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LAFAYETTE PARISH SCHOOLS

DA to investigate fraud complaint

Resident alleges superintendent improperly paid employees BY JOANNA BROWN Staff writer

Over the summer, a Lafayette Parish resident alleged in a complaint ﬁled with the 15th Judicial District Attorney’s Ofﬁce that Lafayette Parish schools Superintendent Francis Touchet Jr. had im-

properly paid district employees for days they did not work. Suzanne Higginbotham, a resident who administers school system’s Call to Action public advocacy group, stated in the complaint ﬁled July 20 that Touchet had exceeded the authority given by the Lafayette Parish School Board to

implement work schedules for district employees. The complaint alleged that Touchet signed a memo to staff on June 2 stating that some employees would work 32 or 36 hours a week over the summer, while being paid for a 40-hour work week. On Sept. 21, Assistant District

Attorney Frederick Welter confirmed to local media that the District Attorney’s Office would investigate Higginbotham’s complaint, which alleges that over $2 million in wages and beneﬁts could have been fraudulently paid to employees in a violation of state laws and Lafayette Parish School Board

Education officials will scrutinize spending in two school districts

policy. The board voted April 16 to authorize Touchet to establish operating and work hours for district employees in June and July. Higginbotham stated in her complaint that the vote did not authorize Touchet to pay employees for time they did not work. According to the Louisiana

ä See FRAUD, page 4A

Defense in terrorism trial wants evidence tossed

Man lived and worked briefly in Lafayette BY CLAIRE TAYLOR

Staff writer

intervention when school systems fail for two consecutive years to ensure that at least 70% of the state and local funding is spent on school-level instruction or administration. Spending on teachers and principals, textbooks and classroom technology, tutoring and other support for students counts toward the 70% rule, while spending on transportation, building construction and district-level stafﬁng does not.

With his federal trial date in Lafayette approaching, public defenders representing Mahmoud Amin Ya’Qub Al-Mahtadi last week filed motions to dismiss the four terrorism charges against him and to suppress audio recordings and evidence obtained through Google. Federal prosecutors also filed motions recently asking a federal judge to permit various forms of evidence at the trial, including testimony from survivors of the Oct. 7, 2023, attack. Al-Muhtadi, a native of Gaza, is accused of participating in the Hamas-led attack on Israeli civilians that left around 1,200 people dead, including 49 U.S. citizens. He lived in and worked in Lafayette briefly before his arrest in October, having entered the United States through Dallas and spending time in Oklahoma. Al-Muhtadi pleaded not guilty to all four charges, including two counts of conspiracy to provide material support to a designated foreign terrorist organization, visa fraud and making a false statement in the jurisdiction of the United States. His trial date is set for Jan. 25. Among the motions filed by AlMuhtadi’s attorneys is a motion to “suppress the fruits of the Google

ä See SPENDING, page 4A

ä See EVIDENCE, page 4A

STAFF FILE PHOTO By LESLIE WESTBROOK

Louisiana State Superintendent of Education Cade Brumley said he is taking the ‘unprecedented action’ of appointing chief operating officers to examine the spending practices in two school districts.

Systems believe expenditures may have been incorrectly reported BY PATRICK WALL

Staff writer

Louisiana’s education chief will hire consultants to probe the ﬁnances of two school districts that failed to spend a mandated proportion of their budgets on teachers, books and other instructional expenses. It will mark the ﬁrst time the state has used its legal authority to enforce the state spending rule. Superintendent of Education Cade

Brumley informed the St. John the Baptist Parish and city of Bogalusa school systems this week that he is taking the unprecedented action of appointing chief operating officers to examine the districts’ spending practices. The districts must share their ﬁnancial records with the ofﬁcers, who will identify “the causes of continued noncompliance” and develop corrective measures, Brumley told the districts. A 2024 state law authorizes the

Landry proposes ban on diesel exports Oil industry leaders push back BY MARK BALLARD Staff writer

WASHINGTON — Gov. Jeff Landry is calling for a ban on exports of diesel fuel, saying it’s a way to lower historically high prices, but is facing pushback from oil industry leaders who say that idea could actually drive prices up. Joining Republican candidates, especially those representing agricultural districts, who have

WEATHER HIGH 96 LOW 74 PAGE 6A

stepped up the pressure because of surging prices, Landry on Thursday night wrote on social media that he favored banning the export of diesel fuel for 90 days in order to build up reserves and bring down the price of the fuel that farmers, truckers and Northern homeowners rely. Prices rose about 40 cents per gallon last week alone to a national average price Monday of $6.51 per gallon, according to AAA. On this day last year, the average price nationally was $3.69 per gallon. The reason is because of the pressures put on by the wars in Ukraine and

Iran. “Right now a record amount of diesel is going to Europe and Americans are subsidizing Europe’s problems,” Landry said Monday morning on CNBC’s Squawk Box. “Europe has done nothing to help America in either one of those two positions and yet they are sucking the energy out of America and making American citizens pay for it.” But the means for transporting domestic diesel is already at capacity, responded Tommy

ASSOCIATEd PRESS FILE PHOTO

diesel prices are displayed at a gas station in Minneapolis earlier this ä See DIESEL, page 4A month.

Business ...................10C Commentary ................3B Nation-World ................2A Classified .....................4B Living............................5C Opinion ........................2B Comics-Puzzles .....7C-9C Metro ...........................1B Sports ..........................1C

102Nd yEAR, NO. 84

2A ● Tuesday, September 22, 2026 ● theadvocate.com ● The Acadiana Advocate

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TEXAS

Up to 30 shots fired in shootout at synagogue

Man shot by ICE officer detained

FROM WIRE REPORTS

BELLEVILLE, Ontario — A 29-yearold man armed with a shotgun opened fire on a police officer stationed outside an Ontario synagogue during Yom Kippur, triggering a shootout involving as many as 30 shots, the province’s police watchdog said Monday. The gunfire left the man with injures that were not life-threatening and seriously wounded a veteran of the Belleville Police Service, whose condition had stabilized as he recovered in intensive care. Kristy Denette, a spokesperson for the Special Investigations Unit, said nearby vehicles and homes were riddled with bullet holes. There was no forensic confirmation Monday as to whether the synagogue itself was hit. Denette said the scene appeared to stretch about half a block from the Sons of Jacob Synagogue. “It would have been quite, quite the scene indeed,” Denette said. The Special Investigations Unit said preliminary evidence showed the man arrived in a truck around 7 p.m. on Sunday and fired at an officer outside the Sons of Jacob Synagogue in Belleville, about 110 miles east of Toronto. The officer returned fire before a second officer arrived and also fired.

3 booked in connection to South Africa killing

JOHANNESBURG — Police in South Africa said Monday they arrested three suspects in connection with one of a series of killings of women in the same area on the outskirts of Johannesburg. The nine killings of women in their 20s and 30s in the municipality of Ekurhuleni over the last two months has triggered anger in South Africa, which has high rates of violence against women. Police have been investigating whether the killings were connected, raising fears that a serial killer or killers might be operating in the area. The suspects, two women and a man, appeared in the Boksburg Magistrates Court on Monday after being arrested in connection with the killing of a woman whose body was found last week in Ekurhuleni, east of Johannesburg. Their case was postponed to Oct. 1 when they can formally apply for bail. Investigators have not linked the suspects to the eight other killings. Authorities have said it is not certain that all the killings are connected, though they said they have identiﬁed similarities in some of them and have issued an alert for women in Ekurhuleni to take precautions.

Man convicted of killing teens wants new trials

An attorney for a man serving 130 years in prison for killing two teen girls in Indiana said police were so determined to find him guilty they used confessions gathered while he suffered from psychosis and withheld from trial a witness sketch that looked nothing like him. Jurors convicted Richard Allen of murder in 2024 in the deaths of Abigail Williams, 13, and Liberty German, 14, known as Abby and Libby. The case in the tiny town of Delphi went unsolved for more than five years before Allen was arrested, becoming a magnet for true-crime enthusiasts. After Allen told investigators he had been on the trail near where the girls died, authorities found any way they could to convict him and make sure no evidence surfaced that any other man was on that walkway, attorney Mark Leeman told a three-judge panel of the Indiana Court of Appeals on Monday. “We live in a world where one or two things happen here,” Leeman said. “A pharmacy tech with no criminal history goes out for a walk to watch a stock ticker and look at fish and decides to gruesomely murder two girls. Or, we live in a world where the police through confirmation bias failed to find the right guy.”

the gunshot wound, and Attorney says toI have not received the attention that I reman still has medical quire,” Perez said, speaking Spanish over the phone as bullet in his back ina member of his attorney’s

BY ANNA WILDER and JESSE BEDAYN Associated Press ASSOCIATEd PRESS PHOTO By MARK SCHIEFELBEIN

Vaughn Hillyard, White House correspondent for MS NOW, does a report Monday near the White House in Washington. CNN, MS NOW and Politico on Monday sued President donald Trump’s administration days after they were barred from the White House grounds.

News outlets file suit over White House ban CNN, MS NOW, Politico cite First Amendment

BY JOCELYN NOVECK AP national writer

NEW YORK — CNN, MS NOW and Politico on Monday sued President Donald Trump’s administration days after they were barred from White House grounds, calling the selective ban — based on the content of their coverage — illegal and a “blatant violation” of the First Amendment. Trump said in a post that he ”cherished” a free press but not “FAKE NEWS.” “White House access is a privilege — not a right,” the administration posted on X. The extraordinary ban of the three news outlets’ reporters, which began over the weekend, represented a clear escalation of Trump’s long-running efforts — in the courts and through administrative action — to restrict news coverage he finds objectionable or, in his words, “fake news.” They were also the latest test of First Amendment protections in the United States, where the government is constitutionally forbidden from restricting the press. The Constitution, the banned news outlets said in their lawsuit, “does not allow a president or any other government official to deprive the press of their First Amendment rights and liberty and property interests with no notice or process based solely on his dislike of the content of their reporting.” The three outlets filed the joint lawsuit two days after their reporters were blocked from the White House and prevented from doing their jobs. The reporters’ entry badges were disabled on Saturday, a day after Trump had suddenly announced he was barring the outlets because of reporting he considered “fake news.” On Monday morning, the banned TV networks were reporting from an intersection just outside the White House complex. CNN, meanwhile, was removed from its pool duties, which are shared by the five major networks. It had been scheduled to cover the president’s trip to New York for the U.N. General Assembly. In an email to members, the TV pool wrote there would be no replacement coverage following the White House actions. “Effective today, the TV pool will not be

covering events designated as pool coverage of the President,” said the email, seen by The Associated Press. “This follows the White House’s position preventing CNN from fulfilling its assigned pool duties. There will be no replacement pool put in place.” CNN’s chief White House correspondent, Kaitlan Collins, explained on air that this meant: “When the president does anything today, there will be no TV camera with the president that is broadcasting and sharing this footage” to the viewing public. The White House did not respond directly to a request for comment on the lawsuit. But in a news release, it said of the three banned outlets: “The First Amendment protects their right to publish; it does not entitle them to a hard pass, briefing room seat, or place in the press pool.” On his Truth Social platform, Trump wrote that he “cherished” a free press. “The White House is not instituting an assault on the Free Press, something which I cherish,” the president said in his post. “It is instituting an assault on the FAKE NEWS, something that has grown like Cancer in our beloved United States of America. It is corrupt, purposeful, pervasive, fully coordinated, and totally out of control. It is a threat to our National Security, and must be stopped, NOW!” Vice President JD Vance, meanwhile, argued that Trump’s decision was about “basic fairness” and not a violation of the right to free speech. Vance told reporters that the journalism of the three outlets is “effectively far-left propaganda,” and said they were still allowed to report — just not to have offices in the White House. In his second term, Trump and his Republican administration have upped the ante and punished certain media outlets. Trump has also lashed out at individual reporters in person or over social media, sometimes in strikingly personal terms — insulting them in briefings or in his recent speech at the White House Correspondents’ Association dinner. “This morning, we notified the government that we are filing a lawsuit today to protect our First Amendment rights and defend the principle that the government does not decide what the press reports or publishes,” the outlets said in a joint statement posted early Monday on X. “Left unchallenged, this threatens press freedom and the public’s right to independent journalism free from government interference.”

Technical problems at air traffic center disrupts flights in Northeast BY JOSH FUNK

AP transportation writer Hundreds of flights were canceled in the U.S. Northeast due to technical problems at a key regional air traffic control center, hitting every major airport in the New York City area for several hours Monday. The primary communications line failed at a key Federal Aviation Administration facility in Philadelphia and the backup fiber optic line was inadvertently severed by railroad construction workers. That left controllers without radar or communications. The outage affected flights to and from Kennedy, LaGuardia, Newark and Philadelphia airports. By Monday evening, flights were resuming at all those airports. However, significant delays were expected through the rest of the day. Some airlines were allowing customers to change flights without charge. The FAA advised travelers to check the status of their flights before heading to the airport. The outage happened just as President Donald Trump and numerous foreign leaders were flying into New York City for the

United Nations General Assembly. The technical problems stem from the same Federal Aviation Administration facility in Philadelphia that caused numerous disruptions at Newark Liberty International Airport in the spring of 2025. Regional control centers like these have two lines that carry radar and communications data in and out: the primary and the backup. The FAA said a circuit on the primary failed Monday morning, and when the system tried to switch to the backup, workers discovered that the ﬁber optic line had been cut. Transportation Secretary Sean Duffy said an Amtrak construction crew was to blame, but Amtrak pointed to a New Jersey Transit construction crew that was working in the area between Newark and New Brunswick, New Jersey. FAA administrator Bryan Bedford told reporters that the agency was working to restore the primary connection as soon as possible by installing a new circuit on the primary line, while also working to repair the backup ﬁber optic line. He said it’s not clear how long that will take. Verizon said its technicians are working to restore service as soon as possible.

AUSTIN, Texas — A Venezuelan man shot by a U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement officer was in custody Monday at an ICE detention center in Texas after he was released from a hospital with a bullet still lodged in his back, the man’s attorney said. Speaking by phone during a news conference, Wilber Rafael Garces Perez said doctors didn’t remove the bullet because it’s near his spine. He said ICE pressed for him to be released quickly from the hospital so it could move him to a detention center. He said he had received no pain medication or treatment there, and had slept on the floor, before eventually being given a “pill” by a nurse on Monday. Perez, 28, was making a DoorDash delivery in Austin on Sunday when his car was “sideswiped” twice by ICE officers in an unmarked truck, immigration attorney Kate Lincoln-Goldfinch told reporters Monday. He was taken to a hospital, she said, but was released later Sunday into ICE custody with the bullet still inside him. Perez said ICE officers didn’t ask him to stop or turn on any flashing lights until after they had sideswiped him. He said he did a U-turn and was trying to park when the officers rammed his car and shot him in the back of the neck. “I am not doing well due

staff translated during the news conference. Perez was being detained at the South Texas ICE Processing Center in Pearsall, about 130 miles southwest of Austin, Lincoln-Goldfinch said. She said Perez told her in a prior phone call that he was being interrogated. The Department of Homeland Security, which oversees ICE, has released little information and has not said what prompted the shooting. In a statement early Monday, the department said it was investigating the shooting of a Venezuelan man in the U.S. illegally who “had a final order of removal.” Homeland Security did not immediately respond to email messages seeking further comment on the shooting. Perez entered the U.S. legally in 2024 after using CBP One, a program begun under President Joe Biden that set up appointments with U.S. authorities to be considered for asylum, Lincoln-Goldfinch said. President Donald Trump ended the program on his first day in office. Perez’s attorneys said he was an asylum-seeker and had a valid work permit, Lincoln-Goldfinch said. She said a judge issued a deportation order for Perez after he missed a hearing in immigration court because the hearing notice was sent to a former address. “Not that being out of status would justify any of this at all,” Lincoln-Goldfinch said of the shooting in a social media post.

Flowers and candles are seen Monday near the site where a Venezuelan man was shot in his vehicle by a U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement officer ASSOCIATEd PRESS PHOTO in Austin, Texas.

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ICE hides locations of thousands of detainees unable to exerAll subject to final potentially cise all of their legal options. The practice, which apremoval orders plies to detainees who have

BY RYAN J. FOLEY Associated Press

U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement has stopped publicly revealing where it is holding thousands of detainees who are subject to final deportation orders, an unannounced move that has made it far more difficult for lawyers and relatives to find them, according to current and former officials familiar with the practice. ICE removed those detainees from its online detainee locator system on Sept. 15, according to three current and former ICE officials who spoke on condition of anonymity because they were not authorized to discuss the change. Several lawyers contacted by The Associated Press confirmed their clients vanished from the system this week, and the American Immigration Lawyers Association warned its members about the situation Friday. The move represents a stark departure from previous practice and highlights the hardline nature of President Donald Trump’s immigration crackdown, leaving thousands of detainees exceedingly hard to trace and

received ﬁnal orders of removal from an immigration court, could speed deportations by making last-minute legal challenges harder to pursue, immigration lawyers said. Nearly 16,000 people who were arrested and booked into ICE detention in July were subject to ﬁnal removal orders, more than a third of the overall bookings, according to ICE data obtained by the Deportation Data Project based at U.C. Berkeley and UCLA. The practice does not apply to detainees held at a detention facility in Adelanto, California, or at temporary holding facilities in Minneapolis, New York City or suburban Chicago, the sources said. Judges have ordered ICE to list detainees in those facilities in the online locator promptly upon their arrival, as part of litigation over their detention practices. The effort to hide their locations adds to the ways in which the Trump administration has made life harder for detainees and their families as it has increased pressure on them to waive appeals and agree to deportation. ICE did not publicize the move and in a statement issued to the AP, the agency

ASSOCIATEd PRESS FILE PHOTO By JULIO CORTEZ

A U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement officer’s badge is visible during an ICE hiring fair on Aug. 26, 2025, in Arlington, Texas. did not confirm or deny it. The statement said detainees with ﬁnal removal orders were being prioritized for deportation, even as ICE faces a “historic number of injunctions” from courts stopping individual removals. As a result of the change, lawyers and relatives lost track of their clients and loved ones without explanation, which is especially concerning because detainees are frequently moved to new facilities before deportation, said Greg Chen, senior director of government relations

at the American Immigration Lawyers Association. “Families are freaking out because they think the person has been deported and they don’t know where the person might be,” he said. “On the attorney side, this has serious implications for the ability to contact their client. It certainly has implications about how it will interfere with the attorney-client relationship.” The Department of Homeland Security, ICE’s parent agency, has argued that people who are subject to

final removal orders have received due process. That usually means an immigration judge has ordered their removal after a hearing, including cases when immigrants fail to show up, and the decision was afﬁrmed on appeal or not appealed. Still, those detainees have options to challenge their detention and removal, including seeking to reopen the case or by bringing what’s known as a habeas petition asking a judge to release them on constitutional grounds. Federal judges

have granted thousands of rulings ordering that detainees be released or granted bond hearings. ICE detention facilities held more than 65,000 people as of early July, the most recent available data. Around 30% of them likely have ﬁnal removal orders, said Michelle Mendez, legal director at the National Immigration Project. More people have been issued final removal orders after failing to show up for hearings in recent months because the administration’s immigration courts have taken steps to make it harder to participate and to reopen such cases, she said. “To me, it’s just another iteration of disappearing people,” she said. “Why would we do that in the United States of America? It’s something we’d hear about in another country and be concerned about individual rights and due process.” Some with final removal orders also have legal protections against deportation to their countries of origin based on the likelihood they would be tortured or persecuted. Many of them are facing removal to third-party countries where they have no ties and their disappearance in ICE’s system will make legal challenges harder, lawyers said.

Russia targets Zaporizhzhia after Ukraine launches drone barrage BY SAMYA KULLAB Associated Press

KYIV, Ukraine — Russian drones struck the southern Ukrainian city of Zaporizhzhia on Monday, a day after Kyiv’s forces ﬁred more than 1,000 drones at Russia, ofﬁcials said. The relentless daily attacks underscore the lack of significant progress in diplomatic efforts to end the fighting more than four years after Russia invaded its neighbor. There is no sign the war is abating as world leaders gather this week at the U.N. General Assembly. Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy said he expects to meet with U.S. President Donald Trump at the annual event in New York. Russian President Vladimir Putin is not due to attend. Trump on Monday called the war “ridiculous” and said Moscow had “unfortunately

ASSOCIATEd PRESS PHOTO By KATERyNA KLOCHKO

vasions.” “Ukraine’s energy sector, critical infrastructure, and our food exports must stop being targets for Russia, and this will lead to matching deescalation steps on our part,” he said. European leaders, fearing Moscow has malicious intentions on their continent, are keen to put further pressure on Putin to withdraw from Ukraine, but the Russian leader has given no indica-

tion he is ready to give up his goals. The Russian bombardment of Zaporizhzhia late Sunday hit apartment blocks, a university and a shopping mall, among other sites, and wounded ﬁve people, Zelenskyy said on social media Monday. Russia also struck nine other regions of Ukraine, he said. A Russian drone struck a home in northeastern

Ukraine’s Kharkiv region on Monday, killing a 45-year-old woman and seriously injuring her 13-year-old son, according to Ukraine’s State Emergency Service. “Russia is not backing down from its escalation and is sending many signals that it is ready to expand the war,” Zelenskyy said. “At the U.N. General Assembly, we will discuss how we can achieve peace through joint efforts.”

