ASCENSION CHRISTIAN ELEMENTARY HAS THE LATEST CLASSROOM SPOTLIGHT ä Page 4G
THE ASCENSION
ADVOCATE
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DONALDSONVILLE • DUTCHTOWN • GEISMAR • GONZALES • PRAIRIEVILLE • ST. AMANT • SORRENTO
THURSDAY APRIL 9, 2015 H
THEADVOCATE.COM
Darlene Denstorff AROUND ASCENSION
La.44 development sent to council BY ELLYN COUVILLION
ecouvillion@theadvocate.com
DDENSTORFF@ THEADVOCATE.COM
Music in the Park kicks off Sunday Boogie Men kick off the Music in the Park free concert series Sunday in Jambalaya Park. The concert, hosted by Gonzales Mayor Barney Arceneaux’s Mayor’s Council for the Arts, is from 2 p.m. to 5 p.m. The series continues each Sunday through May 3.
Commodities distribution
The Greater Baton Rouge Food Bank and the Ascension Parish Health Unit will hold a quarterly distribution of commodities in Ascension Parish. Distribution will be from 8 a.m. to noon Tuesday at the Lemman Memorial Center, 1100 Clay St., Donaldsonville. The commodities program is a federal program that makes donated foods available to emergency feeding organizations that provide food staples to qualified residents and families to relieve situations of emergency distress, a news release said. The Food for Families program’s food distribution is set from 8 a.m. to 10 a.m. Tuesday at the Lemann Center. Food for families is a Catholic Charities organization. New applications for Food for Families will be taken during the distribution.
Wear purple Friday
Residents are encouraged to wear purple on Friday to support the American Cancer Society and Ascension Parish Relay for Life and their efforts to support those fighting cancer and to remember those who have lost their battle. Relay for Life Ascension sold specially designed Paint the Town Purple T-shirts to raise money in advance of its May 2 event at Cabela’s in Gonzales. For information, call Noelle Franz at (225) 439-1263 or email ascensionrelay@gmail. com.
Crawfish boil at Expo Center
Dreams Come True is holding a South Louisiana Crawfish Boil, Craft and Car Show from 9 a.m. to 5 p.m. Saturday at the Lamar-Dixon Expo Center. The event features a crawfish-boiling contest, crawfisheating contest, bands, craft äSee AROUND, page 2G
GONZALES — The Gonzales Planning and Zoning Commission has given the nod for zoning requests on a 344-acre mixed-use community on La. 44 to go to the City Council for a vote. “This development is something really needed in this area, and I’m excited about it,� Commissioner John Lanoux said of the Conway Plantation community being developed by Southern Lifestyle Development.
The City Council will vote on the matter at its next meeting, April 13. At a public hearing Monday night, Robert Daigle, managing partner of Lafayette-based Southern Lifestyle Development, and Prescott Bailey, area president for the company, said the project will offer a traditional neighborhood development combining retail and residential, traditional single-family homes and apartments. Developers of Conway Plantation are requesting traditional
neighborhood development zoning for 106 acres of the project, formerly zoned for varying residential lot sizes and for retail commercial. The company also is requesting 6,000-square-foot-lot residential zoning for 204 acres of the property, which was formerly zoned commercial. Bailey said the developers will be adding an additional northbound traffic lane on the property to make two northbound lanes on La. 44 to Interstate 10. The main entrance of Conway
Plantation onto La. 44 also will have a two-lane roundabout, Bailey said. Ernest Allen, a resident of the Pelican Point subdivision farther south on La. 44, voiced his concerns about increased traffic on the state highway, and Bobby Schexnayder, who lives on Loosemore Road at the southern edge of the development, voiced his worries about increased traffic there. Daigle said the development company had spent $27,000 on an independent traffic study,
requested by the state Department of Transportation and Development, and will present it to DOTD in the future. Southern Lifestyle Development believes a second northbound lane to the interstate would be helpful, Daigle said. In the end, he said, “The DOTD will decide what happens.â€? He said DOTD has told the developers that the state is currently designing a roundabout at Loosemore Road where it interäSee DEVELOPMENT, page 2G
INYOUR EASTER
BONNET
Lucille Taylor gets her photo taken after winning the funniest hat category.
Ascension Council on Aging hosts annual Spring Fling
Advocate staff report
Evelyn Logwood had the prettiest Easter hat April 2 at the Ascension Council on Aging’s Spring Fling according to a group of judges who viewed the parade of hats. Senior citizens used stuffed animals, crosses, plastic eggs, colorful straw, leaves, lace, ribbon and even a plastic football to decorate hats for the bonnet contest. äSee SPRING, page 3G
Advocate staff photos by BILL FEIG
Contestants line up for the Spring Fling hat contest April 2 at the Ascension Council on Aging’s Gonzales Senior Center. ä See more photos at www.theadvocate.com/news/ascension.
Blue Run aims to raise awareness of abuse prevention BY C.J. FUTCH
cfutch@theadvocate.com April is Child Abuse Prevention Month, said Ginger Cangelosi, and Child Advocacy Services hopes to raise both awareness and funds with the fifth annual Blue Run, scheduled for 7 a.m. April 11 at Gonzales City Hall, 120 S. Irma Blvd. The event includes a 1-mile Fun Run and a 5K race, both starting at City Hall, Cangelosi said, and proceeds will benefit programs provided by Child
Advocacy Services, a nonprofit agency that supports Court Appointed Special Advocates program, Children’s Advocacy Center, along with clinical services and prevention education for children and families in 10 Southeast Louisiana parishes including Ascension, Assumption, East and West Feliciana, Livingston, St. Charles, St. Helena, St. James, St. John and Tangipahoa parishes. “The first year, the run was in Hammond, and we have people participating from all over,�
Cangelosi said. “We had lots of requests to move it to Ascension, because it’s more centrally located (to the service area), so we did, and we’ve had it in Gonzales ever since.� One of the services CAS provides is forensic interviews for physical and sexual abuse cases, Cangelosi said, which significantly reduce the impact of abuse on the victims. Ashleigh Fuller, forensic interviewer covering Ascension, St. James and the Felicianas, sees children just after they’ve told
someone about an instance of abuse. Her field is fairly new, she said, and was the answer to an interview process that added the trauma of retelling the story of abuse many times to a child already experiencing a traumatic event. “I’m a neutral third-party for investigations started by the Department Children and Family Services and law enforcement,� Fuller said. “I interview the child in a developmentally sensitive and legally sound way. It’s audio
and video-recorded, and supervised by the investigating party.� That breaks down to open-ended questions that take into account children’s age and grasp of concepts like time and place, she said. Younger children can’t answer when and where questions as accurately, because time and place don’t exist in the same way to them yet. The recording makes it more likely that the child would have to tell the story of the traumatic äSee BLUE RUN, page 2G
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