreeing to buyout terms. Running backs coach and associate head coach Frank Wilson will be the interim head coach, a source confirmed. Wilson was previously the head coach at
McNeese State and UTSA. Kelly took the LSU job in 2021 after he became Notre Dame’s all-time winningest coach across the 12 years he spent in South Bend, Indiana. The Tigers played for the SEC championship in his first year and produced Heisman trophywinning quarterback Jayden Daniels in his second, but they have not come close to reaching the playoff in any of the four seasons he spent in Baton Rouge. In 2025, LSU lost its hopes of reaching the CFP across a stretch in which it lost three of four games, starting with a Sept. 27 road defeat to No. 7 Ole Miss. The Tigers’ offense collapsed down the
ä See KELLY, page 4A
A BULL MARKET
Carter-backed candidates fell short in elections BY TYLER BRIDGES | Staff writer
competitions, but there are also events like “Convict Poker,” where four inmates compete to be the last man sitting at a poker table with an angered bull charging them.
U.S. Rep. Troy Carter acknowledges that three key members of his Algiersbased political organization didn’t perform well on election night in New Orleans two weeks ago. Two of them lost badly as they sought more powerful positions, and the third, an incumbent, was forced into a runoff against a newcomer. But Carter dismisses any suggestion that the Carter results say anything about his political influence at home or his political strength ahead of next year’s midterms, when he might face a rocky road to reelection if the U.S. Supreme Court invalidates Louisiana’s congressional map. “In this town, where there’s always an election, you pick people that you think are the best for the job at the time,” Carter said. “Sometimes it works, and
ä See RODEO, page 4A
ä See ELECTIONS, page 5A
BY CHRISTOPHER CARTWRIGHT | Staff writer The gospel music flickers into range around mile 17 on the Tunica Trace, a trail formerly used by the Tunica Native American tribe paved into a 20-mile highway in West Feliciana Parish. As hundreds of cars pass churches releasing their congregations, the broadcast of 91.7 KLSP-FM — “The Incarceration Station” — sharpens. “I’m doing the best I can; I’m doing the best I can,” the Rev. Andrew Cheairs and The Songbirds sing. “While I’m traveling, I’m traveling through this land.” The broadcast emanates from the road’s end: the Louisiana State Penitentiary at Angola. It’s a destination few ever leave, imprisoning around 3,900 inmates, with roughly 70% of those sentenced for life. However, on Oct. 12, the prison’s inmate-
PAGE 6B
ä See RTA, page 5A
‘When the race is over, you move on,’ congressman says
Angola’s prison rodeo is a major economic driver for the region and for inmates
WEATHER HIGH 81 LOW 65
The New Orleans Regional Transit Authority’s board of commissioners has agreed to pay $750,000 to settle a lawsuit brought by a construction firm whose controversial contract with the transit agency led to an exodus of board members last year and attracted the attention of the FBI and federal prosecutors. The RTA’s decision to settle with BRC Construction Group LLC comes despite a state appellate court ruling in April that the contractor had failed to provide sufficient evidence to compel a payment from the transit authority. That ruling from the Fourth Circuit Court of Appeal reversed a lower court decision that required the RTA to pay BRC the nearly $456,000 the firm argued it was owed, plus $68,400 in attorney’s fees and interests. It’s unclear why the RTA board ultimately decided to settle for $750,000 — or nearly $225,000 more than what BRC argued it was entitled to in court records. The chair of the RTA board, Fred Neal Jr., didn’t respond to multiple requests for comment. The RTA’s director of communications, Tara Letort, declined to comment. The settlement is the latest development in the long-running dispute between the RTA and BRC, which landed a $250,000 construction services contract in March 2022 that, through a series of board-approved change orders, grew to encompass more than $1.2 million worth of work.
STAFF PHOTO By JAVIER GALLEGOS
An inmate hits the ground at the start of a bull ride during the Angola Prison Rodeo on Oct. 12. Every April and October, the Louisiana State Penitentiary at Angola hosts the last remaining prison rodeo in the nation. It’s a major economic driver for the region. run radio station played for thousands of people driving toward the Angola Prison Rodeo. Every Sunday in October and one weekend in April, crowds witness incarcerated men voluntarily participating in rodeo events. Some are traditional bull- or horse-riding
Classified .....................7D Deaths .........................3B Nation-World................2A Comics-Puzzles .....3D-6D Living............................1D Opinion ........................4B Commentary ................5B Metro ...........................1B Sports ..........................1C
13TH yEAR, NO. 76