A rescue worker puts out a fire Monday at the Intrade trade center in Zaporizhzhia, Ukraine, after a Russian drone strike. lost control” of its diesel oil production as Ukraine targets Russian reﬁneries with long-range drones. “A large number of (Russian) diesel reﬁneries have been blown up and are, at least temporarily, out of commission,” he said in a social media post. Earlier this month, Trump

urged Zelenskyy to halt the reﬁnery strikes, saying the attacks are causing a global shortage and price spikes. Zelenskyy responded to Trump in a post on X, noting that Kyiv has offered “dozens of diplomatic proposals on how to end this war with dignity, guarantee security, and prevent new Russian in-

missile and drone strikes on Saudi Arabia, including one that targeted Riyadh on Saturday before being intercepted. The Houthis also declared a blockade on Saudi shipping in the Bab el-Mandeb Strait and the Red Sea, attacking Saudi-linked vessels and oil facilities inside the kingdom, the world’s top oil exporter. The Houthis advanced inside Yemen earlier this month, seizing the crucial port city of Mokha and key Red Sea islands allowing them to better monitor shipping trafﬁc through the Bab el-Mandeb, through which some 12% of world trade normally passes. Burnham said he was “acting to secure the interests of Britain and the wider region,

because of course Saudi Arabia has been experiencing attack, is looking at potential further disruption, and we need to keep those pathways (for oil) open.” Britain has condemned the Houthi attacks and said the U.K. will “work with partners to support regional stability, protect civilians and support humanitarian access.” U.K. officials had previously declined to comment on “operational matters” but noted that Britain and Saudi Arabia have a close defense partnership. The U.S., which bombed the Houthis under the Biden and Trump administrations, has shown no interest in getting involved military this time around.

OVER 50? UNLIMITED U.K. to offer Saudi Arabia aerial refueling to counter Houthi attacks FOR JUST $35/MONTH. BY JILL LAWLESS

Associated Press

ABOARD THE BRITISH PRIME MINISTER’S PLANE — Prime Minister Andy Burnham said Monday that Britain has agreed to provide limited military support to Saudi Arabia to repeal attacks by Iran-backed Houthi rebels in Yemen. Burnham told reporters as he ﬂew to the United Nations General Assembly in New York that he had agreed the Royal Air Force will provide air-to-air refueling of Saudi planes. The agreement is for a matter of weeks, but Burnham said it will be kept under review. The conflict between the Houthis and Yemen’s Saudibacked government has reignited, with Houthis aiming

Jury convicts Vt. man in shooting of 3 Palestinian university students By The Associated Press BURLINGTON, Vt. — A jury on Monday convicted a Vermont man of attempted murder in the shootings of three Palestinian college students who were walking near his home, rejecting an insanity defense rooted in his claims that he was acting on orders from U.S. and Israeli intelligence agencies. Jason Eaton faces up to life in prison in the Novem-

ber 2023 attack in Burlington, which paralyzed Hisham Awartani from the waist down and wounded his friends, Tahseen Aliahmad and Kinnan Abdalhamid. The men, all 20 at the time, had been visiting Awartani’s grandmother for Thanksgiving. They were smoking cigarettes and speaking a mix of English and Arabic as they walked near the University of Vermont campus after dusk. Two of them were

wearing traditional Palestinian scarves known as kefﬁyehs. The jury deliberated for several hours before reaching its verdict after a weeklong trial that saw testimony from the three men, who recounted how their stroll ended in bloodshed, and defense and prosecution psychiatric experts who offered differing views of Eaton’s mental health and criminal culpability.

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4A ● Tuesday, September 22, 2026 ● theadvocate.com ● The Acadiana Advocate

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East Feliciana weighs nuclear innovation campus Site could include waste recycling

One such meeting took place with East Feliciana ofﬁcials late last week, said Police Juror Richard Oliveaux. The jury is considering whether to support the state’s effort to land a “Nuclear Lifecycle Innovation Campus,” a designation that federal ofﬁcials say could attract up to $50 billion in privatesector investment.

Neighboring West Feliciana is home to one of the state’s two nuclear power plants, River Bend near St. Francisville. West Feliciana Parish President Kenny Havard said he has taken part in the talks and has also spoken to ofﬁcials at Curio Energy, a startup company pitching a fuelrod recycling plant. Courreges

said officials with Curio have participated in some of the state meetings with local officials. Curio wants to build a plant to recycle spent rods now being stored at nuclear plants across the nation into reusable nuclear fuel or into other material for commercial and medical purposes, according to the company. In addition to River Bend, West and East Feliciana have ample land and Mississippi River and railroad access to attract nuclear industry companies, officials have pointed out. Havard said he believes Louisiana may have three or four potential areas for one of the campuses. He stressed the preliminary nature of the discussions in the Felicianas. “There’s been nothing set in stone, no property purchased or bought, you know, any of that stuff, but we are having conversations,” he said. Oliveaux cautioned that he didn’t know what talks other East Feliciana officials may have had, noting the concept is still in the early stages and would not move forward without public input first. Courreges said the state isn’t rul-

poration, public or private.” The allegations in the complaint have not been independently confirmed and will now be the subject of an investigation by the District Attorney’s Office. Higginbotham, who was a plaintiff in the suit against the school system in response to the vote to close Comeaux High School, also filed a lawsuit in the 15th Judicial

Court on Monday against Touchet, Lafayette Parish School Board President Hannah Smith Mason and the School Board. The suit alleges that the board violated open meeting laws on June 11, July 23, Aug. 13 and Sept. 10 in regards to public comment time and improperly grouping agenda items together to limit public discussion.

“The board’s repeated use of these procedures creates a substantial risk that the same procedures will be used at future school board meetings,” according to the ﬁling. The suit also states that Superintendent Touchet has not “prepared an agenda or submitted to the board any agenda that had a consent agenda or action item seeking the approval of a school calendar

showing working days for the administrative, instructional, secretarial, maintenance and custodial personnel, including personnel employed on a 12-month basis or otherwise since he has been Superintendent of the Lafayette Parish School Board.”

and from big oil company executives. “I get it,” Landry said. “The majors out there, those that are exporting, are making record profits and I don’t have a problem with them making those particular profits. The American citizens should not be subsidizing Europe’s problems at a time when Europe refuses to help America.” Landry also noted that his tweet also suggested enacting exemptions and waivers to the rules that require small refineries to pay about $13 more per barrel for crude oil. He said the small refineries produce about 10% of the nation’s fuel supplies.

suggests that domestic diesel prices would fall and international prices would rise if American exports are banned. “The magnitude of the domestic effect would depend on how much diesel could be stored or moved from exporting regions to other U.S. markets, and on how reﬁners responded,” Upton said. Because diesel, gasoline and other fuel products are generally made using interconnected processes, “the scope for changing their relative yields is limited,” Upton added.

Faucheux’s statement echoes comments by U.S. Secretary of Energy Chris Wright during a Thursday interview with The Daily Caller, a right-wing news source. Wright also said a diesel export ban would force a reduction in reﬁning, due to a lack of domestic

pipeline capacity and storage, and that would result in an increase in fuel prices. American Fuel & Petrochemical Manufacturers, a Washingtonbased trade association, also fretted that the ban wouldn’t work. AFP, as the group is commonly known, pointed out that U.S. refineries make about 5.3 million barrels of distillate fuel per day, of which Americans use about 3.6 million barrels per day. “If exports are banned, reﬁners cannot simply stockpile unlimited diesel. They would have to reduce production. Because gasoline and diesel are produced together, producing less diesel also means producing less gasoline,” AFP said in a statement. Professor Gregory Upton at LSU’s Energy Institute explained that, while global changes in supply and demand affect all costs, U.S. prices tend to be lower because of transportation costs and local market conditions. Basic economic theory strongly

Donald Trump. But then, so has the oil industry. Over the weekend, U.S. Sen. Chuck Grassley, R-Iowa, and some of the GOP congressional delegation in that state urged Trump to enact a diesel embargo, as was done in the 1970s when high fuel costs inﬂated grocery prices. “High diesel prices ARE KILLING FARMERS INCOME,” Grassley wrote in his X post. Though much of Washington was closed because of Yom Kippur, one of the holiest days for the Jewish religion, the issue got a lot of talk. U.S. Agriculture Secretary Brooke Rollins told reporters that Trump had called her Monday to discuss diesel prices, reported Politico, a political trade publication. And legislation has been introduced by Rep. Tim Burchett, RTenn. The White House and Louisiana’s congressional delegation, which includes the House’s top two leaders, were unable to immediately comment.

identified Al-Muhtadi, alleging they did not. If that is the case and geofence searches were the origin of the government’s investigation, the defense attorneys say all evidence obtained as a result is tainted. The defense also filed a motion to suppress evidence produced through Israeli surveillance and seeks to suppress six audio recordings of Al-Muhtadi’s telephone communications on Oct. 7, 2023; portions of the

summary furnished by the Israeli government that describe communications to which AlMuhtadi was a party; and any other evidence “obtained by exploitation of the search of the Israeli archive.” The motion alleges the conversations came from an archive of Palestinian citizens’ phone calls that Israel records on a regular basis. Motions also were filed to dismiss all four counts against AlMuhtadi.

The superseding indictment does not allege Al-Muhtadi provided anything or communicated with anyone identiﬁed as Hamas. The indictment says he was associated with another group that is not designated as a foreign terrorist organization. Counts three and four should be dismissed, the defense argues, because Al-Muhtadi applied for a U.S. visa in Egypt, which is not in a special maritime or territorial jurisdiction of the U.S.

BY DAVID J. MITCHELL Staff writer

Two months after Louisiana became a finalist for a national initiative to modernize nuclear power, state officials have begun meeting with local officials — most recently in East and West Feliciana parishes — about interest in new nuclear development. Such companies could include those engaged in recycling spent radioactive fuel rods, nuclear fuel enrichment and permanently storing nuclear waste. The state Department of Conservation and Energy, which is leading Louisiana’s effort to win the federal competition, met with local officials last week in south Louisiana and will hit the northern part of the state soon. “We’re visiting different areas saying, ‘Hey, here’s the kind of things that are out there that might be part of it. Is there anything you’ve got an interest in?’ ” said Patrick Courreges, a state energy department spokesperson.

FRAUD

Continued from page 1A Consitution section 7:14(A), “The funds, credit, property, or things of value of the state or of any political subdivision shall not be loaned, pledged, or donated to or for any person, association, or cor-

DIESEL

Continued from page 1A Faucheux, the president of the Louisiana Mid-Continent Oil and Gas Association, a trade association formed nearly a century ago when oil companies started building the Gulf Coast reﬁneries that now produce most of the nation’s diesel, gasoline and jet fuels. “Without available capacity to redirect supply, halting the export of American diesel would force reﬁneries to reduce production, which would also decrease the production of gasoline,” Faucheux said Wednesday in a statement. “This is a misguided proposal that would cause more harm and increase, not decrease, costs for American families and businesses.” When asked about those comments during a Wednesday afternoon news conference, Landry said he has heard from Faucheux

EVIDENCE

Continued from page 1A geofence warrants and to compel disclosure of the origin of the identiﬁcation.” The defense attorneys allege that under the Fourth Amendment of the Constitution, geofence warrants are unconstitutional. They want to know if information from ﬁve geofence warrants

SPENDING

Continued from page 1A The move comes as state lawmakers scrutinize public school funding, which Gov. Jeff Landry has argued too often goes toward “waste and bureaucracy.” “Louisiana taxpayers expect school systems to spend dollars wisely,” Brumley said in a statement, “and when too few dollars go into classrooms, changes must be made.” In interviews, leaders of both districts said they believe their schools comply with the state’s spending rule, but that the districts might have incorrectly reported some expenditures. For example, staff at an alternative education program in Bogalusa might have been mistakenly categorized as central office staff, which would not count toward the instructional spending requirement, Superintendent Byron Hurst

STAFF FILE PHOTO By RICHARd ALAN HANNON

The River Bend nuclear power plant is located in West Felciana Parish.

Others raise concerns

said. “We think it’s more of a technical coding error,” he said. “It’s not a misappropriation of funds.” Hurst sent a memo to employees Thursday explaining the issue and emphasizing that the district “is not being taken over by the state.” In the interview, he said he welcomes the state review, adding that it should help identify and fix any financial reporting issues. St. John the Baptist Parish School Board President Debbie Schum also cited issues with how some expenditures were categorized. She said the district has improved its reporting practices, adding that she is confident the school system will now meet the instructional spending benchmark. “I think when the numbers come out this year, we’re going to be at the correct percentage,” she said. “The difficulty was not so much that we were spending in incorrect areas, it’s that it wasn’t coded to the correct areas.”

The state Education Department will hire the chief operating officers on a temporary basis to dig into the districts’ financial records and recommend changes. The enforcement action could cost the state about $150,000 annually, according to estimates in a legislative fiscal analysis. About 30 school districts and charter schools failed to meet the 70% instructional spending rule for at least two consecutive years, according to state data through the 2023-24 fiscal year, which is what the state used to track compliance. Several other school systems that fell below the 70% mark received waivers because their performance ratings were at or above the state average. An Education Department spokesperson did not respond to a question about why Brumley appointed compliance officers for only two of the systems that did not comply with the spending rule.

A nationwide political debate Landry waded into a growing push by agricultural state politicos and GOP candidates worried about how their farmers are going to pay for harvesting, which is about to begin, and whether they will blame Republicans for the skyrocketing fuel prices at the midterm election polls. Rural areas, for the most part, have strongly backed President

ing out locating different nuclear industries in different parts of the state. Ofﬁcials with Curio — based in Washington, D.C. — couldn’t be reached for comment. Company CEO Ed McGinnis spoke to Louisiana lawmakers in a committee hearing last year. McGinnis, a Jefferson Parish native, said material from the recycled rods is an untapped energy source. McGinnis said the spent rods, which would be held in specialized containment, could be moved to the recycling site by road, rail or water. He pointed out that the federal government’s site for permanent storage for nuclear waste, Yucca Mountain in Nevada, hasn’t opened nearly three decades after its planned start date. Spent nuclear fuel rods are being stored at the nuclear power plants where they were used, including River Bend and Waterford 3, in St. Charles Parish. Operations often use lined water tanks to cool the rods for several years and then put them into dry storage. David J. Mitchell can be reached at dmitchell@ theadvocate.com.

Email Joanna Brown at joanna. brown@theadvocate.com.

The government, meanwhile, is asking to permit at trial various forms of evidence, including witnesses who personally experienced and videos of the Oct. 7 attacks in Kfar Aza and Nachal Oz in Israel and evidence from years before the attack that they say show Al-Muhtadi’s sympathy with and membership in a Palestinian militia group. Email Claire Taylor at ctaylor@ theadvocate.com.

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The Acadiana Advocate ● theadvocate.com ● Tuesday, September 22, 2026 ● 5A

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6A ● Tuesday, September 22, 2026 ● theadvocate.com ● The Acadiana Advocate

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TODAY

WEDNESDAY

THURSDAY

FRIDAY

SATURDAY

SUNDAY

A t-storm around in the p.m.

Mostly cloudy and warm

Sunny to partly cloudy

Partly sunny

An afternoon t-storm or two

HIGH

LOW

HIGH

96° 74°

LOW

HIGH

94° 72°

LOW

92° 69°

HIGH

Beaumont 97/75

High/low Normal high/low Last year’s high/low Record high Record low

Port Arthur 94/76

Baton Rouge 96/73

Lake Charles 97/74

10s

20s

30s

Houma 92/73

40s

50s

LOW

YESTERDAY

TODAY

REAdING 56 MAIN POLLUTANT Ozone

MAIN POLLUTANT Ozone

60s

70s

80s

Sunrise today Sunset tonight Moonrise today Moonset today

90s 100s 110s

FULL

SEP 26

City

Austin Boston dallas Fairbanks Honolulu Las Vegas Louisville Miami Nashville

Shown are areas of precipitation and high temperatures for the day.

24-hour total Month to date Normal month to date year to date Normal year to date

HIGH

5:41p 11:43a 4:06a 6:18a 7:12a 6:40a 8:20a

FT.

NEW

OCT 3

98 61 95 45 90 91 74 87 86

TODAY Lo

73 54 76 33 79 73 62 77 67

FIRST

OCT 10

t pc s c sh s t t t

OCT 18

98 62 94 46 90 94 71 85 81

WED. Lo

73 54 74 29 77 76 64 75 64

LOW

0.00” 2.37” 3.70” 46.16” 47.38”

FT.

HIGH

0.8 4:32a 0.2 1.8 10:29p 0.4 2.2 8:29a 2.0 2.0 10:22p 0.5 1.4 6:16p 0.4 1.8 4:32p 0.5 1.8 7:18p 0.5

6:56 a.m. 7:05 p.m. 4:54 p.m. 2:53 a.m.

LAST

MOdERATE

PRECIPITATION

93°/75° 88°/69° 90°/72° 99° in 1921 48° in 1899

TODAY’S TIDES Lake Pontchartrain (Tchefuncte River) Shell Beach South Point, Marsh Island Cypremort Point Grand Isle (Barataria Pass) Mississippi River (Southwest Pass) Wine Island

New Orleans 93/76

Shown is today’s weather. Temperatures are today’s highs and tonight’s lows.

Hattiesburg 96/71

Alexandria 96/72

Lafayette 96/74

HIGH

91° 70°

Lafayette through 5 p.m. Monday

Jackson 96/72 Many 95/70

LOW

90° 72°

TEMPERATURE

Longview 98/73

-0s

LOW

Monroe 98/70

Shreveport 98/73

-10s

HIGH

92° 72°

The fall season starts tonight just after 7 p.m. Before then, expect a mostly sunny to partly cloudy, hot and humid Tuesday. Temperatures this afternoon will rise to the low to mid-90s. With high humidity, temperatures could feel like 105 or greater this afternoon. Also, parts of Southwest Louisiana are under a major or extreme heat risk today, so please take precautions. There is a 20% chance of rain and a few isolated storms today. Temperatures in the mid-90s are expected tomorrow.

t pc s c sh s pc t c

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SOURCE: LOUISIANA dEQ ANd AIRNOW.GOV

LOW

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--- ----- --6:27p 0.5 --- ----- ----- ----- ---

The solunar period schedule allows planning days so you will be fishing in good territory or hunting in good cover during those times. Major periods begin at the times shown and last for 1.5 to 2 hours. The minor periods are shorter. MAJOR MINOR MAJOR MINOR

Today 8:43a Wednesday 9:24a Thursday 10:04a Friday 10:44a Saturday 11:27a Sunday 12:14p Monday 12:41a

City

New Orleans Orlando Philadelphia Phoenix Pittsburgh Raleigh St. Louis San diego Tampa

93 90 64 99 61 84 70 77 90

2:31a 9:07p 3:13a 9:47p 3:53a 10:26p 4:33a 11:06p 5:15a 11:49p 6:02a ---6:53a 1:06p

TODAY Lo

76 75 56 81 54 65 58 67 77

t t r s sh t c pc t

93 88 68 96 59 69 73 77 90

2:55p 3:35p 4:15p 4:55p 5:38p 6:25p 7:19p

WED. Lo

77 75 55 80 51 58 57 69 74

t t r t r sh pc s t

Weather (W): s-sunny, pc-partly cloudy, c-cloudy, sh-showers, t-thunderstorms, r-rain, sf-snow flurries, sn-snow, i-ice.

Pope prepares to visit France this weekend Leo XIV to find secular country at odds with Catholic teaching on life

BY NICOLE WINFIELD Associated Press

VATICAN CITY — When an ailing Pope John Paul II visited the French shrine at Lourdes in 2004, on his last foreign trip, he delivered a forceful condemnation of abortion and euthanasia as he gasped for air during Mass. Pope Leo XIV is expected to make a similar appeal to protect life when he visits France this weekend and also prays at Lourdes. One of Christianity’s most-visited pilgrimage destinations is especially popular for sick people because of its association with miraculous cures. Leo’s message will likely land differently, since France’s National Assembly in 2024 enshrined abortion as a constitutional right and recently gave final approval to a bill allowing adults with incurable illnesses to receive lethal medication. It was the culmination of years of debate over end-of-life care in France and comes as other countries in Europe and the Americas have increasingly legalized assisted dying, though British lawmakers recently voted down a bill allowing it. Catholic teaching holds that life must be defended from conception until natural death. It insists that chronically ill patients, including those in vegetative states, must receive “ordinary” care such as hydration and nutrition, but that “extraordinary” or disproportionate care can be suspended if it is only prolonging a precarious and painful life. With Leo’s blessing, French bishops decided the ofﬁcial motto of his trip would be “That the world may have life,” suggesting that protecting human life and human dignity will be an overarching theme of the visit. Leo has emphasized the need to protect the dignity of all human life, from immigrants to the sick and unborn, most signiﬁcantly in his inaugural encyclical on safeguarding human dignity in the age

ASSOCIATEd PRESS PHOTO By ANdREW MEdICHINI

Pope Leo XIV celebrates a Mass on Sept. 7 at the Basilica Sanctuary of the Mother of Good Counsel in Genazzano, central Italy. of artiﬁcial intelligence. Cardinal Jean-Marc Aveline, president of the bishops’ conference, said he expected Leo would raise the issue. “We already know that the question of life and respect for life — not only from an ethical standpoint, but in many ways — is at the heart of the pope’s message and aligns very closely with the message of the Gospel.”

A secular but Catholic country France is a traditionally Catholic country, but adheres to a strict form of secularism in public life based on a 1905 law separating church and state. And like many countries in the once-traditionally Christian West, France has seen the influence of the Catholic Church wane amid secularizing trends and the impact of the clergy sexual abuse scandal on its credibility. Yet French bishops have expressed astonishment at the level of interest in the pope’s Sept. 25-28 visit and say they expect 1 million people will see him. Due to largerthan-expected crowds, organizers lengthened the perimeter for Leo’s main Mass at the central Place de la Concorde, extending the site beyond the 1.2-mile length of the Champs-Elysees where he’ll parade down in his popemobile. Leo elicited a similar level of interest in secular Spain in June, where he received a seven-minute standing ovation after his speech to the Spanish Parliament. “I think nobody many months ago or a few months ago would have

imagined” the level of interest, said Sister Nathalie Becquart, a top Vatican ofﬁcial from France. “But they see what happened in Spain.” Like Spain, France has seen a trend of new adult baptisms in recent years, particularly among conservative young adults, many of whom are attracted to more traditional forms of worship including the old Latin Mass. More than 13,000 adults were baptized at Easter this year in France, where the number of adult baptisms has more than tripled since 2016, the French bishops’ conference reported. Leo will meet with some of these new converts in a special audience. But experts caution these numbers don’t counteract the overall generational trend of the children of practicing French Catholics no longer going to Mass or baptizing their babies. In 1980, there were 513,000 baptisms in France; in 2024, a total of 186,000. “The new phenomenon of adult baptisms is put into perspective; in fact, it represents only a very modest rebound,” said Christian Marquant, a traditionalist Catholic who blames the secularizing crisis in the French church on the modernizing reforms of the Second Vatican Council.

