Lafayette's city-parish council has drawn criticism from candidates looking to take over next year for a budget amendment proposed that would provide a 10% pay increase for the council over four years.

But that criticism isn't exactly accurate.

Councilman Bruce Conque introduced an amendment during Thursday's budget meeting to set aside money for a 10% increase in pay for council members and the mayor-president across the four-year term that the newly elected officials will serve after this fall's election.

None of the other council members who were present objected to the amendment, but that doesn't mean it was automatically approved.

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Councilman Jared Bellard, who has offered most of the objections during this year's budget process, left the meeting before the amendment was introduced because of a work obligation. The council did not vote on the amendment and would not have been able to vote on it until the next meeting Thursday.

On Friday, Conque announced plans to withdraw the amendment and defer the decision to the two new councils that will be seated in January.

"While the Charter allows for the compensation adjustments, I should have left that decision to the new Parish and City Councils and the new Mayor-President to address once they take office in January," Conque wrote in an email to the council's other members Friday. "I will request that my budget amendment be withdrawn at final adoption of the FY 19-20 budget."

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The council would have been forced to vote on the raise as part of the entire budget this coming Thursday because it was introduced without objection this week, but any council member could have forced a separate vote on the raise during this coming Thursday's budget meeting, so the amendment hasn't passed any more than plans to provide $5 million to dredge the Vermilion River have.

Conque's amendment would have brought next year's proposed budget in line with provisions in Lafayette's Home Rule Charter that grant the council the power to budget the 10% raise over the course of its four-year term. Making preparations to secure that money during the budgeting process outside the context of the council transition would have been routine.

The amendment also wouldn't have required the next council to approve the raise, but would have instead made sure the money was already in the budget should they decide to adopt it.

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Andy Naquin, a candidate for the new city council District 2, who is running against Conque, falsely claimed Conque voted for the amendment on Facebook, though no vote was held or could have been held, and Naquin wrote that it was his understanding that Mayor-President Joel Robideaux would not be able to use his line-item veto on the amendment, which the mayor's administration said was incorrect.

Mayor-president candidates Simone Champagne and Josh Guillory also posted about the proposed amendment, both erroneously claiming the council had already voted to approve it. Guillory and Champagne clarified their points in interviews Friday.

"The fact is they were entertaining a 10% raise, and I just disagree with that," Guillory said.

"It should have been left out the budget until the new administration takes office and debated then," Champagne said Friday.

Naquin, Guillory and Carlee Alm-LaBar, also a candidate for mayor-president, posted that they would not take the 10% raise if it is approved by the new city and parish councils.

Alm-Labar wrote that Conque's decision to withdraw the amendment was a good idea, but defended the rationale for introducing it at this week's budget meeting.

"The council, looking ahead to January when the council split will become effective, allocated enough funds in the budget so that, in the event those two new councils want to fund a pay raise for the councils and/or mayor-president, the funds are available to do so. This move didn’t raise pay, but it did provide that dollars would be available if the new councils want to raise pay," she wrote.

"Long story short — the new councils would have to decide whether or not to actually raise pay. And those raises are limited by the charter."

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