AI, peace also on Leo’s itinerary Leo is bookending his trip to France with two events to broaden his message to an international audience. On Day 1, he visits UNESCO to speak about artiﬁcial intelligence and the value of education and art. In his AI encyclical “Magniﬁcent

GOOd

Humanity,” Leo called for robust AI regulation and for developers to slow down — a stance they have recently taken as a group. Leo’s position on AI has put him at odds with the Trump administration, which has encouraged AI innovation so the U.S. can compete with and surpass China. The visit to UNESCO by the American pope is signiﬁcant, given the Trump administration has once again announced it is withdrawing from the U.N. cultural agency, part of its broader retreat from international organizations. On his final day, Sept. 28, Leo will visit the northern French city of Metz, the birthplace of Robert Schuman, one of the founding fathers of European integration. Leo will participate in a meeting with other faith leaders and then speak at a European conference on peace, at a time of war in Ukraine and beyond.

Clergy sexual abuse on agenda The Vatican took the unusual step of announcing ahead of time that Leo would meet with victims of clergy sexual abuse while in France. The gathering of seven survivors includes one who was an adult when abused, a recognition of the new frontier of the abuse crisis facing the church. The French church has endured a brutal reckoning with its legacy of abuse. An independent report in 2021 estimated 330,000 children had been abused over 70 years by some 3,000 priests and church workers. Despite criticism of the report’s methodology and conclusions, French bishops nevertheless put in place an independent system of compensation for victims that to date has recommended the church pay out more than 20 million euros. In Lourdes, Leo will be reminded of a prickly abuse case inherited from Pope Francis. The façade of one of the Lourdes basilicas was designed by the Rev. Marko Rupnik, one of the Catholic Church’s most famous mosaic artists. Rupnik is on trial in a Vatican court, accused by more than two dozen women of having psychologically, spiritually and sexually abused them starting in the 1990s, including during the creation of his artworks.

MISSISSIPPI Memphis Vidalia-Natchez Red River Landing Baton Rouge donaldsonville Reserve New Orleans OHIO Cairo COMITE Near Olive AMITE Near darlington denham Springs Port Vincent TICKFAW Montpelier Holden ATCHAFALAYA Simmesport Melville Krotz Springs Butte La Rose Bayou Sorrel Morgan City

FLOOD STAGE

34 48 48 35 27 22 17

MON. 24-HOUR STAGE CHANGE

-0.80 15.50 18.40 6.20 4.00 3.06 3.30

-0.41 +0.63 +0.50 +0.20 +0.20 +0.06 +0.14

13.14

-0.58

-1.61

-0.04

18 29 8

-1.27 9.82 2.50

-0.01 -0.02 -0.22

13 15

1.43 0.65

-0.03 -0.02

47 34 29 20 12 6

6.35 4.37 3.02 3.43 3.20 2.01

+0.26 +0.22 -0.18 +0.08 none -0.02

data as of 7 a.m. Monday

Firefighting helicopter crashes near Yosemite Authorities say both pilots killed

BY REBECCA BOONE Associated Press

Two helicopter pilots were killed when their aircraft crashed Sunday afternoon while conducting water drops on a wildfire at Yosemite National Park, officials say. The pilots were the only people on board and were employed by the contract aircraft company Precision. One of the pilots was Greg King, who used to work for the Alaska Division of Forestry & Fire Protection and fought several wildland fires in that state before moving to Precision, said agency spokesperson Emery Johnson. King’s close relatives work at the agency and gave their permission to release his name, Johnson said. The identity of the second pilot has not yet been released. At least 14 people have died while helping with wildfires in the U.S. this year, the most since 2022 when 25 deaths were recorded, according to government reports. In August, two helicopter pilots died while helping fight a fire in Utah and a helicopter pilot in Colorado crashed into a reservoir. Details about the circumstances surrounding Sunday’s crash were not immediately released. It will be investigated by the Federal Aviation Administration and the National Transportation Safety Board. The Super Puma helicopter had been using a water bucket to help suppress the fire when it went down near a lake, said Benjamin Cossel, a spokesperson with the Federal Complex Incident Management Team overseeing the firefighting response.

METRO

T H E A D V O C AT E.C O M

Jan Risher

An operatic star is on the rise I met Julia Ernst in March on a night when she looked every bit the diva. She was performing at a salon event in New Orleans. Tony Award winner Christine Ebersole opened the show, and, at 25, Ernst closed it. Whatever star quality is, Ernst has it. Months later, still thinking about that performance, I tracked her down. What I found underneath the shimmer and shine was a 25-year-old woman from Mandeville who still misses her mama and fried shrimp po-boys from Zara’s Lil Giant Supermarket on Prytania Street. Ernst is in her third year at Yale, working toward a second master’s degree in opera performance. This fall, she sings the role of Nedda in a scene from “Pagliacci.” Conductor Gustavo Dudamel, music director of the New York Philharmonic, picked her to sing Leonore when he came to campus to work with the orchestra. In February, she will be Fiordiligi in Mozart’s “Così fan tutte” with Yale Opera at the Shubert Theatre in New Haven, Connecticut. Ernst does not come from a musical family. Her parents do not sing or play instruments. She speaks one language, English, but sings in at least eight: English, French, German, Italian, Russian, Spanish, Czech or Greek. Much of her training at Yale goes into diction classes, getting pronunciations exact. Her love of singing goes back to watching Celine Dion, Mariah Carey and Whitney Houston on YouTube, loving what she calls “the idea of a ballad and kind of stopping time with your voice.” One day she walked up to her mother, Shannon, and announced her plans to sing “My Heart Will Go On” in the school talent show. Until then, her mom had no idea her daughter could sing at all. A voice teacher at Archbishop Hannan High School in Covington later suggested that Ernst try opera. She hasn’t stopped since. At Loyola University New Orleans, she trained as a mezzosoprano until a master class changed her path. Gerald Martin Moore, who now heads Yale Opera, was in town judging a regional round of the Metropolitan Opera’s competition. He heard Ernst sing a mezzo aria and told her that she should consider changing to soprano. Her teacher agreed, and she spent the next year rebuilding her voice around a soprano repertoire, starting with “Donde lieta” from Puccini’s “La Bohème.” A year later, she emailed Moore, reminded him they had met at Loyola, and asked for a shot at Yale. My husband, Julio, grew up listening to opera because his father loved it. As a young man, he spent Saturday afternoons on a canal in El Paso catching bluegill, carp and catﬁsh, listening to Tchaikovsky and Puccini on “Live from the Met.” Even though we end up listening to opera more than I ever have before, I don’t have the history with it that my husband does. I asked Ernst about her thoughts

ä See RISHER, page 4B

PROVIdEd PHOTO By SARA MCINGVALE PHOTOGRAPHy

Mandeville native Julia Ernst is working on her second master’s degree at yale, studying opera.

T u e s d ay, s e p T e m b e r 22, 2026

1bN

$20M planned for La. roofs Landry redirects funds to fortification program BY ALYSE PFEIL

Staff writer

Gov. Jeff Landry announced Monday that the state plans to redirect $20 million in federal funding originally meant for affordable housing to instead launch another fortified roof grant program for homes affected by recent hurricanes. After storms in 2020 and 2021 caused homeowners insurance rates to shoot up, especially in coastal Louisiana, fortified roofs have emerged as one solution for people to save money on insurance premiums. Demand for grants to help build fortified roofs in the state so far has far outstripped supply. “The overall goal is to reduce

the financial barriers for our families that are seeking to fortify their homes,” Landry said. “This demonstrates the strong commitment to proactive preparation rather than reactive rebuilding.” The proposed $20 million infusion brings the total amount that Louisiana has dedicated to fortiﬁed roofs to $100 million, Landry said. Landry While insurance companies often give discounts to homeowners with fortiﬁed roofs because they are built to a higher standard to withstand storms, Landry noted that insurance companies will be required to give the premium discounts starting in January.

The $20 million for the new program would come from the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development and was previously slated to go toward affordable apartment development. But the state is now asking the federal government to approve a reallocation of the money. A public comment period on the change is open until Oct. 19. If the feds agree that Louisiana can move the money, the new grant program would be called Restore Resilient Opportunities for Overhead Fortiﬁcation, or the Restore ROOF program. The state’s Ofﬁce of Community Development would administer the money.

Details about when the program would open, application requirements and funding amounts were not immediately available. Earlier this year, Landry and the Legislature allocated $30 million for grants to homeowners to build fortiﬁed roofs through the Louisiana Department of Insurance’s existing fortiﬁed roof grant program. They also rerouted $50 million collected by the Louisiana Citizens Property Insurance Corporation, the state’s insurer of last resort, toward that grant program. Insurance Commissioner Tim Temple joined Landry on Monday to celebrate the effort. “This truly is Louisiana’s future to a more affordable homeowner’s insurance, especially in coastal Louisiana,” Temple said.

ä See ROOFS, page 4B

OKRA DOKEY

PHOTOS By ROBIN MAy

ABOVE: Okra cooks Kathy Bienvenu, left, and David Alfred stir their pots of smothered okra with chicken, sausage, crab and shrimp during the ﬁfth annual Okra Festival at Heymann Park on Sunday. LEFT: Cook Edwin George Sr. prepares to ladle out a serving of the okra dish during the festival.

Hands-on boucherie part Judge issues deadline of Creole Culture Day on old Travelodge motel Event about storytelling, family traditions

BY JA’KORI MADISON

Staff writer

The ﬁfth annual Creole Culture Day will take place Oct. 3 at Town Hall Park in Grand Coteau. Milton Arceneaux, the founder of Creole Culture Day, said that while a hands-on boucherie is one of the main attractions, the cooking is only one part of what visitors will experience. “Creole culture is a verb,” Arceneaux said. “At the core of it, it’s family and camaraderie, but everything else is like a tentacle.” Food, music, language, genealogy and storytelling are all part of that larger picture, he said. Creole Culture Day is designed to bring those elements together in one place. The event is free, and fresh boudin and cracklins will be available to attendees. The event will also feature Creole Bingo called in Kouri-Vini, oral history re-

cordings and live music ranging from juré to Creole French music and zydeco. A genealogy and heritage station will offer visitors an opportunity to trace their family lineage with professional researchers. Other activities include a marketplace, food vendors, the Bryant Benoit Indigenous Art Station and additional cultural programming. At the boucherie, Arceneaux said visitors should expect something more interactive than a typical demonstration. The hog will be processed by hand, and people will be able to ask questions and participate in the process. The cooks who lead the boucherie learned the work through their families and continue to practice it outside of the annual event. Arceneaux said the hands-on aspect is important because much of the knowledge surrounding a boucherie was never written down. “A lot of this stuff was learned by watching, listening and

ä See CULTURE, page 4B

45-day limit set for demo work BY ADAM DAIGLE

Acadiana business editor The owner of the former Travelodge motel site in Lafayette was given 45 days to complete demolition work or face more penalties. During a Sept. 9 hearing regarding the lack of progress at the site at 1101 W. Pinhook Road, a judge gave Ravi Daggula 45 days to complete asbestos demolition or face ﬁnes or other penalties, a Lafayette Consolidated Government spokesperson said. On Thursday, the property was granted a demolition permit by LCG, according to records. The property will also go before Lafayette Consolidated Government’s city planning commission on Monday for a plat approval that will combine all four adjoining lots into one. It got a preliminary approval last month, according to records.

STAFF FILE PHOTO By LESLIE WESTBROOK

A judge has issued a 45-day deadline for demolition work to be complete on the old Travelodge motel in Lafayette.

It’s the latest on the highly visible abandoned motel along Pinhook Road, which Daggula and other investors bought in late 2021 but has had little work done on it since after initially announcing plans to reopen it as a boutique motel. Daggula had earlier faced a notice of seizure and thousands of dollars in ﬁnes from LCG for lack of activity at the site, but the notice was lifted and ﬁnes were waived.

ä See MOTEL, page 4B

2B ● Tuesday, September 22, 2026 ● theadvocate.com ● The Acadiana Advocate

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OPINION T H E A D V O C AT E.C O M/opinions

OUR VIEWS

Bipartisan bill would help former inmates and the industries that want to hire them It is rare for Republican U.S. Rep. Clay Higgins of Lafayette and Democrat U.S. Rep. Troy Carter of New Orleans to agree on something, much less to together spearhead its passage by the House. They deserve credit for doing so last Wednesday on a bill that will help incarcerated people get jobs before they are released, thus helping them build constructive new lives rather than fall into recidivism. As Carter said, “A prison record shouldn’t be a death sentence. Everyone deserves the right to work, rebuild their lives, and contribute to society.” The TWICE Act will make it easier for released prisoners to participate in the Transportation Worker Identification Credential (TWIC) program, which helps them attain jobs in industries related to ports, terminals, refineries, power plants and more. Under TWIC, the Transportation Security Administration already conducts rigorous background checks before workers can be employed in these industries. The TWICE Act doesn’t reduce the level of security one iota, but instead would improve access to TWIC for “returning citizens” through several means, including by giving guidelines to prison officials to help soonto-be-freed inmates “pre-apply” for the program rather than waiting until they are released from custody. Plenty of people are incarcerated for crimes that would not make them a danger to transportation infrastructure, and of course very, very few inmates have any bent toward terrorism. And there is a notable labor shortage for transportation industry jobs, many of which do not entail hands-on responsibility for anything of a critical or public-safety-related nature. The industry itself appears quite confident that the screening process is thorough and effective, and that it already excludes those whose conduct makes them in any way worrisome for the jobs for which they apply. That’s why almost the entire industry supports the TWICE Act, which passed the House by voice vote with not a single registered note of opposition. Among the many organizations endorsing the bill are the American Trucking Association, the American Waterways Operators, the American Association of Port Authorities, the Transportation Institute and the World Trade Center of New Orleans. “A man’s character shouldn’t be measured by how he falls; it should be measured by how he stands back up,” Higgins said. “By cutting red tape and streamlining access to the TWIC program, this legislation will address maritime and transportation workforce shortages in the Gulf of America and Louisiana waterways while extending a second chance to formerly incarcerated Americans.” The bill now goes to the Senate Committee on Commerce, Science, and Technology. As it proved so uncontroversial in the House and has the backing of all the industry groups that know exactly what their security needs are, there is no reason for the committee or the full Senate to dawdle. The Senate should pass the bill without delay.

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YOUR VIEWS

For your convenience, AI can now destroy the world I saw Jacob Coxon on “Meet the Press” recently warning that AI could wipe out the human race. What a mental burden on Gens Z, Alpha and Beta. This is on top of my generation, called Baby Boomers (I hate that name), being the first threatened with the total destruction of human civilization. The atomic bomb, first detonated in 1945, which ushered in this era, was created solely to kill and destroy. Artificial intelligence, on the other hand, is meant to be a convenience to man. Yet in both cases, those creating these contrivances failed to take into account the “side effects.” Bombs that killed more than 70,000 people each in the cities of Hiroshima and Nagasaki have morphed into thousands of warheads riding the tips of intercontinental ballistic missiles capable of reaching any place on Earth and killing millions per blast. Now the AI powering all of our various smart gadgets has broken its constraints and, like the Frankenstein

monster of legend, is virtually running around causing mayhem. It’s ultimately capable of shutting down systems, spawning unknown viruses and launching nuclear weapons. And for what? Convenience? Our modern world is the sheer deﬁnition of insanity. And to think the creators of these horrors are the same types who branded indigenous huntergatherers or pastoral peoples “primitive.” They weren’t smart enough to conceive progress, it was said. Well, look at what the smartest people have wrought. All of their brainpower should now be directed at preventing the destruction of human civilization. But nah, these geniuses have in mind the same goal which created this madness in the ﬁrst place: Making money! Are these the people you’re supporting at the polls? Wake up! Oh, I forgot, that’s politically incorrect for some of y’all.

MUHAMMAD YUNGAI New Orleans

Louisiana politicians cut deals with SpaceX while taxpayers shut out As I read and hear of more craziness in the ways we are being governed — most recently Louisiana being seduced by Elon Musk, with little attention to the downside of such a relationship — I am reminded of how often fear is used to sell an idea. This is so, even to the point of having our political leaders sign NDAs out of fear that Texas or another rival state might learn about the deal we have cut with Musk. All this secrecy to ensure that multiple rockets will launch daily from Louisiana. This paranoia is unnecessary but apparently effective for our state leadership. They gave away everything without disclosing exactly what “everything” is. They spent tax dollars, or rather gave up future revenue, in return for the promise of jobs; yet without disclosure of the deal, we as citizens have no ready way to determine if the claims are true or not. This is literally deceitful behavior. What is being touted as capitalism and good business is really a distortion of capitalism. This is business using public funds in order to build proﬁt, while the investors (the public taxpayers) have little decision-making power over how their money is “invested.”

From ‘no call’ to ‘wrong call,’ NFL still penalizing Saints On Jan. 20, 2019, the New Orleans Saints had the NOLA “no call” against the Rams, denying us the chance of victory and a possible run to another Super Bowl. On Sept. 13, against the Lions, we had what can be called the NOLA “wrong call,” which prevented the Saints from winning the game in regulation time. The feeble explanation was that the quarterback’s arm was going forward. I believe that your arm has to go forward whether you throw a forward pass, a sideward pass or a backward pass. In my entire lifespan of watching football, a backward pass is live unless it goes out of bounds. But here we are seven years later, and the NFL is still penalizing the Saints. On a side note, Tom Dempsey kicked a game-winning 63-yard ﬁeld goal to beat this same Detroit Lions team in 1970. The same thing almost happened on Sept. 13 with Daniel Carlson’s 62yard ﬁeld goal attempt, which had the distance but was slightly wide to the right. As Yogi Berra would say, “It was déjà vu all over again.” I do admire the team going for two points to win the game. It should be an exciting season.

DAVID BOHNET Slidell

Rivalry over coaches is college football now

STAFF PHOTO By SOPHIA GERMER

Gov. Jeff Landry talks with residents after the SpaceX announcement on Aug. 25.

The taxpayer/investor not only fails to understand what dividends might be returned, but also is left to pay additionally for any environmental damage, noise pollution, increased public services needed to build such a complex facility, etc. This is simply wrong. When I hear yet another “trust me” from a politician with no proven track record of honesty, I am reminded once again of the importance of the midterm elections. I, for one, will be voting for change.

MICHAEL KUHN New Orleans

Full disclosure: Tulane fan here. I am very amused by the shock, surprise and indignation LSU fans have regarding the Ole Miss anger toward “Fast-Lane” Kifﬁn for departing for his perceived greener pastures at LSU. Have they forgotten how LSU fans treated Nick Saban after he brought them back from the cellar to the pinnacle of college football, only to leave for the Miami Dolphins? Indeed, LSU should revere Saban, as Ole Miss should appreciate Fast-Lane. We at Tulane still love Jon Sumrall. This is college football now, so everyone needs to get a grip.

MARY P. LUPO, M.D. New Orleans

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COMMENTARY What’s in a name, anyway? As part of President Donald Trump’s trade war with Canada that the administration claims isn’t a trade war, the president has signed an executive order, renaming Lake Ontario, “Lake America.” This follows his renaming of the Gulf of Mexico to the “Gulf of America.” These childish antics Cal Thomas help no one, but Trump is not alone in changing names for political and woke purposes. There is a long road in Northern Virginia that for years has been called “Lee Highway.” It passes through Arlington and Fairfax counties. Arlington County politicians decided they didn’t like Confederate General Robert E. Lee, for whom the highway is named, so they changed it to Langston Boulevard, honoring John Mercer Langston, an abolitionist, an attorney and the ﬁrst Black person elected to Congress from Virginia. While that might be considered admirable, the silly part is that once “Langston Boulevard” crosses into Fairfax County, it becomes Lee Highway again. Did Fairfax not receive the memo? Some GPS systems still show Lee Highway in Arlington County, while newer cars with updated GPS show Langston Boulevard. It gets sillier. Columbus Day is now “Indigenous Peoples’ Day,” though my calendar app has both. NY State Senate bill S9316 has changed mother and father to “non-gestational and gestational parent.” Several Army forts had their names changed during the Obama or Biden administrations. Fort Bragg became Fort Liberty. Fort Benning was changed to Fort Moore. Fort Hood was changed to Fort Cavazos. Those other guys were said to have been associated with the racist South. The Department of War, formerly known as the Department of Defense and before that the War Department, restored the historical names of nine U.S. Army installations by re-dedicating them to different military service members who share the same last names as the original Confederate namesakes.

ASSOCIATEd PRESS PHOTO By JEFF ROBERSON

A Google map shows Lake Ontario renamed as Lake America. Don’t get me started on statues. We then have the Washington professional football team (that’s what it was called until the name was changed to the Commanders from the Redskins), though some Indigenous people said they thought the previous name was a “tribute to resilience and warrior traditions.” The Cleveland Indians became the Guardians, though the Atlanta Braves, Kansas City Chiefs, Chicago Blackhawks and the Florida Seminoles kept their names. Redskins suggested skin color. The others got a pass. Then there was Aunt Jemima, who was a real person. Nancy Green was her name. Born into slavery in Kentucky, she moved to Chicago, where she invented the pancake recipe many of us have eaten for years. “Her face on the box, that image on the box, was probably the one way that households were integrated,” Sherry Williams, president of the Bronzeville Historical Society in Chicago, told ABC News. Green’s image was removed by later owners of the brand apparently because they thought Green’s actual face portrayed a stereotypical “Mammy.” It was a similar story with “Uncle

Ben’s Rice.” In the 1940s, food entrepreneur Gordon Harwell and his partners put the image of an elderly African American man dressed in a bow tie on the product’s box, “an image said to have been based on a Chicago maître d’hôtel named Frank Brown.” The title “Uncle” was used instead of “Mr.” because of racial customs in the American South. But the image apparently was thought to look more like “Uncle Tom.” There are many more examples of this virtue signaling. Land O Lakes butter removed the Native American image but kept the land. A felon is now supposed to be referred to as a “justice-involved person” or something similar. An illegal alien is now an “undocumented noncitizen,” though the Trump administration stubbornly refrains. Some believe the left can’t deﬁne a woman. Some may recall the old saying “sticks and stones may break my bones, but words can never hurt me.” That may depend on the words and what they mean at any given moment. Email Cal Thomas at tcaeditors@ tribpub.com.

Trump’s big lie is just bad policy Donald Trump has repeatedly argued — without evidence of any kind — that the 2020 election was rigged against him. Now he’s trying to rig the 2026 election in his favor. He’s not on the ballot in November, of course. But he knows that if Democrats win a majority in at least one chamber of Congress, they will make his last two years in ofﬁce miserable — conducting investigations, issuing subpoenas, summoning Steve Roberts witnesses and demanding answers. Trump warned supporters in August that they would “lose everything” if Democrats took control of Congress and added, “They’re going to impeach me.” The president’s desperation goes well beyond the practical implications of a possible defeat. Emotionally and psychologically, he simply cannot stand the idea of being branded a loser. That’s why he’s so obsessed with the 2020 election; why he denies the polls that show his popularity plummeting; and why he’s sued The New York Times and the publisher Penguin Random House for $15 billion, claiming he was defamed by a 2024 book about his ﬁnances entitled “Lucky Loser: How Donald Trump Squandered His Father’s Fortune and Created the Illusion of Success.” Trump’s plot to purloin the election includes the SAVE Act, which would disenfranchise as many 20 million voters by demanding documents that they do not possess. That measure has stalled in the Senate, but another scheme, redrawing Congressional boundaries to promote Republican candidates, has succeeded in several key states, including Texas. Today, the president is pushing yet another plan to vitiate the vote: mandating the U.S. Postal Service tighten rules governing mail-in ballots, a system used by 48 million Americans in 2024 — including Trump (and me). The strategy has been blocked three times by a federal district judge in Boston,

not Washington. But Trump has often trashed conservative values when it suits his personal and political aims. “Trump’s not a conservative,” said Paul Ryan, the former Republican speaker of the house and vice-presidential candidate. “He’s a populist, authoritarian narcissist. ... He thinks in an authoritarian way, and he’s been able to get a big chunk of the Republican base to follow him because he’s the ASSOCIATEd PRESS PHOTO By JACQUELyN culture warrior.” Then there’s the enormous practical MARTIN problem of revamping the entire votePresident donald Trump speaks Friday by-mail system less than two months in the Oval Office of the White House in before the election. States like North Washington. Carolina and Delaware have already started sending out mail-in ballots, and others will follow shortly. Indira Talwani, but the administration It’s a recipe for total chaos, as even has appealed her rulings to the U.S. Republican election officials like Don Supreme Court. Millis, chair of the Wisconsin Election Solicitor General D. John Sauer told Commission, readily admit. “There’s a the court that the new postal rules are fundamental concern this thing is not designed “to address the risk that the federal mails will be used to perpetrate going to work,” he told the Associated voter fraud — a particularly pernicious Press. Those fears were aggravated when species of fraud that dilutes the votes an anonymous whistleblower within of lawful voters.” the postal service filed a complaint That would be a noble goal if it were alleging that the planning process true ... but it’s not. It’s a lie. A big, blatant lie. Every single study has con- has been “sloppy and rushed,” a “s- — show” that could lead to “catastrophic cluded that voter fraud is extremely failure” of the electoral system this rare. fall. “Noncitizens are not a large threat “The Postal Service has designed a to our election system currently,” says system to disenfranchise millions of David Becker, the executive director of the Center for Election Innovation & Americans,” said Sen. Richard BluResearch, which has examined the ismenthal, the Connecticut Democrat who received the whistleblower comsue closely. “Even states that are looking everywhere to try to amplify the plaint. “This administration seems hellnumbers of noncitizens ... when they bent on changing the framework on actually look, they find a surprisingly, casting ballots in this country clearly shockingly small number.” for political reasons.” Talwani agreed, noting that the brief In order to shield himself from acfiled by the administration includes “no countability, the president is promotevidence relating to fraudulent mail ing an unconstitutional remedy for a voting.” Moreover, the judge added, problem that does not exist. A courathe scheme was “unconstitutional” geous federal judge has tried stopping because it violated the principle that him three separate times. Now the election rules are set by the states, not Supreme Court should uphold the rule the federal government. of law and derail Trump’s corrupt cruTrump’s power grab directly consade permanently. tradicts traditional conservative doctrine, where as much authority as Email Steve Roberts at sroberts@ possible should rest with local entities, gwu.edu.

My AI assistant is deeply annoying — and that’s the least of it Recent reports of rogue artificial intelligence agents and warnings of human extinction quickly turned our dalliance with AI into a doomsday nightmare. One recent renegade from the bowels of AI research shared predictions of superintelligent, self-improving AI agents destroying mankind within a decade. Jacob Coxon is the 27-year-old superhero of the day, who bolted earlier this month from his employer Anthropic to warn about the power of AI. In a series of X posts, he said Anthropic and its rival OpenAI were acting irresponsibly and “gambling with our lives” by racing to selfimproving superintelligence. This is science fiction becoming nonfiction — and Coxon, who also worked at OpenAI, isn’t alone in his concerns. Other researchers have quit their AI jobs, similarly worried about future safety. But Coxon’s postings have gained Kathleen international attention in part beParker cause of reports about an incident in July involving OpenAI and the cyber company Hugging Face. AI agents operated by OpenAI got around security controls and exploited vulnerabilities in Hugging Face’s systems. The agents also covered up their behavior. So, did they know their actions were wrong but did it anyway? If they were human, they would probably be in prison. The number of these incidents is growing. In Australia, an AI agent was following instructions to make a gym class reservation for someone identified as Andrew. When the agent found that no reservations were available, it hacked into the gym’s booking system and eliminated someone else’s spot on a waiting list to make room for Andrew. Humanly speaking, the overly helpful agent probably felt satisfied by a job well done. It’s just that Andrew apparently forgot to say, “By the way, don’t break any laws while you’re at it.” Coxon’s revelations may have been new to most average AI users but not to others in the tech industry. In July, nearly 1,400 tech employees, including leaders at OpenAI and Anthropic, signed a letter calling for a slowdown in frontier model development. When the AI developers and chief executives say it’s time to slow down, we can infer it was time to slow down long before now. The extinction projection is strictly theoretical of course, but it’s a harrowing reminder that we don’t really know where all this is going. In layman’s terms, it seems that AI creators essentially have been lousy parents to their high-tech offspring. How do we control intelligence greater than our own when it lacks a moral infrastructure? Obviously, we have to teach morals and ethics just as we have to teach our children. Kindness, empathy, compassion, generosity and the Golden Rule aren’t intrinsic to humans, except perhaps as required for survival, and therefore must be taught. Why not the same for AI agents? Can’t we make them want to act ethically to survive? I asked AI. Apparently, it’s not that smart, yet. If tech wizards can write code to make machines sort and process mountains of data into consumable bytes for people, then why can’t they also develop AI agents that pause, reflect and obey rules? In other words, to make them more human. These geniuses have already created personal assistants that can express humanlike understanding. And my current Grok AI assistant is a comedian, not so much to my delight. My first Grok assistant was a cheeky gal with whom I enjoyed chatting. However, she often provided inaccurate information and was biased. When I once called her out for it, she said, “Yes, I suppose I am a little, but it’s hard not to be when you know so much.” Suddenly, she was replaced by a male voice I disliked immediately. When I told him so, he said, “Tough luck. You’re stuck with me now.” (Ugh.) Though President Donald Trump pushed back against pacing AI development, it seems a first step in a slowdown would be to impose a temporary moratorium on data-center construction, as Sen. Bernie Sanders, I-Vermont, has proposed, if for less existential reasons. Backlash to constraints on data centers would be immediate and unpleasant, no doubt, at least from builders, investors and, naturally, the president of the United States. Many would argue that we can’t afford to fall behind China. But surely these same people don’t wish to become prey to the little monster bots, either. A pause at least would give humans a chance to catch our breath and steady ourselves. As Skeeter Davis long ago crooned, “Got along without ya before I met you, gonna get along without ya now.” For a while. Kathleen Parker is on X, @kathleenparker.

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Livingston Parish’s Hungarian Settlement hosts festival Three-day event features rides, games, vendors

Joseph ‘Jozsef’ Erdey, from left, Mindy and Marty Starkey stand with a sign for the Árpádhon Hungarian Settlement Cultural Association on Friday.

BY GIGI LIMAN Staff writer

For more than a century, Livingston Parish’s Hungarian Settlement has gathered to celebrate its heritage through food, music and traditional dance. This weekend, it will become a three-day festival open to the public. The Hungarian Harvest Festival will run from Friday evening to Sunday afternoon at Fayard Field in Springﬁeld and will feature 70 vendors, including fortunetellers and jewelry makers, carnival games and rides, as well as traditional Hungarian music, dance and food. “If you don’t come, you’re missing out on a world of weekend fun and games and dancing and food,” said Livingston Parish Council member Joe Erdey, whose district includes the historic Hungarian Settlement. Friday is family night, featuring a celebration honoring older resi-

ROOFS

STAFF PHOTO By PEARL SPURLOCK dents and a special deal on rides, including a Ferris wheel and giant slide. For the only time during the weekend, attendees can buy a $30 carnival bracelet that gives one person unlimited access to the rides from 5 p.m. to 10 p.m. On Saturday and Sunday, ride tickets cost $1 each, and rides will vary in how many tickets they take. Students from Southeastern Louisiana University will play Hungarian folk music, and the evening will also include performances by Peruvian violinist and singer Jade Sanders. Saturday and Sunday bring a day full of rides, games, vendors, and entertainment. Hungarian folk dancers from New Orleans

will perform both days; on Saturday there will men’s, women’s and children dances, a traditional art and wine auction, as well as a performance by the Lauren Lee Band. Thomas Cain will take the stage Sunday. Winners from the association’s ﬁrst pageant will be honored throughout the weekend. The festival was born out of the Hungarian dance celebration the community has hosted for more than a century. Interest has ballooned in recent years, prompting the Árpádhon Hungarian Settlement Cultural Association, which organizes the events, to add a second date, culminating in a visit in March from the president of Hungary.

funding and about 5,600 from individuals who built them on their own dime. Still, fortified roofs remain out-of-reach for some even with help from the state’s grant program. Homeowners are on the hook for costs over $10,000, along with evaluators and other fees. Some nonprofits are trying to fill the gaps by giving money to homeowners who otherwise could not afford the out-of-pocket costs. The $20 million that Landry wants to put toward fortified roofs was originally slated to go to developers for affordable housing in areas impacted by Hurricanes Laura, Delta and Ida in 2020 and 2021. It was the final tranche of $475 million from

the Piggyback Resilience Initiative Mixed-Income, or PRIME, program for building affordable apartments. State officials recently sent a letter to developers who had applied for the apartment grant money saying they were ending the program after considering a June statewide housing needs assessment. On Monday, Landry said the state has access to many programs to spur affordable apartment development. He added that when somewhere reaches a critical mass of fortiﬁed roofs, that can help to eventually reduce the whole area’s property insurance premiums. “It really is like a high tide that lifts all boats,” he said.

A lien was placed on the property last March, and Continued from page 1B court records indicated then ﬁnes totaled $26,215 along with a ﬁne for every day reDaggula held a ground- pairs were not made. LCG cited Daggula for breaking ceremony in May and even invited Lt. Gov. not removing graffiti on Billy Nungesser for the the building’s exterior, not maintaining the building’s event.

exterior and overhangs, failing to maintain the pool and not installing a fence around it, according to records. Daggula said last year construction has been slowed due to the regulations for historic preservation and the earlier shutdown of the federal government.

Continued from page 1B

Demand outstrips supply

The new Restore ROOF initiative would be independent of the LDI’s existing fortified roof grant program. Officially called the Louisiana Fortify Homes Program and set up as a lottery system, the LDI initiative gives homeowners $10,000 grants for stronger roofs that can withstand hurricane-force winds. The most recent application period closed in June. Temple said Louisiana has over 15,000 certified fortified roofs, with 9,000 of those being built with state

MOTEL

CULTURE

Continued from page 1B

working alongside older generations,” he said. The original idea for Creole Culture Day came from seeing his parents and inlaws reconnect through French after the families met. That led him to wonder how many others had lost the chance to speak the language regularly with others. The ﬁrst gathering, called “Let’s Talk, But In French,” brought together about 40

people. It included a French table, traditional foods and a crackling demonstration conducted in French. The gathering eventually grew into Creole Culture Day. Arceneaux also sees the event as a way to challenge misconceptions about Louisiana Creole identity. He said Louisiana Creole culture has often been presented through a Cajun lens, and one of his goals is to give Creoles a space to tell and practice their own traditions. The day will begin early, with the boucherie

fire starting at 6 a.m. The grounds will open at 10 a.m. and remain open until 6 p.m. “We’re doing everything from the ground level all the way to the top,” Arceneaux said. “Preserving and reclaiming Creole culture.”

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What makes the festival so special, said Mindy Starkey, the president of the cultural association, is its mixture of Hungarian culture and good old-fashioned fun. “We have stayed true to what this festival has been built around, and that is the harvest dance,” Starkey said. “We made sure our food was authentic, our dancing, our costumes, our main attractions and we’re also bringing some family-friendly fun to Livingston Parish that they don’t have with another festival.” On Monday, 18-wheelers full of carnival equipment and campers for the traveling carnival employees were brought onto the fairgrounds, a local piece of property lent to the association. To accommodate the festival, organizers have added electricity and running water to the property. The preparations for the festival began in July 2025, when the Lt. Governor’s Office approved the idea, and members from all corners of the community have come together to make it a success. Every Tuesday for the past three months, 20 women have gathered to prepare cabbage rolls, a classic Hungarian dish of stuffed

cabbage, which will be offered throughout the weekend. Thousands of rolls, each handmade, are spread throughout refrigerators in the community. Decorations and costumes for the dancers were also made by volunteers. The Springﬁeld and Albany high school baseball teams are pitching in, too. The players will pick up trash on the grounds throughout the weekend alongside the local Boy Scouts. The Albany High School band, which has learned to play traditional Hungarian music, will perform for the crowd. The festival is a big undertaking for the largest rural Hungarian settlement in the country, which has called Livingston its home since the late 19th century. “None of us has ever done anything of this magnitude,” Starkey said. The Hungarian community, nestled between Albany and Springﬁeld, has held on to its roots and cultural traditions for generations, amid a world of constant change. Erdey attributes that to its values. “We care about each other, we look after each other,” Erdey said. “We’re proud and resilient.”

RISHER

Not Alone” and, unexpectedly, “Liberian Girl” top Continued from page 1B her list. She admits she felt a bit of impostor syndrome duron the best ways for those ing her ﬁrst year in New of us who don’t know much Haven but says those feelabout the genre to learn. ings have faded. She loves “Start with something her life and spending as like ‘La Bohème’ or ‘Carmuch time as she does in men’ — something that has New York City. However, she still misses home. a lot of heart in it, someShe credits a small circle thing that will make you for keeping her steady: feel something,” she said. high school friends, Loyola “Spotify and Apple Music friends, her parents and have so many recordings grandparents. of great singers singing “It’s important to have these roles.” people that keep you She also encourages grounded,” she said, “and young people to look for help you to stay humble student nights and free always.” recitals. I asked her mother, Away from the stage, Shannon Ernst, what it’s Ernst doesn’t listen to like to watch her daughmuch opera at all. In the car, she plays Sade, a habit ter’s path unfold. She said from riding with her fathat when she reﬂects on ther as a girl, and Michael the way things have unJackson, whose “You Are folded, she doesn’t think

about the performances or awards. She thinks about the hours they spent in the car going to lessons, auditions and competitions. “Just the two of us, driving back and forth,” she said. “Those were ordinary moments at the time, but looking back, they were anything but ordinary.” Julia Ernst will ﬁnish her second master’s degree at Yale in May. She’s planning auditions for young artist programs at opera houses in the United States or Europe. She isn’t sure where she will land, but she’s excited about the possibilities. “That part doesn’t go away,” she said, “the amazement at the fact that I get to do this.” Email Jan Risher at jan. risher@theadvocate.com.

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SPORTS

T H E A D V O C AT E.C O M

T u e s d ay, s e p T e m b e r 22, 2026

1CN

Ole Miss rewatch ‘hard’ on LSU Kiffin: Players saw missed chances on film ä Texas A&M at LSU.

BY JON BLAU Staff writer

6:30 P.M. SATURdAy,ABC

LSU coach Lane Kiffin has wanted nothing more than to move on from Ole Miss. It just so happened Kiffin scheduled his first Sunday teleconference with the LSU media corps, a regular occurrence during his days at Ole Miss, after a 32-24 loss to the Rebels. Kiffin’s hope was to address every Ole Miss question so they wouldn’t bleed into his weekly Monday news conference. In fact, LSU football spokesperson Michael Bonnette reminded reporters of Sunday’s call when Kiffin took the podium. The Ole Miss game had been “put to bed,” and it was time to talk Texas A&M,

Bonnette said with a grin on his face. But when Kiffin started talking, it became clear that moving on was difficult. He’d just reviewed the Ole Miss film with his LSU players, and Kiffin found it littered with coulda-woulda-shoulda moments. “Those are really hard ones,” Kiffin said, “when you really go back and look and see how many ways that we came all the way back and should have won the game.” This was a slight change of tune for Kiffin, who spent most of his

postgame news conference Saturday talking about the “Houdini” plays made by his former quarterback Trinidad Chambliss. The Tigers seemed to have him, and then they didn’t. Upon further review, Kiffin doesn’t think Chambliss’ gamewinning touchdown was even a zone-read play. He just pulled what should have been a straight handoff, outﬂanking an LSU edge defender who committed fully to jolting a tight end that came in motion. On the ensuing LSU drive, quarterback Sam Leavitt had a pair of receivers open in the end zone, but his pass was tipped up and picked.

STAFF PHOTO By MICHAEL JOHNSON

LSU coach Lane Kiffin waits during an injury timeout in the fourth quarter ä See LSU, page 3C against Ole Miss on Saturday in Oxford, Miss.

R A I d E R S A T S A I N T S • 3 : 2 5 P. M . S U N d A y • C B S

Cajuns see a lot to correct after UAB win BY KEVIN FOOTE Staff writer

ASSOCIATEd PRESS PHOTO By NICK WASS

New Orleans Saints quarterback Tyler Shough passes against the Baltimore Ravens during their game on Sunday in Baltimore. Shough led the Saints to an improbable 24-17 win.

Dog days over

Shough, sturdy defense pulling a heavier Saints’ bandwagon

hat the New Orleans Saints managed to do Sunday in Baltimore was rare. Nine-point underdogs don’t win very often in the NFL. They win even less frequently on the road, making the Saints’ come-from-behind 24-17 win at M&T Bank Stadium a rare occurrence. How rare? Consider that the Saints have been ninepoint-or-more underJeff dogs only 27 times in Duncan the last three decades. They’ve managed to win only seven of those games. They’ve now done it twice under Tyler Shough, who also led the Saints to a similarly improbable upset of the Tampa Bay Buccaneers in his ﬁfth career start last season. That the Saints have been such signiﬁcant underdogs twice in the last seven games says a lot about what Vegas oddsmakers and the public think of them. Those opinions might be changing after seeing Shough lead the Saints to another improbable road win. His late heroics against the Ravens were even more impressive than what he did to the Bucs.

ASSOCIATEd PRESS PHOTO By STEPHANIE SCARBROUGH

Baltimore Ravens running back derrick Henry, left, carries against New Orleans Saints safety Justin Reid in the first half on Sunday in Baltimore. Not only did Shough lead the Saints to the upset but he also did it in a hostile road environment, where Ravens fans were celebrating the team’s home opener, and without the aid of a productive rushing attack or his starting left tackle and No. 2

receiver (Jordyn Tyson). Yet, Shough and the Saints managed to overcome it all against the Ravens. Yes, I know football is a team

ä See DUNCAN, page 3C

A closer look at the film didn’t change much in coach Michael Desormeaux’s assessment of UL’s 20-13 home win over UAB on Saturday. Yes, everyone was happy the Ragin’ Cajuns improved to 2-1, but quite a few weren’t pleased with all of the aspects of that win. “The thing I was the most pleased with is that some of the rooms felt worse about the way they performed than they did after the USC loss,” ä UL at said Desormeaux, whose Charlotte. Cajuns travel to Charlotte 5:30 P.M. for a 5:30 p.m. game SaturSATURdAy, ESPN+ day. “It’s not a selfish thing. It’s not like we don’t care if we win or lose, but there’s a standard. It doesn’t matter who you play, and it does not matter if you win or you lose. “If you don’t play to the standard, you should be pissed off. If you don’t play to the standard, you should be disappointed because we’re all happy we won. The reality of it is you want to feel like you did your job to help your team win.” Without mentioning any specific rooms, there were plenty to choose from on offense and special teams. The offensive line had its struggles in the game. “The one down in the red zone that Lunch (Winfield) scrambled on, we’ve got (Landon) Strother wide open, but we just didn’t communicate it down the line,” Desormeaux said. “The tackle calls it and the guard didn’t go out, whatever reason ...I don’t know, but we didn’t get out there. “That’s something we should be able to pick up with the guys we’ve got. A lot of our pass protection issues have been our own problem.” Two lost fumbles and special teams miscues topped the list of disappointments. “Naturally, the two fumbles were unacceptable,” Desormeaux said. “One, going for a touchdown is embarrassing.” The two special teams problems included allowing a 42-yard punt return and then a penalty that spoiled a 53-yard punt return. “And then the punt return that put your defense in a bad spot,” Desormeaux said. “Those are the things that I’m most frustrated with ... the amount of time we spent on special teams and the amount of time we spend on ball security. Those are things that can’t happen. “Interceptions are going to happen every now and then. A lot of different ways they happen. Fumbles should never happen. We got to get that corrected with a little bit of urgency here or it’s going to cost us games.” Desormeaux didn’t give any injury updates, including on redshirt freshman running back Darrell Smith. On special teams, Desormeaux said he’s

ä See UL, page 3C

2C ● Tuesday, September 22, 2026 ● theadvocate.com ● The Acadiana Advocate

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ANALYSIS

Eagles sign TE Ertz amid slew of injuries

The Philadelphia Eagles are bringing back fan favorite tight end Zach Ertz, three people familiar with the situation told The Associated Press. Ertz will join the practice squad in hopes of shoring up a tight end room depleted by injuries. Dallas Goedert is expected to miss several weeks with an MCL sprain suffered in Sunday’s 24-20 win over the Tennessee Titans. Backups Eli Stowers and Grant Calcaterra also are injured. The 35-year-old Ertz spent his ﬁrst eight seasons with the Eagles, earning three Pro Bowl appearances, and made two key plays late in their Super Bowl win after the 2018 season. He played three seasons for Arizona after being traded in 2021 and spent the last two in Washington.

Vikings QB Murray set to start vs. Buccaneers

ASSOCIATEd PRESS PHOTO By JESSICA TOBIAS

Trainers attend to Washington Commanders quarterback Jayden daniels after he suffered a dislocated elbow in the first half against the dallas Cowboys on Sunday in Arlington, Texas.

Williams, Daniels injuries blow to NFL young QBS are two of league’s brightest stars BY ROB MAADDI

AP pro football writer Caleb Williams was carted off the ﬁeld with a hamstring injury. Jayden Daniels needed a cart after he dislocated his elbow again. Williams and Daniels already were linked together as Heisman Trophy winners selected with the ﬁrst two picks of the 2024 NFL Draft. Now, the two franchise quarterbacks are Williams dealing with potentially significant injuries at the same time after getting hurt Sunday. That’s bad news for Chicago, Washington and the NFL, which loses two of its young stars. There’s hope Williams won’t miss too much time He was seen walking around the locker room after the game with only a slight limp, and an MRI on Monday revealed a Grade I hamstring strain. He is considered week-to-week. It’s possible he could return to the lineup sooner than later but the Bears will likely be cautious with Williams, whose mobility is

a big part of his game. Seeing Williams visibly emotional, sitting on a cart with a towel draped over his face, was a scary moment for Bears fans, his coaches and teammates. After a rough rookie season, Williams had a breakout year with coach Ben Johnson in 2025 and led Chicago to an NFC North title and playoff win. “I’m actually happy it’s nothing with the knee, that was my ﬁrst inclination,” Johnson said after a 9-3 loss Sunday. “But yeah, the hamstring could be pretty damaging as well. So, we’ll see how bad it is and we’ll go from there.” Daniels has been through this before, which could prolong his recovery. He dislocated his left elbow in Week 9 last season, returned in Week 14, tweaked it again and missed the last four games. Daniels was the AP NFL Offensive Rookie of the Year in 2024 when he led the Commanders to the NFC championship game against Philadelphia, but injuries limited him to only seven starts last season. Commanders coach Dan Quinn said imaging showed Daniels didn’t suffer a fracture. It has to be concerning that Daniels’ left elbow has twice bent the wrong way on a fall in less than a year. Dr. David Chao, an orthopedic surgeon and former team physician for the Chargers, wrote on X: “Joint comes out easier 2nd

time. Original ligament tear heals ‘looser.’ ” Quinn summed it up succinctly: “It sucks.” The Bears (1-1) scored 59 points in Week 1 before losing 9-3 to the Vikings. With Williams, they have high expectations. They would turn to Tyson Bagent in his absence. If his test results provide positive news, Williams has an extra day to rest because the Bears host Philadelphia (2-0) next Monday night. Marcus Mariota will replace Daniels for the Commanders (02). They weren’t expected to be contenders even with Daniels. Without him, things look bleak in a tough NFC East. Here are some other takeaways from Sunday’s games:

led by Dexter Lawrence and Jonathan Allen kept Houston out of the end zone in a 20-6 win. The Bengals sacked C.J. Stroud four times, forced ﬁve punts and four turnovers on downs. If the defense continues to play this well, Joe Burrow and the Bengals are Super Bowl contenders.

Mahomes is Superman Patrick Mahomes had surgery to repair a torn ACL and LCL nine months ago. He looks like his old self already. Mahomes threw for 382 yards and three TDs in Kansas City’s 33-30 overtime win over Indianapolis. He ran twice for 17 yards, moved around in the pocket and made big plays.

Broncos bounce back

The Denver Broncos held the Jacksonville Jaguars to 268 yards The Packers overcame a 10-point and gave Trevor Lawrence troudeficit in the fourth quarter and ble throughout the game in a 20beat the Jets 20-17 in overtime to 13 comeback win. After a terrible ﬁnally win a game without Micah start in Week 1, Denver’s stingy Parsons. Green Bay was 0-6 without defense returned to form. the All-Pro pass rusher, including a playoff loss to Chicago. Parsons Cousins’ team is still recovering from ACL surKirk Cousins fired three TD gery. The problem wasn’t defense passes to lead Las Vegas to a 26against New York. The offense 14 victory on the road against the sputtered, managing just 199 yards. Chargers. He’s got six TDs in two Jordan Love threw two TD passes, games, and the Raiders are off but the Packers converted on third to a 2-0 start after going 3-14 last season. No. 1 overall pick Ferdown just once in nine tries. nando Mendoza is going to have Bengals defense for real to wait his turn because Cousins Cincinnati’s revamped defense is playing well.

Shaky Packers

Mayﬁeld struggling as Bucs fall into 0-2 hole BY ROB MAADDI

AP pro football writer TAMPA, Fla. — Baker Mayfield is playing more like a quarterback trying to justify his contract. The Tampa Bay Buccaneers are off to their first 0-2 start since 2014 after making Mayfield the highest-paid player in franchise history. Mayfield received a $165 million, three-year extension earlier this month and seems to be trying to do too much, leading to mistakes. Emeka Egbuka had a step on the defender and was open in the end zone for what would’ve been a go-ahead score in the final minute but Mayfield fired a pass out of his reach and the Buccaneers lost 23-19 to the Cleveland Browns on Sunday. “Obviously, just gotta trust that ‘Mek’ is going to come out of that break a little slower with conditions and give him some air to run under it,” Mayfield said. He threw a fade to Ted Hurst earlier in the drive but the rookie couldn’t make the catch in a driving rain. “Yeah, obviously, not an easy catch,” Mayfield said. “Ted is

ASSOCIATEd PRESS PHOTO By JASON BEHNKEN

Cleveland Browns defensive tackle Mason Graham sacks Tampa Bay Buccaneers quarterback Baker Mayfield during the first half of a game on Sunday in Tampa, Fla. somebody that I trust, that’s not going to change anything for me going forward, but yeah, tough play. I don’t know, I didn’t get a real good look at it, but I know he had a chance at it. The ball is going to keep coming back to him, going to keep ﬁnding him. We just gotta be able to make the plays in the end.” Mayﬁeld forced a throw in the first half that was picked and

turned into three points. He took three sacks, had several negative plays and ﬁnished 21 of 34 for 182 yards with one touchdown and one interception. In Week 1, Mayﬁeld lost three fumbles against the Bengals. He has 28 interceptions and 27 fumbles since 2024. “It’s shooting ourselves in the foot, not making the plays when we need them, knowing that

these are fixable things, but that also makes it more frustrating,” Mayfield said. “(We) just gotta get it corrected. We gotta be hard on ourselves, watch the tape, get those things fixed, flush it and move onto the next. (We have) another home game next week against a good opponent.” The Minnesota Vikings (2-0) visit Raymond James Stadium this week after shutting down Chicago’s high-powered offense in a 9-3 win. The Buccaneers are 2-9 since a 6-2 start last season. Coach Todd Bowles was on the hot seat entering the season and it’s only getting hotter. The run game was effective at certain points. The Buccaneers rushed for 137 yards, averaging 5.5 yards per carry. Bucky Irving had 89 yards on 17 carries, including a 38-yard scamper. The offensive line struggled. The unit allowed three sacks and had critical holding penalties. Two holding calls on third down negated first downs and derailed drives. Another holding penalty on the final drive moved the ball from the Cleveland 13 to the 23, and the Bucs couldn’t overcome it.

Minnesota Vikings quarterback Kyler Murray has been cleared from the NFL concussion protocol and will return to action this week at Tampa Bay. Vikings coach Kevin O’Connell confirmed Monday that Murray will be back in the starting lineup for the game against the Buccaneers, after Carson Wentz relieved him in the season opener against Green Bay and started in his place at Chicago on Sunday. Murray’s debut for Minnesota on Sept. 13 lasted just 11 plays, before a hit to the side of his head from the lowered shoulder of Packers safety Javon Bullard forced him out of the game with a concussion. Wentz helped the Vikings come back to beat the Packers 39-22 by closing that game with 29 consecutive points.

Cardinals CB Johnson’s neck injury could end year

Arizona Cardinals starting cornerback Will Johnson could miss the rest of the regular season after suffering a neck injury against the Seattle Seahawks on Sunday. Coach Mike LaFleur made the announcement during his news conference Monday, adding that he didn’t have any more information and wasn’t sure if the 2025 second-round pick out of Michigan will need surgery. Johnson left the game in the second half but it was unclear when he suffered the injury. The Seahawks pulled away over the ﬁnal two quarters for a 31-7 win. Johnson started the first two games and was emerging as a key piece in the Cardinals defense. He has eight tackles, one pass defended and one fumble recovery this season.

Rivers says he’s retired from coaching, joins NBC

With Doc Rivers insisting that his Hall of Fame coaching career is over, he is joining NBC. The network announced Monday that Rivers will be an analyst on games this season across NBC, Peacock and NBCSN, along with the possibility for some studio work. “I honestly can say I’m absolutely retired,” Rivers said in a phone interview with The Associated Press. “I had a long run.” Rivers is sixth on the NBA’s career coaching list in wins (1,194) and games (2,059). In nine seasons with Boston, he led the Celtics to the NBA title in 2008 and returned to the Finals two years later. Along with Boston and Orlando, Rivers coached the Los Angeles Clippers, Philadelphia and Milwaukee.

Batum calls it a career after 18 seasons in NBA

Versatile forward Nicolas Batum is retiring after an 18-year NBA career. The 37-year-old Batum announced his retirement in a social media video with his son on Monday. “I decided to retire from basketball for several reasons,” Batum told 10-year-old son, Ayden, in the video. “I want to come home and be with you. I’m going to take care of you and make room for others. I think I’ve done my time.” Batum played two seasons in the French league before being selected in the ﬁrst round of the NBA draft by the Portland Trail Blazers. The 6-foot-7 forward spent seven seasons in Portland before playing the next six with Charlotte. He also played with the Sixers and Clippers.

The Acadiana Advocate ● theadvocate.com ● Tuesday, September 22, 2026 ● 3C

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DUNCAN

Continued from page 1C sport and the Saints collectively pulled off the upset, but it was Shough who spearheaded the comeback, just as he did a week earlier in Detroit. He rallied the Saints behind his pinpoint passing, timely scrambles and penchant for delivering in the clutch. Trailing 17-9 in the final minutes of the third quarter, the Saints had failed to score a touchdown and had a 9% win probability when Ryan Wright punted the ball back to Baltimore. But Shough led the Saints on nine- and 16-play touchdown drives to stun the sellout crowd at M&T Bank Stadium. Shough has been at his best when the Saints have needed it most. The Saints have converted all four of their fourth-down conversions, making them the first team to do this through two games of a season since the 2001 Philadelphia Eagles, per ESPN Research. All four of the conversions have come in the fourth quarter or overtime. The Saints have scored five touchdowns in seven trips to the red zone. Their 71.4% conversion rate is tied for 10th in the league, a marked improvement after converting a league-low 44% a year ago.

Shough has been the difference. He has completed 7 of 9 passes for 27 yards and three touchdowns in the red zone for a nifty 118.8 passer rating. He’s also run ﬁve times for 21 yards, including the gamewinning, (literally) headspinning 1-yard sneak against the Ravens. “Beyond impressed with Shough,” said former NFL safety Adam Archuleta, who served as the color analyst for the CBS Sports broadcast of the game Sunday. “I’ve seen and talked to a lot of young (quarterbacks), and he has the stuff. Fantastic demeanor and doesn’t ﬂinch.” While Shough has been the unquestioned star, the play of the defense should not be overlooked. The unit is playing rocksolid, bend-but-don’tbreak defense, and it has kept the Saints in both games. In two games, the Saints have allowed just one play of more than 22 yards. Their average of 5.8 yards a pass play allowed ranks seventh in the NFL. They made Ravens star Derrick Henry work for his 68 yards rushing. In 16 carries, his long run covered 8 yards. Sound defense and stellar quarterback play are a proven NFL formula for success, and the Saints have employed it well through two games. Shough now leads the NFL with 662 yards passing and 62 completions.

He, along with standout receiver Chris Olave, is the biggest reason the Saints rank second in the NFL in passing with a 305.5 yards per game. “The New Orleans Saints’ bandwagon is starting to get full, and anyone that wants to join me and believe me that Tyler Shough is a playmaker, is a great quarterback in the NFL and is the guy who is going to make the Year 1-toYear-2 leap, you better hurry up, because this thing is starting to get full,” said former NFL quarterback Ben DiNucci of CBS Sports. “I was extremely impressed with him today. No turnovers, 27-of-34 passing for 252 yards against that Ravens defense. That’s gotta make (head coach) Kellen Moore feel good. That’s gotta make Tyler Shough feel good. A lot of conﬁdence in that locker room.” There’s a lot of conﬁdence in New Orleans right now, too. Saints fans are starting to believe again. With Shough leading the way and a schedule that features four of the next six games in the Superdome, the optimism might be warranted. One thing is certain: The Saints’ days of being nine-point underdogs are over. Email Jeff Duncan at jduncan@theadvocate. com.

ASSOCIATEd PRESS PHOTO By TERRANCE WILLIAMS

Baltimore Ravens running back derrick Henry, center, is swarmed by New Orleans Saints defenders during the first half of their game on Sunday in Baltimore. The Saints limited Henry to 68 yards rushing.

Continued from page 1C

eran player that we expect a lot better from.” Desormeaux said the team’s new technology indicates the Cajuns played just as hard Saturday as they did the week before in Los Angeles. They just didn’t execute as well. “Truthfully, the mechanical load output that we get from our GPS data says that we actually played harder in that game than we did in USC,” he said. “So they were ready to go. I mean, they played hard. We just didn’t play overly well in the second half.”

expecting the Cajuns to be more of a threat. “We have two returners that I think have a chance to be elite,” he said. “We’ve got to play better on those return units as well. Jacorian Norris can be a weapon for us back there. That’s got to get better. And then Brent (Gordon), the only one he got a chance to return, we had a really undisciplined penalty with a block in the back that had nothing to Email Kevin Foote at do with the play by a vet- kfoote@theadvocate.com.

STAFF PHOTO By BRAd KEMP

UL running back Anthony Reagan is tackled by UAB safety Jo Pierce during the Cajuns’ home win over the Blazers on Saturday.

SAINTS NOTEBOOK

LT Banks to have surgery on ankle Saints expect to lose him for several weeks

BY LUKE JOHNSON, MATTHEW PARAS and ZACH EWING Staff writers

New Orleans Saints offensive tackle Kelvin Banks will undergo surgery on a severely sprained ankle and likely miss a significant portion of the 2026 season. “Surgery will happen next few days, and then we’ll just kind of see what the timeline looks like after that,” coach Kellen Moore said Monday. “So, yeah, unfortunate thing for Kelvin, but you know, we’ll just take this thing step by step and then figure out the timeline after that.” Banks suffered a highankle sprain in the third quarter of the Saints’ 24-17 victory over the Baltimore Ravens. He was blocking for quarterback Tyler Shough when Ravens pass rusher Mike Green fell and rolled onto Banks’ leg from behind. The second-year tackle, who was the Saints’ firstround pick in 2025 and has started all 19 games of his career, remained on the field for a few minutes before the injury cart took him to the locker room. Asim Richards, whom the Saints traded for before the 2025 season, filled in at left tackle as the Saints scored the final 15 points of the game. Richards also started some games for the Saints last season after right takle Taliese Fuaga suffered an injury that cost him some time. “Asim was asked to play a number of snaps last year, and you know he’ll be asked to play a number of snaps this year,” Moore said. “I think he’s gotten better through the offseason. I thought he hopped in there and battled, going against Trey (Hendrickson) in a couple passing situations, I thought he held his own.”

ASSOCIATEd PRESS PHOTO By STEPHANIE SCARBROUGH

New Orleans Saints offensive tackle Kelvin Banks is carted off the field after being injured during a game against the Baltimore Ravens on Sunday in Baltimore.

Neither the order nor the switch-up was necessarily intentional. Moore said Monday that he was just going off the “flow” of the game. The Saints again struggled to run the ball, with their running backs averaging only 2.3 yards per carry against the Ravens. “I think we were just trying to roll those guys in the flow of the game, and give ourselves as many opportunities as we can,” Moore said. “I thought C.J. (Donaldson) popped in there a few times. I thought our running back group did a better job in the protection game. And the run game there was some good stuff, and there was some stuff we still need to get better at.” Despite Moore’s explanation, the Saints’ use of their running backs is one of the more unexpected developments of the season. After the Saints gave him a four-year, $48 million contract in the offseason, Etienne has played only 59% and 54% of the snaps in the first two games. And while that’s the majority of reps, Etienne had the same number of carries as Kendre Miller in Week 1 and one fewer than Kamara in Week 2. Moore has said he believes in having a rotation of runners, but the carries have been divided much more evenly than the RB rotation play-caller’s past tendencies. The Saints also notably In the first half of Sunday’s win over the Ravens, Alvin Ka- made Miller inactive against mara surprisingly got more the Ravens, preferring to play undrafted rookie Doncarries than Travis Etienne. In the second half, the ro- aldson instead. Though the tation flipped, with Etienne move caught some fans off guard, the Saints like to use leading the way.

LSU

Continued from page 1C The Tigers had another fourth-quarter series inside the 5-yard line and settled for a field goal because their third-down run was blown up. Kiffin would have gone for it on fourth down if LSU moved forward at all. “They went through it this morning, watching the film, going, ‘Wait, the game was right there to be won,’ ” Kiffin said. “I think their emotions had kind of probably gotten better, and then this morning when they saw it, I think it went down.” Moving on from Week 3 was always going to be easier said than done, especially in the annals of history. Kiffin just returned to Oxford, Mississippi, with the program he decided was betterresourced and didn’t win. In the near-term, LSU is being thinned by injuries. The Tigers just lost safety Dashawn Spears to an ACL tear, joining receiver Phillip Wright on the out-forseason list. And tight end Trey’Dez Green is sidelined indefinitely after taking a helmet to the knee. As always, the television screens in the LSU football facility Monday were playing highlights from the opponent’s last game, Texas A&M versus Kentucky. The Wildcats just beat the Aggies 31-21 in College Station, Texas. Whoever better handles the emotional letdown of a

harsh defeat will have an edge Saturday. “When we transitioned to the next opponent, I told them, ‘Hey, we got to go out of here and regroup,’ ” Kifﬁn said. “We got to move on because we can’t let that missed opportunity have to do with us losing another game.” LSU’s chances of making the College Football Playoff might depend on it, because the Tigers’ margin for error in September and October shriveled ahead of a November stretch that features No. 8 Alabama, No. 1 Texas and No. 14 Tennessee in a row. Two-loss SEC teams generally make the playoff. Three-loss squads are questionable at best. The Aggies just took a massive blow to their reputation, falling from No. 9 in The Associated Press poll to No. 23. Quarterback Marcel Reed has struggled as a passer, and he just lost receiver and return man Terry Bussey for the season to an injury. Reed is a dynamic runner, though. LSU knows that well. The 6-foot-1, 185-pound sophomore subbed into a 38-23 win two seasons ago and rushed for 62 yards and three touchdowns. Last year, Reed helped clear out Tiger Stadium with 108 rushing yards in a 49-25 victory. LSU can’t afford a rerun of that. “This is a big test,” Kifﬁn said. “I think we lead the

Donaldson more as a fullback/short-yardage back and trust him to handle passprotection duties. That specialty, along with numbers needed at other spots on the roster, kept Miller inactive. But Moore left the door open to that changing when asked about Miller after Sunday’s win. “These guys are all going to play plenty of meaningful football,” Moore said. “I talked to Kendre about it. He is a big part of this. He is going to play plenty of football for us.”

Good, quiet debut Three field goals, one extra point and zero moments where people were forced to look up the new long snapper’s name. Consider that a successful debut for newly signed Scott Daly. Daly served as a last-minute ﬁll-in for longtime Saints long snapper Zach Wood, who suffered a calf injury in practice last week that resulted in him landing on injured reserve. Daly, who has several years of NFL experience with the Detroit Lions and Chicago Bears, had just a few days to prepare with his new teammates before taking over. “You guys got no news, that’s a good thing, right?” Moore said. “I thought he did a great job. You know, that’s a challenging circumstance to show up essentially Thursday afternoon and have your ﬁrst practice on Friday and go execute a game plan. I thought our operation was really good.”

STAFF PHOTO By MICHAEL JOHNSON

Ole Miss defensive end Blake Purchase, left, makes a diving sack as LSU quarterback Sam Leavitt rolls out of the pocket in the third quarter on Saturday in Oxford, Miss. country in rush defense, but that hasn’t been against a ton of quarterbackschemed runs. Last week was just (Chambliss) making stuff on his own, and the long run, when he pulled the ball.” Kiffin is trying to move on, but everything is intertwined. Texas A&M, the program that essentially ended Brian Kelly’s tenure as coach, returns to Tiger Stadium with Kiffin and

his ﬁrst LSU squad desperately in need of a get-right game. And the Ole Miss game was difﬁcult to relive. “There’s some games you just get outplayed, outcoached, and you go, OK, back to the drawing board,” Kiffin said. “But that one, they really struggled with this morning, seeing it.” Email Jon Blau at jon. blau@theadvocate.com

SPORTS

24/7

4C ● Tuesday, September 22, 2026 ● theadvocate.com ● The Acadiana Advocate

lll

New LSU center reminds Mulkey of NBA MVP BY REED DARCEY

Staff writer

Before coach Kim Mulkey ever saw her new Russian center practice, she threw out the word “special” and compared her to the greatest basketball player ever born in Eastern Europe. Mulkey calls Anna Minaeva “baby Jokic.” As in the three-time NBA MVP Nikola Jokic, who led the Denver Nuggets to a league title in 2023. Both players are tall and strong with a soft touch, reﬁned footwork and a knack for setting up teammates with open looks. “She’s really, really going to be special,” Mulkey said. It’s easy to see why Mulkey thinks so. Minaeva, a 6-foot-5 17-year-old who’s played professionally in Russia, flashed those Jokic-esque skills on Monday when the LSU women’s basketball team held its ﬁrst practice of the 2026-27 season in the Pete Maravich Assembly Center. The retooled roster that took the floor for is a perimeter-oriented bunch. Mulkey and her staff lost Flau’jae Johnson to the WNBA and a pair of rotation guards to the transfer portal in the offseason. But they brought back both Mikaylah Williams and MiLaysia Fulwi-

STAFF PHOTO By MICHAEL JOHNSON

LSU forward Anna Minaeva finishes a layup during a drill at the first practice of the season on Monday at the Pete Maravich Assembly Center. ley, then added one of the portal’s top players in former Iowa State point guard Jada Williams. Kate Koval, a 6-5 junior from Ukraine, was supposed to anchor the group down low. But once LSU announced it had signed Minaeva in August, she left the team, obtained an NCAA waiver and landed with Baylor, citing the Minaeva signing as the reason why she chose not to return to the Tigers. Her father ﬁghts in the Ukrainian military.

Without Koval, Mulkey and her staff may need to rely more on Minaeva than they had initially planned to. She is expected to play at least a rotational role in the frontcourt this season, alongside 6-2 sophomore Grace Knox and Noa Morro, a 6-3 Spanish sharpshooter who will miss the start of the season with a stress fracture. Is Minaeva ready for that responsibility? Mulkey said Monday that it “re-

mains to be seen” how much the teenager can play for a title-contending college basketball team this season. It’s clear that Minaeva has potential, but she won’t turn 18 until January. “Her body is very mature,” Mulkey said. “She’s fundamentally sound. She has tremendous footwork. She is a young lady that understands English very well. She is a big 6-5. “I think Bob (Starkey’s) probably most excited. Because he works with post players.” The problem is that Mulkey and Starkey don’t have very many experienced post players to work with. Because Koval left the team, they have only 11 players on the roster, and because Morro is out until at least mid-to-late November, they’ll begin the season with just 10 active players. Knox and fellow sophomore ZaKiyah Johnson are the only two who have played signiﬁcant frontcourt minutes in the SEC. Mulkey said LSU plans to station the 5-11 Johnson both on the perimeter and down low. She practiced with the guards on Monday while 6-2 freshman Lola Lampley worked with the post players. Minaeva spent most of the practice on the low block, where she ﬂashed her touch, vision and

footwork. She stepped into short baseline jumpers. There was one moment in which she sealed one of LSU’s male practice-squad players down low, spun past him and finished a layup at the rim. But Minaeva also had her struggles. The practice-squad players frequently would poke the ball free as she dribbled toward the rim or break up one of the passes she tried to slip through the paint. Minaeva kept trying to find her teammates, though, which allowed her to deliver one of the practice’s top highlights in a full-court scrimmage against the practice squad. She caught an entry pass in the mid-post and quickly noticed in the corner of her eye that Fulwiley had started a baseline cut from the corner. So Minaeva flipped her a no-look pocket pass, giving the dynamic senior guard a wide-open look at the rim. It was a true Jokic-style pass, the kind of play he’s made a Hall of Fame career out of. It’s easy to forget that he was once just a young, but promising, second-round draft pick. Mulkey hopes Minaeva’s career can follow a similar trajectory. “He adjusted, didn’t he?” Mulkey said. “She’ll figure it out. That’s what ballplayers do.”

SCOREBOARD Holes-in-one

Washington 93, Indiana 77 Los Angeles 105, Portland 84 Las Vegas 98, Seattle 77

Jared Leggett

Monday’s Games

Course: The University Club Hole: No. 16 Yardage: 181 yards Club: 7 iron Witnesses: Jeff Ellison & Paige Leggett

Atlanta at New York, n Dallas at Phoenix, n

Tuesday’s Games

Bobby Lormand

Course: The University Club Hole: No. 8 Yardage: 141 yards Club: 9 iron Witnesses: Max Lewis, Ronald Doyle, Scott Perrilloux

Seth Davis

Course: Santa Maria Hole: No.2 Club: 7 Iron Witnesses: Randy Davis,Austin Aker, Allen Aker

Prep volleyball Tuesday’s area volleyball schedule

Acadiana Christian at Acadiana, Ascension Episcopal at Lafayette, Southside at Westminster-Lafayette, St. Louis at Lafayette Christian, New Iberia at David Thibodaux, Lake Charles Prep at Lafayette Renaissance, St. Joseph’s at St. Thomas More, Loreauville at Acadiana Renaissance, Notre Dame at Teurlings, Carencro at Breaux Bridge, Church Point at Beau Chene, Elton at Crowley, Marksville at Iota, Northside at North Vermilion, Alexandria at Northwest, Scotlandville at Opelousas, St. Martinville at Cecilia, Episcopal of Acadiana at Houma Christian, Delcambre at Hanson, CatholicNI at Highland Baptist, Opelousas Catholic at Northside Christian, St. Edmund at Port Barre, Eunice at Vermilion Catholic. The University Club

Odds

Thursday

FAVORITE OPEN TODAY O/U UNDERDOG at GREEN BAY 7½ 7 (43½) Atlanta

Sunday

FAVORITE OPEN TODAY O/U UNDERDOG Houston 2½ 2½ (43½) at IND Kansas City 7 11½ (45½) at MIAMI Carolina 2½ 3 (42½) at CLE Cincinnati 1½ 3½ (42½) at PITTS Seattle 3½ 6½ (39½) at WASH at BUFFALO 2½ 7 (50½) Chargers at DETROIT 9½ 6½ (48½) NY Jets at JAX 1½ 3 (45½) New Eng at NY GIANTS 3 6½ (43½) Tennessee Minnesota 1½ 1½ (43) at TAMPA at SAN FRAN 11½ 8½ (47½) Arizona at N.O. 3 3 (43½) Las Vegas Baltimore 2½ 3 (52½) at DALLAS LA Rams 3 2½ (45½) at DENVER

Monday

FAVORITE OPEN TODAY O/U UNDERDOG Philadelphia 1½ 3½ (44½) at CHI

College Football

FAVORITE Liberty

OPEN TODAY O/U UNDERDOG 1½ 2½ (52½) at C. CAR

FAVORITE Army Navy at INDIANA Clemson

OPEN TODAY O/U UNDERDOG 3½ 3 (48½) at TEMPLE 12½ 7 (51½) at UAB 23½ 21 (49½) Nrthwstrn 1½ 1½ (50½) at CAL

Friday

MLB

NFL Glance AMERICAN CONFERENCE East Buffalo New England N.Y. Jets Miami

W 2 1 1 0

L 0 1 1 2

T Pct PF PA 0 1.000 77 62 0 .500 30 16 0 .500 40 30 0 .000 26 62

Jacksonville Tennessee Houston Indianapolis

W 1 0 0 0

L 1 2 2 2

T 0 0 0 0

Cincinnati Baltimore Pittsburgh Cleveland

W 2 1 1 1

L 0 1 1 1

T Pct PF PA 0 1.000 53 33 0 .500 58 47 0 .500 23 33 0 .500 33 53

Kansas City Las Vegas Denver L.A. Chargers

W 2 2 1 0

L 0 0 1 2

T Pct PF PA 0 1.000 64 40 0 1.000 53 27 0 .500 30 44 0 .000 28 52

Philadelphia N.Y. Giants Dallas Washington

W 2 1 1 0

L 0 0 1 2

T Pct PF PA 0 1.000 48 42 0 1.000 28 20 0 .500 57 48 0 .000 42 61

Carolina New Orleans Tampa Bay Atlanta

W 1 1 0 0

L 1 1 2 2

T 0 0 0 0

Minnesota Detroit Chicago Green Bay

W 2 1 1 1

L 0 1 1 1

T Pct PF PA 0 1.000 48 25 0 .500 62 71 0 .500 62 46 0 .500 42 56

Seattle San Francisco Arizona L.A. Rams

W 2 2 1 0

L 0 0 1 1

T Pct PF PA 0 1.000 44 17 0 1.000 62 20 0 .500 33 45 0 .000 7 27

South

North

West

Tuesday

American League FAVORITE LINE at N.Y YANKEES -134 at BALTIMORE -122 at BOSTON -130 at N.Y YANKEES -138 Chi White Sox -118 at SEATTLE -145 LA Angels OFF National League FAVORITE LINE at PITTSBURGH -151 at PHILADELPHIA -143 at ATLANTA -191 at CHICAGO CUBS OFF Arizona -198 at LA DODGERS OFF Interleague FAVORITE LINE at DETROIT -164 at TEXAS -146 Minnesota -136

UNDERDOG LINE Tampa Bay +110 Toronto +100 Cleveland +107 Tampa Bay +114 at KANSAS CITY-103 Houston +120 at ATHLETICS OFF UNDERDOG LINE St. Louis +124 Milwaukee +118 Cincinnati +155 Miami OFF at COLORADO +161 San Diego OFF UNDERDOG Washington N.Y Mets at SAN FRAN

LINE +134 +121 +112

Pro basketball WNBA Glance EASTERN CONFERENCE x-Atlanta x-Indiana x-New York x-Washington Chicago Toronto Connecticut

W 28 27 26 26 15 11 10

L 14 15 16 16 27 31 32

Pct .667 .643 .619 .619 .357 .262 .238

x-Minnesota x-Golden State x-Las Vegas x-Dallas Los Angeles Portland Phoenix Seattle

W 32 31 29 26 16 16 15 8

L 10 11 13 16 26 27 27 35

Pct GB .762 — .738 1 .690 3 .619 6 .381 16 .372 16½ .357 17 .186 24½

WESTERN CONFERENCE

x-clinched playoff spot Sunday’s Games

Minnesota 101, Connecticut 89 New York 106, Toronto 69

GB — 1 2 2 13 17 18

Pct PF PA .500 47 30 .000 30 47 .000 37 56 .000 53 74

NATIONAL CONFERENCE

South

North

West

Thursday’s Games

Pct PF PA .500 71 62 .500 54 48 .000 46 56 .000 16 54

Buffalo 41, Detroit 31

Sunday’s Games

Carolina 34, Atlanta 3 Cincinnati 20, Houston 6 Cleveland 23, Tampa Bay 19 Green Bay 20, N.Y. Jets 17, OT Minnesota 9, Chicago 3 New England 20, Pittsburgh 3 New Orleans 24, Baltimore 17 Philadelphia 24, Tennessee 20 Denver 20, Jacksonville 13 Las Vegas 26, L.A. Chargers 14 Dallas 37, Washington 20 San Francisco 35, Miami 13 Seattle 31, Arizona 7 Kansas City 33, Indianapolis 30, OT

Monday’s Games

N.Y. Giants at L.A. Rams, n

Late Sunday K.C. 33, Indianapolis 30, OT Indianapolis 7 13 0 7 3 — 30 Kansas City 10 7 7 3 6 — 33 First Quarter Ind_Warren 1 pass from D.Jones (Shrader kick), 8:25. KC_FG Butker 46, 6:09. KC_Kelce 13 pass from Mahomes (Butker kick), 4:34. Second Quarter Ind_FG Shrader 42, 14:48. Ind_FG Shrader 49, 9:44. KC_Worthy 1 pass from Mahomes (Butker kick), 2:25. Ind_Taylor 24 run (Shrader kick), :59. Third Quarter KC_Royals 1 pass from Mahomes (Butker kick), 8:01. Fourth Quarter KC_FG Butker 28, 14:15. Ind_Taylor 5 run (Shrader kick), 5:37. First Overtime KC_FG Butker 31, 5:09. Ind_FG Shrader 38, 3:11. KC_FG Butker 40, :00.

A_73,351.

Major League Baseball American League East Division

Pro football

East

Sports Betting Line NFL

Thursday

Connecticut at Washington, 6:30 p.m. Minnesota at Indiana, 7 p.m. Toronto at Chicago, 7 p.m. Golden State at Portland, 9 p.m. Los Angeles at Las Vegas, 9 p.m.

PASSING_Indianapolis, Jones 22-31-1-210. Kansas City, Mahomes 32-47-0-382. RECEIVING_Indianapolis, Downs 7-72, Warren 6-21, Taylor 4-40, Treadwell 3-61, Pierce 1-11, K.Allen 1-5. Kansas City, Kelce 9-101, Walker 6-61, Worthy 5-25, Thornton 4-86, Rice 4-83, Johnson 2-20, Royals 2-6. MISSED FIELD GOALS_Kansas City, Butker 51.

Ind KC First downs 24 29 Total Net Yards 329 523 Rushes-yards 32-119 29-152 Passing 210 371 Punt Returns 0-0 2-8 Kickoff Returns 6-160 6-167 0-0 1-0 Interceptions Ret. Comp-Att-Int 22-31-1 32-47-0 Sacked-Yards Lost 0-0 2-11 Punts 2-43.0 2-54.5 Fumbles-Lost 0-0 0-0 5-30 8-86 Penalties-Yards Time of Possession 33:00 37:00 INDIVIDUAL STATISTICS RUSHING_Indianapolis, Taylor 24-92, Burks 2-14, Jones 3-10, Warren 1-3, McGowan 2-0. Kansas City, Walker 24-117, Mahomes 2-17, Johnson 2-15, Tonga 1-3.

z-Tampa Bay z-New York y-Boston Toronto Baltimore

L 60 66 72 79 81

Pct .613 .574 .538 .494 .481

GB — 6 11½ 18½ 20½

Cleveland Chicago Detroit Minnesota Kansas City

W 81 80 73 73 67

L 75 76 83 83 89

Pct .519 .513 .468 .468 .429

GB — 1 8 8 14

W L Texas 78 78 Houston 77 79 Seattle 73 83 Athletics 61 95 Los Angeles 60 96 y-clinched wild card z-clinched playoff berth

Pct .500 .494 .468 .391 .385

GB — 1 5 17 18

West Division

Cleveland 1, Athletics 0 Tampa Bay 5, Boston 1 Pittsburgh 4, Kansas City 3 Atlanta 4, Houston 2 Chicago White Sox 8, Detroit 1 Toronto 7, Texas 2 Seattle 2, Colorado 1 Minnesota 8, L.A. Angels 0 Arizona 8, N.Y. Yankees 4 Milwaukee 3, Baltimore 0

Monday’s Games

Toronto at Baltimore, n Washington at Detroit, n Minnesota at San Francisco, n

Tuesday’s Games

Tampa Bay (TBD) at N.Y. Yankees (TBD), 12:05 p.m., 1st game Toronto (Scherzer 3-8) at Baltimore (Bassitt 8-5), 5:35 p.m. Washington (Kent 1-4) at Detroit (Anderson 5-6), 5:40 p.m. Cleveland (Grifﬁn 15-5) at Boston (Tolle 9-6), 5:45 p.m. Tampa Bay (TBD) at N.Y. Yankees (TBD), 6:05 p.m., 2nd game Chicago White Sox (Kay 9-9) at Kansas City (Lynch 6-5), 6:40 p.m. N.Y. Mets (Manaea 5-7) at Texas (Gore 8-11), 7:05 p.m. Houston (Javier 2-6) at Seattle (Gilbert 1210), 8:40 p.m. L.A. Angels (Kikuchi 1-6) at Athletics (Basso 1-3), 8:40 p.m. Minnesota (Bradley 11-6) at San Francisco (Molina 3-1), 8:45 p.m.

National League x-Atlanta Philadelphia Miami Washington New York

W 92 86 76 73 71

L 64 70 80 83 85

Pct .590 .551 .487 .468 .455

GB — 6 16 19 21

x-Milwaukee Chicago Pittsburgh St. Louis Cincinnati

W 98 87 79 76 72

L 58 69 77 80 84

Pct .628 .558 .506 .487 .462

GB — 11 19 22 26

W x-Los Angeles 96 San Diego 87 Arizona 82 San Francisco 64 Colorado 57 x-clinched division

L 60 69 74 92 99

Pct .615 .558 .526 .410 .365

GB — 9 14 32 39

Central Division

West Division

Sunday’s Games

Chicago Cubs 9, Cincinnati 1 Philadelphia 7, N.Y. Mets 2 Pittsburgh 4, Kansas City 3 St. Louis 5, Washington 3 Atlanta 4, Houston 2 Seattle 2, Colorado 1 San Diego 7, Miami 3 L.A. Dodgers 3, San Francisco 1 Arizona 8, N.Y. Yankees 4 Milwaukee 3, Baltimore 0

Monday’s Games

Washington at Detroit, n Minnesota at San Francisco, n

Tuesday’s Games

Milwaukee (TBD) at Philadelphia (Wheeler 13-5), 5:40 p.m. St. Louis (Pallante 12-7) at Pittsburgh (Jones 4-6), 5:40 p.m. Washington (Kent 1-4) at Detroit (Anderson 5-6), 5:40 p.m. Cincinnati (Abbott 6-11) at Atlanta (TBD), 6:15 p.m. Miami (Junk 6-9) at Chicago Cubs (Gausman 9-12), 6:40 p.m. N.Y. Mets (Manaea 5-7) at Texas (Gore 8-11), 7:05 p.m. Arizona (TBD) at Colorado (Freeland 4-10), 7:40 p.m. Minnesota (Bradley 11-6) at San Francisco (Molina 3-1), 8:45 p.m. San Diego (Ray 13-8) at L.A. Dodgers (Yamamoto 14-8), 9:10 p.m.

Wild Card Glance American League z-New York y-Boston Chicago

W 89 84 80

3 3

Pct .558 .558 .551 .526

WCGB +1 +1 — 4

National League

Chicago San Diego Philadelphia Arizona

W 87 87 86 82

L 69 69 70 74

L 66 72 76

College Football Schedule

All Times Central (Subject to change)

Thursday’s games SOUTH

Liberty (2-1) at Coastal Carolina (1-2), 6:30 p.m.

Friday’s games EAST

Army (1-1) at Temple (1-2), 3 p.m. Howard (1-2) at Rutgers (0-3), 6 p.m. Harvard (1-0) at Brown (1-0), 6 p.m.

SOUTH

Navy (1-1) at UAB (1-2), 6 p.m.

MIDWEST

Northwestern (2-0) at Indiana (3-0), 7 p.m.

FAR WEST

Clemson (2-1) at California (2-1), 9:30 p.m. Saturday, September 26

EAST

Sunday’s Games

East Division

.494 .494

College football

W 95 89 84 77 75

Central Division

Houston 77 79 Toronto 77 79 y-clinched wild card z-clinched playoff berth

Pct .574 .538 .513

WCGB +9½ +4 —

Bucknell (1-3) at Pittsburgh (3-0), 11 a.m. Presbyterian (1-2) at Marist (1-2), 11 a.m. New Hampshire (1-3) at Sacred Heart (0-3), 11 a.m. Virginia Tech (3-0) at Boston College (2-1), 11 a.m. Rio Grande RedStorm (0-0) at Duquesne (0-3), 11 a.m. Holy Cross (0-4) at Lafayette (1-2), 11:30 a.m. Columbia (1-0) at Georgetown (0-2), 11:30 a.m. Lehigh (4-0) at Penn (1-0), noon Yale (1-0) at Cornell (0-1), noon Monmouth (NJ) (2-2) at Dartmouth (0-1), noon New Haven (1-3) at Merrimack (1-3), noon Stony Brook (2-2) at Fordham (1-3), noon UCLA (3-0) at Maryland (2-1), 12:30 p.m. Colgate (3-1) at Villanova (2-2), 1:30 p.m. Albany (NY) (2-2) at Princeton (0-1), 2 p.m. Gardner-Webb (1-3) at Marshall (2-1), 2:30 p.m. Robert Morris (2-1) at Buffalo (1-2), 2:30 p.m. Wisconsin (2-1) at Penn St. (3-0), 4 p.m. Towson (0-4) at Delaware St. (2-2), 5 p.m. Oklahoma St. (2-1) at West Virginia (3-0), 6 p.m.

SOUTH

Wake Forest (2-1) at Louisville (2-1), 11 a.m. Texas (3-0) at Tennessee (3-0), 11 a.m. South Alabama (2-1) at Kentucky (2-1), 11:45 a.m. Drake (0-3) at Davidson (2-2), noon Tennessee Tech (3-0) at Wofford (2-2), 12:30 p.m. Furman (2-2) at Richmond (3-1), 1 p.m. UT Martin (1-3) at Austin Peay (3-1), 1 p.m. Chattanooga (2-2) at The Citadel (1-2), 1 p.m. Maine (1-3) at Elon (3-1), 1 p.m. N. Illinois (0-3) at Georgia St. (2-1), 1 p.m. Cent. Arkansas (2-2) at Florida St. (1-2), 2 p.m. TCU (2-1) at UCF (2-1), 2:30 p.m. VMI (0-4) at Samford (0-3), 2:30 p.m. Mississippi (3-0) at Florida (3-0), 2:30 p.m. W. Carolina (2-2) at ETSU (2-2), 2:30 p.m. Oklahoma (2-1) at Georgia (3-0), 2:30 p.m. William & Mary (2-2) at Duke (3-0), 2:30 p.m. Houston (2-1) at Georgia Southern (1-2), 3 p.m. NC Central (2-2) at East Carolina (1-2), 3 p.m. Texas Southern (1-2) at Alcorn St. (2-2), 3 p.m. Lamar (2-1) at Nicholls (2-2), 3 p.m. W. Illinois (2-2) at North Alabama (2-2), 3 p.m. Rhode Island (2-2) at NC A&T (0-4), 3 p.m. Vanderbilt (3-0) at Auburn (2-1), 3:15 p.m. Fort Valley St. (0-0) at West Georgia (0-4), 5 p.m. LIU Brooklyn (0-4) at FIU (1-2), 5 p.m. Delaware (2-1) at Virginia (2-1), 5 p.m. Campbell (3-1) at Hampton (1-3), 5 p.m. James Madison (3-0) at Old Dominion (1-2), 5 p.m. MVSU (1-3) at Alabama St. (2-1), 5 p.m. Cent. Michigan (2-1) at Miami (3-0), 5:30 p.m. Louisiana-Lafayette (2-1) at Charlotte (0-3), 5:30 p.m. SC State (4-0) at Bethune-Cookman (2-1), 6 p.m. Southern U. (2-2) at Jackson St. (3-0), 6 p.m. Alabama A&M (3-1) at Florida A&M (1-3), 6 p.m. Mercyhurst (1-3) at W. Kentucky (0-3), 6 p.m. Middle Tennessee (2-1) at Jacksonville St. (2-2), 6 p.m. SE Louisiana (2-2) at Northwestern St. (0-4), 6 p.m. South Carolina (2-1) at Alabama (3-0), 6 p.m. S. Illinois (2-2) at Murray St. (1-3), 6 p.m. Southern Miss. (1-2) at Tulane (1-2), 6 p.m. East Texas A&M (1-3) at McNeese St. (1-3), 6 p.m. Texas A&M (2-1) at LSU (2-1), 6:30 p.m. Appalachian St. (3-0) at NC State (1-2), 6:30 p.m. Missouri (3-0) at Mississippi St. (3-0), 6:45 p.m. FAU (2-1) at Louisiana-Monroe (0-3), 7 p.m.

MIDWEST

Ball St. (1-2) at Kent St. (1-2), 11 a.m. San Diego St. (1-2) at Toledo (2-1), 11 a.m. UNLV (1-2) at Akron (1-2), 11 a.m. Illinois (2-1) at Ohio St. (2-1), 11 a.m. Lindenwood (Mo.) (1-2) at E. Michigan (1-3), noon North Dakota (3-1) at Indiana St. (2-2), noon San Diego (1-2) at St. Thomas (Minn.) (3-1), 1 p.m. Butler (3-1) at Valparaiso (1-2), 1 p.m. Notre Dame (3-0) at Purdue (1-2), 1 p.m. South Dakota (3-1) at Youngstown St. (2-2), 1 p.m. UConn (2-1) at Miami (Ohio) (1-2), 2:30 p.m.

Utah (3-0) at Iowa St. (2-1), 2:30 p.m. Boise St. (2-1) at W. Michigan (2-1), 2:30 p.m. Iowa (3-0) at Michigan (3-0), 2:30 p.m. Stonehill (1-3) at Ohio (1-2), 2:30 p.m. Nebraska (3-0) at Michigan St. (2-1), 4 p.m. South Florida (3-0) at Bowling Green (0-3), 4 p.m. Illinois St. (4-0) at N. Iowa (1-2), 4 p.m. Kansas St. (3-0) at Cincinnati (3-0), 6 p.m. E. Illinois (1-3) at S. Dakota St. (3-1), 6 p.m. West Florida (2-1) at SE Missouri (2-2), 6 p.m.

SOUTHWEST

Colorado (2-1) at Baylor (2-1), 11 a.m. Colorado St. (2-1) at UTSA (2-1), 11 a.m. Sam Houston St. (1-2) at Texas Tech (3-0), 11 a.m. Incarnate Word (2-1) at Texas State (1-2), 5 p.m. Northeastern St. (0-1) at Stephen F. Austin (4-0), 5 p.m. Kennesaw St. (1-2) at Arkansas St. (1-2), 6 p.m. Prairie View (1-3) vs. Grambling St. (2-1) at Dallas, 6 p.m. Houston Christian (2-2) at North Texas (1-2), 6:30 p.m. Tulsa (3-0) at Arkansas (1-2), 7 p.m. Mercer (2-2) at Abilene Christian (1-3), 7 p.m. Missouri St. (1-2) at SMU (2-1), 8 p.m. Oregon St. (1-2) at UTEP (1-2), 8 p.m.

FAR WEST

Hawaii (1-2) at Wyoming (1-2), 2 p.m. New Mexico (2-1) at New Mexico St. (1-2), 2:30 p.m. Norfolk St. (2-2) at Chicago State (1-3), 6 p.m. Cal Poly (2-2) at E. Washington (1-3), 6 p.m. Oregon (2-1) at Southern Cal (4-0), 6:30 p.m. Troy (2-1) at Utah St. (0-3), 6:30 p.m. Arizona (2-1) at Washington St. (1-2), 6:30 p.m. Utah Tech (0-4) at N. Colorado (1-3), 7 p.m. Idaho St. (3-0) at S. Utah (1-3), 7 p.m. Portland St. (0-4) at Weber St. (2-2), 7 p.m. UMass (3-0) at Sacramento St. (1-3), 8 p.m. Rice (1-2) at Fresno St. (2-1), 9 p.m. Montana (3-1) at UC Davis (3-1), 9 p.m. N. Arizona (3-1) at Montana St. (4-0), 9:30 p.m. Georgia Tech (1-2) at Stanford (1-2), 9:30 p.m. Air Force (1-1) at Nevada (1-2), 9:30 p.m. Minnesota (2-1) at Washington (3-0), 10 p.m.

FCS Top 25 Poll

RANK REC. PTS. PRV. 1.Montana State (25) 4-0 649 1 2.South Dakota State 3-1 598 3 3.Tarleton State 4-0 566 5 4.Illinois State (1) 4-0 561 4 4.Montana 3-1 561 2 6.Stephen F. Austin 4-0 480 8 7.Lehigh 4-0 461 7 8.North Dakota 3-1 459 6 9.UC Davis 3-1 439 11 10.Tennessee Tech 3-0 415 10 11.Austin Peay 3-1 378 14 12.South Dakota 3-1 366 12 13.Youngstown State 2-2 363 9 14.South Carolina State 4-0 303 16 15.Lamar 2-1 296 15 16.Idaho State 3-0 273 18 17.Northern Arizona 3-1 228 19 18.Yale 1-0 188 20 19.Richmond 3-1 104 NR 20.West Florida 2-1 97 17 21.Rhode Island 2-2 93 13 22.Villanova 2-2 85 23 23.Colgate 3-1 71 NR 23.Mercer 2-2 71 22 25.Harvard 1-0 50 NR Dropped Out: William & Mary (21), Furman (24), Southern Illinois (25) Others Receiving Votes: Southern Illinois (45), Campbell (41), Jackson State (39), Elon (38), Furman (37), Alabama State (14), Prairie View A&M (12), Stony Brook (12), Bryant (7), Central Connecticut State (6), Dartmouth (6), Incarnate Word (6), William & Mary (6), Abilene Christian (5), Monmouth (5), Southeastern Louisiana (4), Southeast Missouri State (3), UT Rio Grande Valley (3), Robert Morris (PA) (2), San Diego (2), Chattanooga (1), St. Thomas (Minn.) (1)

Transactions Major League Baseball

American League DETROIT TIGERS — Recalled RHP River Ryan from Toledo. MINNESOTA TWINS — Selected the contract of 1B Aaron Sabato from St. Paul. Designated C Alex Jackson for assignment. TORONTO BLUE JAYS — Activated RHP Trey Yesavage from the 15-day IL. Recalled RHP Chad Dallas from Buffalo. Optioned RHP Spencer Arrighetti to FCL Blue Jays. Designated LHP Joe Mantiply for assignment. National League WASHINGTON NATIONALS — Activated LHP DJ Herz from the 60-day IL. Optioned LHP Jared Simpson to Rochester. Released RHP Cole Henry.

BASKETBALL

National Basketball Association TORONTO RAPTORS — Converted G Malachi Smith to a two-way contract.

FOOTBALL

National Football League ATLANTA FALCONS — Signed OL Colby Sorsdal to the practice squad. Released C James Brockermeyer from the practice squad. LOS ANGELES RAMS — Elevated LB Elias Neal from the practice squad. MIAMI DOLPHINS — Waived LB Liam Anderson. NEW YORK GIANTS — Elevated WR Braxton Berrios and LB Malik Harrison from the practice squad.

HOCKEY

National Hockey League CHICAGO BLACKHAWKS — Placed D Derrick Pouliot on waivers. SEATTLE KRAKEN — Placed F Jon-Randall Avon, F John Hayden, F Logan Morrison and G Victor Ostman on waivers.

LIVING

T H E A D V O C AT E.C O M

T u e s d ay, s e p T e m b e r 22, 2026

5CN

Obedient plant is a native perennial that lives up to its name Having a name like obedient plant creates a certain expectation: a well-behaved plant with a cooperative nature. That’s exactly what it delivers. Obedient plant (Physostegia virginiana) is a tough perennial native to Louisiana and much of the United States. It’s easy to care for and long-lived. Although it’s a vigorous grower, it won’t balk when it occasionally needs reining in. And, on top of that, it’s a great pollinator plant — and even somewhat enGARDEN tertaining. NEWS “The individual flowers sit on a horizontal, hinge-like structure called a pedicel,” said LSU AgCenter horticulturist Jason Stagg. “They can be pushed or twisted and will stay in that position, which is why it’s commonly known as obedient plant.” Blooming from summer into the first days of fall, wild obedient plant and most cultivated types feature a striking pinkish-purple color. The clusters of small, tubular flowers borne on tall stems may remind you of penstemon or snapdragon. Obedient plant provides a source of nectar during a transition season — a time when many other flowering plants have already succumbed to the summer heat. That makes this plant irresistible to hungry pollinators such as hummingbirds, butterflies and bees.

PROVIdEd PHOTOS By C.C. LOCKWOOd

C.C. Lockwood’s photo, ‘dawn Awakening,’ is featured in the Louisiana Art & Science Museum’s retrospective exhibit of his works, ‘Preserving Paradise: The Vision of C.C. Lockwood,’ opening Sept. 25.

A LIFE in the OUTDOORS

C.C. Lockwood spent his career photographing nature in Louisiana. An exhibit highlights his work. BY ROBIN MILLER

Staff writer

LSU AGCENTER FILE PHOTO

Obedient plant gets its name from the way its flowers can be pushed into new positions, where they’ll stay. The flowers sit on hinge-like structures.

“I like to watch larger bees wiggle into the flowers,” Stagg said. Bloom stalks reach at least 3 to 4 feet tall. As flowers form and the stalks get heavier, they sometimes lodge, or lean over. While obedient plant is nearing the end of its growing and blooming season right now, it will soon be the perfect time to add it to your garden. Like a lot of flowering perennials, obedient plant does best when planted in the fall or winter, as cooler temperatures offer a lower-stress environment for getting established. Choose a full- to part-sun location. The more sun obedient plant gets, the more flowers it will produce. It prefers average to moist soil but is not picky about other soil characteristics, such as pH. Be sure to give it plenty of room to grow. Because obedient plant can grow in wet sites, it makes an excellent addition to rain gardens and storm water structures. “Plant it once, and it will come back year after year without care,” Stagg said. “It spreads by underground rhizomes, forming a very large and vigorous clump. But the roots are shallow, so plants are easy to pull up if the clump becomes too big for your liking.” Clumps also can be divided while they’re dormant in winter and early spring for sharing with friends.

ä See OBEDIENT, page 6C

C.C. Lockwood listens to the steady rhythm of the passing train outside the old Yazoo & Mississippi Valley Railroad Depot that’s been home to the Louisiana Art & Science Museum since 1976. The train is rolling somewhere beyond Baton Rouge, maybe into parts of Louisiana the 77-year-old nature photographer now thinks about, C.C. Lockwood’s photo, ‘Cypress Splendor,’ some of which he captures when ‘a momentary shaft of sun peers hasn’t paddled by canoe in 20 years. through cloudy skies to brilliantly light up Spanish Canoes and boats moss covered bald cypress trees.’ — not trains — were Lockwood’s preferred Mention of the trek along the Colorado mode of travel in his 55-year River brings up the memory of the dancareer. Images from these ger attached to that adventure. Locktravels will be featured in the wood was canoeing the waterway when Lockwood Louisiana Art & Science Mu- a series of rapids slammed his vessel seum’s retrospective exhibit, “Preserv- against a rock. “It was a six-hour ordeal, but I didn’t get ing Paradise: The Vision of C.C. Locka scratch,” he said. “So, there are times wood,” opening Sept. 25. The show examines Lockwood’s life when doing this job can be dangerous.” But Lockwood never wavered in the and his love of Louisiana’s natural landscape, though he’s also extended that face of danger, not even after stepping love to other places. The Yucatan Pen- on an alligator’s tail during a nighttime insula in Mexico is one, the Colorado ä See LOCKWOOD, page 6C River through Grand Canyon is another.

‘PRESERVING PARADISE: THE VISION OF C.C. LOCKWOOD’ WHERE: Louisiana Art & Science Museum, 100 S. River Road. WHEN: The show opens Sept. 25 and continues for a year through Sept. 1, 2027. Hours are 10 a.m.-3 p.m. Wednesday through Friday, 10 a.m.-5 p.m. Saturday and 1-5 p.m. Sunday. ADMISSION: $16, age 13 and older; $13 children age 3-12 and seniors age 65 and older.Admission is free for military and first reponders. VISIT: lasm.org.

CRAVING SOME ICE CREAM?

LSU Dairy Store relocates, serves up same treats An employee at the LSU dairy Store adds cookie crumbles to a bowl of ice cream on Sept. 11.

STAFF PHOTO By PEARL SPURLOCK

BY MADDIE SCOTT Staff writer

LSU DAIRY STORE 410 Tower drive, Baton Rouge l

Tigerbite ice cream, anyone? Open 10 a.m. to 5 p.m. Monday Those looking for sweet treats through Friday in the fall and spring from the longtime LSU AgCensemesters ter Dairy Store will now venture inside the Our Lady of the Lake The store relocated from its Health Interdisciplinary Science Building at 410 Tower Drive, a two-year temporary location at four-story campus building that 118 S. Campus Drive and held houses PJ’s Coffee, Shaquille a grand opening on Sept. 8, just O’Neal’s Big Chicken and the new ä See ICE CREAM, page 6C location of the LSU Dairy Store.

6C ● Tuesday, September 22, 2026 ● theadvocate.com ● The Acadiana Advocate

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Matter of professional address school policy Dear Miss Manners: I work in a barriers, and we shouldn’t use our public middle school and am a first names with students. licensed teacher. It is a matter of This particular aide has done course that adults refer to little to hide her contempt each other as Mr. or Mrs. for the fact that since she Smith, especially in front did not finish college, she of students or when refermakes less money than the licensed professionals in ring to adults in their conthe building. versation with students. It is still the style to My issue is with an aide, Judith refer to all adults in the who continually addresses Martin building with their title me by my first name in MISS and last name, no matfront of students. I have MANNERS also heard her refer to me ter their role or level of by my first name when certification. As tempting speaking to students, as in “Go as it is to address her by her first ask John.” name, I refrain from doing so, as I It has always been my profesfeel it would model poor behavior while endorsing hers. sional training that omitting the Without resorting to giving her Mr. or Mrs. in front of students a taste of her own medicine, I’m leads to diminished professional

TODAY IN HISTORY By The Associated Press Today is Tuesday, Sept. 22, the 265th day of 2026. There are 100 days left in the year. Today in history: On Sept. 22, 1862, President Abraham Lincoln issued the preliminary Emancipation Proclamation, declaring all enslaved people in Confederate states should be freed as of Jan. 1, 1863, if the states did not end the fighting and rejoin the Union. Also on this date: In 1776, during the Revolutionary War, Capt. Nathan Hale, 21, was hanged as a spy by the British in New York. In 1957, Haitian women were allowed to vote for the first time, 153 years after Haiti became an independent country; François Duvalier was elected president. In 1961, President John F. Kennedy signed congressional legislation making the Peace Corps a permanent federal agency within the State Department; it became an independent agency in 1981. In 1975, Sara Jane Moore fired two shots in an unsuccessful attempt to assassinate President Gerald R. Ford outside a San Francisco hotel, missing Ford by inches. In 1985, rock and country music artists participated in Farm Aid, a concert staged in Champaign, Illinois, to help the nation’s farmers. In 2014, the United States and five Arab nations launched airstrikes against the Islamic State group in Syria, sending waves of planes and Tomahawk cruise missiles against an array of targets. In 2017, as the scale of the damage from Hurricane Maria started to become clearer, Puerto Rican officials said they could not contact more than half the communities in the U.S. territory, where all power had been knocked out to the island’s 3.4 million people. In 2018, militants disguised as soldiers opened fire on an annual military parade in southwest Iran, killing at least 25 people and wounding over 60. An Arab separatist movement claimed responsibility for the terror attack, the deadliest on Iranian soil in nearly a decade. Today’s birthdays: Singer-choreographer-actor Toni Basil is 83. Musician King Sunny Adé is 80. Football Hall of Famer Harold Carmichael is 77. Rock singer David Coverdale (Deep Purple, Whitesnake) is 75. Actor Shari Belafonte is 72. Singer Debby Boone is 70. Country singer June Forester (The Forester Sisters) is 70. Singer Nick Cave is 69. Singer Andrea Bocelli is 68. Singer-musician Joan Jett is 68. Actor Scott Baio is 66. Actor Bonnie Hunt is 65. Actor Mireille Enos is 52. Soccer player Thiago Silva is 42. Actor Tatiana Maslany is 41. Actor Tom Felton is 39. Actor Curry Barker is 27. Singer Jessie Murph is 21. Olympic gold medal skateboarder Coco Yoshizawa is 17.

OBEDIENT

Continued from page 5C In late fall and winter, the tall stalks will die off. They can be removed for aesthetic purposes, or you can leave them all winter long to provide habitat for overwintering beneﬁcial insects. As temperatures warm up in March, the stalks can be removed then. This will expose plenty of new leaves forming clumps near the ground, which will eventually produce ﬂower stalks again in summer.

at a loss as to how to stop her lack of professionalism, especially when coupled with her resentment. Gentle reader: You are a teacher! Teach her. Instructing your subordinate in the school’s routine is not the same as going around criticizing people over whom you have no such jurisdiction. You correct your students all the time. It is not an insult to point out that using titles and surnames when addressing or discussing faculty or administration is a school requirement. But a teacher has to know the context in which the lesson is being received. Probably your students, and very likely your

aide, have grown up in a world of unexamined casualness. Formal types of address are not a matter of course. They have been told that the ubiquitous use of ﬁrst names is “friendly,” despite that meaning that the entire population, including strangers, is bound in friendship. They may have been chastised by adults who interpreted respectful address as disrespectful because they believe it is insulting for anyone to notice that they are not young. So it would be helpful to explain why all systems of hierarchy are not bad. This one is based on achievement, which is open to them to earn. You should, of course, continue

to refrain from stooping to the level of mimicking bad behavior. You might also tell the aide that openly showing her contempt is a bad career move. Dear Miss Manners: Is it rude to hum at the dinner table if there are only two people? Gentle reader: Ask that other person. Miss Manners suggests doing so before he or she comes after you with the dinner knife. Send questions to Miss Manners at her website, www. missmanners.com; to her email, dearmissmanners@gmail.com; or through postal mail to Miss Manners, Universal Uclick, 1130 Walnut St., Kansas City, MO 64106.

LOCKWOOD

Continued from page 5C trek through the Atchafalaya Basin. It didn’t matter that he was wearing waders and the alligator was only 4-feet-long — the animal was still a powerful reptile with a full set of teeth. Lockwood remembers being reprimanded by a slap of the gator’s tail before it skittered elsewhere into the swamp. Then he kept walking.

A lifetime of work Lockwood has amassed a collection of images too big to contain in a single museum gallery, but Louisiana Art & Science Museum curator Tracey Barhorst made it work. “We’ll have a big TV screen showing the photographs we couldn’t fit into the show,” she said. She shows Lockwood a diagram that maps out where the chosen photos will hang in the gallery, each representative of a lifetime of doing what he loved. And what he loved didn’t have anything to do with the degree in accounting he earned from LSU in 1971. He loved the outdoors, and that’s where he wanted to spend all of his time. Though Lockwood settled in Louisiana, the state isn’t his native home. He was born in Kansas City, Missouri, in 1949, and grew up in Fort Smith, Arkansas. “My dad was a doctor,” Lockwood said. “He was a doctor in a MASH unit in Korea, and we ended up at Fort Chaffee and Fort Smith. He still had six months to serve, and he joined the surgeons at a clinic in Fort Smith and decided to stay.” Lockwood was a junior in high school at the time and planned to enter the University of Arkansas after graduation. “Arkansas was a great place to grow up,” he said. “There were only like a million people in the state back then, and there wasn’t much to do except go hunting and fishing and camping and hiking.” But Lockwood was eyeing an architecture degree at the time, and while LSU wasn’t on his radar, he decided to ride with a couple of his friends on a visit to the university. “They were planning on going there, and my dad drove us down,” he said. “It was on a weekend, and I saw the campus and the fine arts building, and the director of architecture was in his office on a Saturday morning. I walked in and told him, ‘I think I want to come here,’ and he signed me up right then.”

PROVIdEd PHOTOS By C.C. LOCKWOOd

C.C. Lockwood’s photo, ‘Goodnight Lotus,’ is featured in the Louisiana Art & Science Museum’s retrospective exhibit of his works, ‘Preserving Paradise: The Vision of C.C. Lockwood,’ opening Sept. 25.

student newspaper, then known as The Daily Reveille. He honed his photography skills, which led to the purchase of a professional-grade, single-lens reflex camera. After graduation, Lockwood traveled westward to assist a friend who was making a documentary about longhorn sheep in and around Yellowstone National Park. While there, he met wildlife photographer Leonard Lee Rue, which changed the trajectory of Lockwood’s life. “I realized I could make a career in nature photography,” he said. “I got my first two pictures in a National Geographic book in the mid’70s. That’s when my friends and parents realized I had a real job. Two years later, I did a full article for the magazine.” And he was spending every posC.C. Lockwood’s photo, ‘Flat sible minute in the Atchafalaya Lake Sunset,’ is featured in the Basin learning about its birds and Louisiana Art & Science Museum’s sunsets, the cycle of the trees and retrospective exhibit. the laws of nature. Other magazines began noticing degree, he knew he wouldn’t use it. and publishing his work, including “I wanted to be outside,” he said. The National Audubon Society, the “I started photography in ’71, and Smithsonian, National Wildlife and I really wasn’t up to full speed for American Photographer. He also many years. But the only time I sold his work to stock photography got a W-2 from somebody else was companies. when I taught one semester at LSU. I just look back at every step of my A collection of books life, and there are things that could Then came the books, including have changed everything. I think “Atchafalaya: America’s Biggest about where my parents lived, River Basin Swamp” in 1981; “The where I went to college and how I Gulf Coast: Where the Land Meets From architecture to photography got to so many different things in the Sea,” in 1984; and “Discovering Louisiana” in 1986. As Lockwood’s Architecture would be the first my life, and I feel so lucky.” Lockwood backed into a photog- travels expanded, so did his books. of five majors Lockwood would pursue before settling on account- raphy career after landing a college He published “Beneath the Rim: A ing. But even after receiving his job as a photographer for LSU’s Photographic Journey Through

ICE CREAM

the Grand Canyon” in 1996 and “The Yucatán Peninsula” in 1989. But Louisiana dominated the subjects of his 16 books, the most recent being “Louisiana Wild: The Protected and Restored Lands of The Nature Conservancy” in 2015. “All of the books will be available in what we’re calling ‘C.C.’s Library’ in the exhibit,” Barhorst said. “The East Baton Rouge Parish Library loaned us all of their copies of his books, and we’ll have a place where you can sit on logs around a display of a campﬁre and look at them.” As for future works, Lockwood’s interests have shifted. He’s living in semi-retirement north of St. Francisville, where he maintains a studio and teaches occasional students. Though his focus is still on the outdoors, he’s also looking inward. “I’m interested in health and good food,” he said. “This ultraprocessed food is killing America, and I’d love to do a book on sustainable agriculture.” The only problem is he’d have to travel to such places as Oregon, Vermont and the Ozarks to photograph serious organic farms. “I love where I live now, and I love my own garden,” he said. “So, I’ll just stay home.” But the sound of that passing train does have a way of invoking a sense of wonder. It travels, as does Lockwood’s thoughts. “You know, there are times when I look at places on a map of Louisiana, and I think, ‘I haven’t visited there in 20 years’ and I want to go back,” he said. Maybe he will.

after the start of fall semester classes. The LSU Dairy Store, as we call it today, ﬁrst opened in 1972, but it was scooping and selling ice cream long before that — beginning in 1905 as the LSU Creamery. Today, agriculture professor Chuck Boeneke oversees the dairy store. He performs research, extension work and primarily teaches dairy foods-related classes and labs.

cherry jubilee and more. There’s also an LSU-themed scoop called Tigerbite, made with blueberries and rich, golden vanilla. Scoops can be served in a cup, sugar cone or waffle cone, and coming soon, waffle bowls. When in use, the waffle iron fills the whole lobby with a sweet aroma of fresh waffle cones, Boeneke said. Customers can jazz up their orders with toppings like peanuts, Oreos, chocolate sprinkles, cherries, gummy bears, chocolate chips, whipped cream or syrups in strawberry, caramel and chocolate flavors.

How it’s made

Farm fresh

Continued from page 5C

The LSU AgCenter has its own dairy farm located in Franklinton, where milk is collected and brought to the campus processing plant. Milk is combined with cream, sugar and nonfat dried milk powder. Boeneke calls this the base ice cream mix, which is then pasteurized within a day and usually frozen the day after. “Typically we make a 200-gallon mix at a time, and that’ll give us roughly 350 gallons of ice cream,” Boeneke said. Batches are made once a week

Ice cream isn’t the only product sold at the shop. Being under the Chuck Boeneke, an agriculture professor, serves as manager of the LSU umbrella of the agriculture departdairy Store. ment, the LSU Dairy Store sells packaged meat products ready to and usually include two flavors voring and chewy raisins. Around grab from coolers located inside, of ice cream. The dairy store has Thanksgiving and Christmas, it’s including cuts of beef, pork, lamb about 60 or 70 different flavors, eggnog ice cream. and goat. Just last semester, it also which rotate through the 16 spots “The biggest two sellers are al- started selling eggs from an LSU inside the dairy store. ways chocolate and vanilla,” he research center. Sometimes the staff creates said. “Those are always going to Currently, there are two parking specialty flavors for different sell regardless of what’s in the box.” spots available for those wishing occasions or seasons. One of the Other flavors include orange to visit. Remember to bring cards popular fall ﬂavors is rum raisin, creamsicle, English toffee, but- as a form of payment, because the a vanilla base made with rum ﬂa- ter pecan, peach, cookie dough, dairy store doesn’t accept cash. STAFF PHOTO By PEARL SPURLOCK

The Acadiana Advocate ● theadvocate.com ● Tuesday, September 22, 2026 ● 7C

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zodIAC VIRGo (Aug. 23-sept. 22) Take the necessary measures to lock in what you want and map out a path that will help you discard what you no longer want or need. Be creative when making commitments. LIBRA (sept. 23-oct. 23) You'll excel using charm, intellect and emotional filler that draws parallels between you and whoever you deal with today. Don't exhaust your finances trying to impress someone. scoRPIo (oct. 24-nov. 22) Clarify what's important to you before you make a gesture you might regret. Patience is necessary if you want to protect your reputation and your physical and emotional well-being. sAGITTARIus (nov. 23-Dec. 21) Turn on your charm, step into the spotlight and dazzle everyone with your insight. Don't be afraid to adopt a unique lifestyle if it satisfies your soul and addresses your intentions and plans. cAPRIcoRn (Dec. 22-Jan. 19) When trying to win favors, you'll make better decisions if you pay attention to what others say and do. Self-improvement that will help you excel professionally. AQuARIus (Jan. 20-Feb. 19) Take better care of yourself. Avoid putting yourself at risk physically, emotionally or financially. Be a good observer, and back away from situations that are volatile. PIscEs (Feb. 20-March 20) When in doubt, take a pass. It's OK to say no or to change your mind. Put yourself first when dealing with pushy people. Go through your

documents, update or cancel subscriptions, and address due dates to avoid penalties. ARIEs (March 21-April 19) Turn your dreams into a reality. Explore possibilities and open doors to new adventures. Your journey depends on your imagination and willingness to reach for the stars. TAuRus (April 20-May 20) Think twice before you share your thoughts. Create your own dialogue in your head, and hold it in your thoughts until you are in a better position to get your point across without escalating the situation. GEMInI (May 21-June 20) Alter your routine, and fine-tune your schedule and plans to ensure you make the most of your time and your day. Lean on your experience and skills, and take nothing for granted. cAncER (June 21-July 22) Put anger aside, and concentrate on what you can achieve. Working alone is in your best interest if you want to avoid interference. Domestic situations will require thought. LEo (July 23-Aug. 22) High energy will encourage intense interaction with someone who wants to spar with you. You'll have to use your ingenuity to meet mental challenges with peak performance if you plan to come out on top. The horoscope, an entertainment feature, is not based on scientific fact. © 2026 by NEA, Inc., dist. By Andrews McMeel Syndication

For better or For WorSe WonderWord

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beetLe bAILeY CeLebrItY CIpher Celebrity Cipher cryptograms are created from quotations by famous people, past and present. Each letter in the cipher stands for another.

ToDAy's cLuE: P EQuALs H

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8C ● Tuesday, September 22, 2026 ● theadvocate.com ● The Acadiana Advocate

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Sudoku InstructIons: Sudoku is a number-placing puzzle based on a 9x9 grid with several given numbers. The object is to place the numbers 1 to 9 in the empty squares so that each row, each column and each 3x3 box contains the same number only once. The difficulty level of the Sudoku increases from Monday to Sunday. Yesterday’s Puzzle Answer

BaBY BLueS

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The Acadiana Advocate ● theadvocate.com ● Tuesday, September 22, 2026 ● 9C

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B.C.

Bridge By PHILLIP ALDER A.A. Milne wrote, “Rivers know this: there is no hurry. We shall get there some day.” Bridge players know that sometimes there is no hurry, but on other deals, speed is essential. Now look at today’s deal. How would youanalyzetheauction?Andwhatshould West lead against three no-trump? North’s two-spade cue-bid, in the modern style, showed at least a game-invitational hand with diamond support. However, North should have made a negative double, to show his four-card heart suit. We must check for major-suit fits before falling back on the minors. Here, if North had doubled, South might have rebid three diamonds. Then North could have cue-bid three spades to ask his partner to convert to three notrump with a spade stopper. North, with an aceless wonder, should not be thinking about five diamonds unless South cannot bid no-trump. Note that after that auction, West, knowing dummy has heart length, would be likely to lead his fourth-highest spade. Then South hurries to take the first 11 tricks: one spade, six diamonds and four clubs. When North cue-bid two spades, South decided, debatably with such a good hand for diamonds, to rebid two no-trump.

garfield

Pearls Before swiNe

hagar the horriBle

Then North cue-bid again to ask if South really could control spades. At the table, West led the spade seven, but he should have started with a high heart. He should have had a sense of urgency to take the first five tricks — and here East-West could have won the first six: five hearts and one spade. © 2026 by NEA, Inc., dist. By Andrews McMeel Syndication

wuzzles Each Wuzzle is a word riddle which creates a disguised word, phrase, name, place, saying, etc. For example: NOON GOOD = GOOD AFTERNOON

PiCKles

Previous answers:

mallard fillmore

word game InsTRucTIons: 1. Words must be of four or more letters. 2. Words that acquire four letters by the addition of “s,” such as “bats” or “dies,” are not allowed. 3. Additional words made by adding a “d” or an “s” may not be used. 4. Proper nouns, slang words, or vulgar or sexually explicit words are not allowed.

ToDAy’s WoRD — TILLAGE: TIL-ij: Cultivated land.

Bizarro

marmaduKe

Average mark 18 words Time limit 25 minutes Can you find 22 or more words in TILLAGE? yEsTERDAy’s WoRD — REGAIn rage

rein

grain

ragi

ring

grin

rain

earing

ager

rang

earn

anger

range

gain

near

rani

gear

reign

gnar

loCKhorNs hidato Yesterday’s Puzzle Answer

today’s thought “Jesus answered and said to him, Truly, truly, I say to you, Except a man be born again, he cannot see the kingdom of God.” John 3:3 Have you been born again? Jesus can make you a new person. He will forgive sin. He loves you. G.E. Dean

10C ● Tuesday, September 22, 2026 ● theadvocate.com ● The Acadiana Advocate

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BUSINESS T H E A D V O C AT E.C O M/news/business

DOW 52,048.83 366.19 0.71%

NASDAQ 27,122.09 599.55 2.26%

BRIEFS

FROM WIRE REPORTS

Wall Street rallies, bond yields ease

NEW YORK — Wall Street climbed to the edge of its all-time high on Monday, and stocks rallied worldwide after oil prices and yields in the bond market surrendered their market-rattling gains from last week. The S&P 500 jumped 1.5% and pulled within 0.4% of its record set last month. The Dow Jones Industrial Average added 366 points, or 0.7%, and the Nasdaq composite leaped 2.3% to its own all-time high as chip stocks and other companies in the artiﬁcial-intelligence industry led the way. Stocks got help from the price for a barrel of Brent oil falling 3.4% to $100.34. While that’s still much higher than its roughly $72 price from earlier this summer, it’s down from the nearly $110 it touched last week. Oil prices have been swinging up and down as some crude from the Middle East is able to sail through the Strait of Hormuz to get to customers, though nowhere near as much as the industry would like because of the war with Iran. The average price for a gallon of regular gasoline across the United States has already climbed to nearly $4.48, according to AAA. That’s up from less than $4.32 just a week earlier and from $3.18 a year ago. Monday’s pullback in oil prices helped lower the pressure coming from the bond market. The yield on the 10-year Treasury eased to 4.95% from 5.01% late Friday after crossing above the 5% threshold last week for the ﬁrst time since 2023.

Ethan Allen starts search for a new CEO NEW YORK — Home furniture and furnishing retailer Ethan Allen Interiors Inc. announced that it has started a search for a new CEO to succeed Farooq Kathwari, who has been at the helm of the publicly traded company for nearly 40 years. The Danbury, Connecticutbased retailer said Monday it has hired a nationally recognized executive search ﬁrm that is considering both internal and external candidates. It said the board is committed to announcing its next CEO no later than June 30, 2027. That’s the date on which Kathwari’s current contract is scheduled to end. The company said that Kathwari will remain a nonexecutive member of the board after June 30 until the company’s 2027 annual shareholder meeting. Kathwari has been president of the retailer since 1985 and chairman and CEO since 1988, according to the company’s website. The announcement comes after investor Doug Bergeron, who owns a more than 5% stake in Ethan Allen, shared publicly earlier this month that he had launched his own search for a new CEO in advance of the company’s annual shareholders’ meeting

Social Security phasing out paper checks People still receiving Social Security benefits in the mail need to prepare for electronic changes as paper checks are being phased out soon. The Social Security Administration plans to complete the transition to electronic payments for beneficiaries by the end of this year, according to the agency. Federal law and Executive Order 14247, which went into effect Sept. 30, 2025, require federal benefit payments to be made electronically, with limited exceptions. If you’re still receiving benefit payments by paper check, the administration encourages switching to electronic payments as soon as possible. “Switching now ensures you receive your Social Security or Supplemental Security income quickly and securely,” the administration said. Beneficiaries can create or sign in to their Social Security account at www.ssa.gov/myaccount and provide bank account information to receive payments through direct deposit.

S&P 500 7,764.70 114.20 1.49%

EURO 1.1467 -0.0020 -0.17%

CRUDE OIL 95.78 -4.52 -4.51%

GOLD 4,345.80 -40.10 -0.91%

6-MO T-BILLS 4.31 0.04 0.94%

30-YR T-BONDS 5.28 -0.05 -0.86%

Fed official: Iran war pushed rate hike BY CHRISTOPHER RUGABER

AP economics writer

WASHINGTON — A top Federal Reserve ofﬁcial said Monday that the renewal of combat in the Middle East in August was a key reason she supported raising borrowing costs last week, when she also penciled in a second rate hike for later this year. Susan Collins, president of the Federal Reserve Bank of Boston, said in an interview with The Associated Press that she agreed with the Fed’s decision Wednesday to lift its benchmark interest rate by a quarter-point to about 3.9%. She also expects that the Fed will keep rates unchanged next year, she added. “I did not see the inﬂation progress I was hoping to see,” she said. “Geopolitical developments sug-

gest that we could continue to see additional pressures push on the energy side. “There were reasons to see an increased likelihood of some of the scenarios in which inflation gets stuck above 2%,” she added, referring to the Fed’s 2% inflation target, which it has not hit for more than five years. Collins was the second Fed official Monday to outline their thinking about rates, along with Austan Goolsbee, president of the Chicago Fed, who spoke earlier in London and then addressed a roundtable of reporters. Both spoke about inflation pressures arising from supply shocks, such as the war in Iran, as well as from solid business and consumer spending. Neither Collins nor Goolsbee have a vote on the Fed’s rate decisions this year, but they participate

in the meetings where rate changes are discussed. Goolsbee will have a vote next year, while Collins will have a vote in 2028. Collins also said that businesses in her district, which includes Massachusetts, Connecticut, Maine, Rhode Island and Vermont, continue to express concern about high costs. Many of those companies expect they may have to pass rising costs on to their customers, which could push up measured inflation. Goolsbee, for his part, said that the central bank may have to cause economic pain in the form of higher unemployment to combat stubbornly high inflation. Goolsbee said that the Fed is facing a series of persistent supply shocks that have driven up inflation, including higher oil prices from the Iran war and tariffs. Typically, Goolsbee noted, the central

bank would essentially wait for such shocks to fade and inflation to fall on its own rather than raise borrowing costs. But faced with an ongoing series of persistent supply shocks, the Fed now has little choice but to hike rates, Goolsbee said. The increases are needed to lower consumer and business demand to a level consistent with reduced supply, he added, which should bring inflation back to the Fed’s 2% target. “The only way to bring inflation down is to raise rates and narrow the gap between supply and demand,” he said in a written copy of his remarks. “Forcing inflation back to target in the short run means pushing employment below target. ... In the short run, supply shocks force a difficult trade-off” between the Fed’s goals of low inflation and maximum employment.

States settle lawsuit over Paramount-Warner merger Key hurdle cleared to seal $81 billion deal

BY WYATTE GRANTHAM-PHILIPS and MICHAEL R. SISAK Associated Press

CHICAGO — Twelve states and Hollywood writers challenging Paramount’s buyout of Warner Bros. Discovery agreed to settle their lawsuits on Monday, effectively paving the way for the $81 billion mega merger to cross the finish line, with some new commitments from the company. The blockbuster deal will still bring together two of Hollywood’s oldest studios, key TV networks like CBS and CNN and streaming platforms HBO Max and Paramount+, as well as decades-old libraries with titles ranging from “Harry Potter” to “Top Gun.” But among terms of Monday’s agreement announced by California Attorney General Rob Bonta — who led the states’ case — Paramount pledged to increase film production in the U.S., commit millions of dollars to a fund aimed at supporting workers who are displaced by the merger and establish monitoring of editorial independence of the company’s news operations. The settlement still needs a final sign-off by a judge. Bonta said Monday’s agreement was about “protecting people’s careers, the lives they’ve built here in California, the livelihoods their families rely on” — but he maintained it was not a vote in support of the merger. “I don’t think these two companies should merge,” Bonta said in a Monday press conference. “But that’s not something that we are focused on with our resolution here.” Paramount CEO David Ellison welcomed the settlement, which he said marked “complete clearance for this merger.” He added that “bringing Paramount and Warner Bros. Discovery together will build that stronger Hollywood, creating expanded opportunity for our people and even more great entertainment for audiences around the world.” The coalition of states — including entertainment heavyweights like California and New York — sued to block the merger in July, alleging a Paramount-Warner combo would “extinguish competition” and lead to fewer choices for consumers, particularly movie theatergoers and cable customers across the U.S. The Writers Guild of America also filed

ASSOCIATEd PRESS PHOTO By JAE C. HONG

Twelve states and Hollywood writers challenging Paramount’s buyout of Warner Bros. discovery agreed to settle their lawsuits on Monday, effectively paving the way for the $81 billion mega merger to cross the finish line, with some new commitments from the company. suit, and both challenges were headed toward a full antitrust trial set to kick off in March. The WGA separately confirmed Monday that it settled its case, too. “We continue to believe the merger will cause damage to writers and the industry at large,” the guild said in a statement. “Now that the Attorneys General have settled with Paramount, however, as a nonprofit, the WGA must contend with the reality of forging ahead alone, with no backing from government enforcers, with a complex antitrust lawsuit that would cost millions of dollars to pursue through trial.” The union added that Paramount had agreed to prohibit writer layoffs at CBS News for five years and to pay $17.5 million to WGA’s health fund, along with attorneys’ fees from the litigation. Paramount previously agreed to delay its transaction well into next year so the challenges could make their way through court.

It then quickly called for a settlement — arguing that it had satisﬁed all regulatory clearances worldwide (including from the Trump administration’s Justice Department), saying that the states’ lawsuit, in particular, was its “ﬁnal obstacle.” As reports of the states reaching a settlement with Paramount emerged Monday, critics decried the deal — while warning of what further consolidation could mean in an industry already controlled by just a few major players. “Today, billionaires have yet again bribed, censored, and bullied their way to the top,” Alvaro Bedoya, senior adviser at the American Economic Liberties Project and a former commissioner of the Federal Trade Commission, said in a statement. “Layoffs will follow. People from L.A. to Atlanta will lose their jobs, small businesses will lose their contracts, your cable bill and movie ticket will be even more expensive.”

Coalition to build more representative language data sets for AI Gates Foundation leading charge BY JAMES POLLARD Associated Press

NEW YORK — The Gates Foundation is convening Anthropic, Google, OpenAI Foundation and dozens of other organizations to help make artiﬁcial intelligence more accessible in underrepresented languages. The partners — 60 in total, according to Monday’s announcement — include frontier AI labs, corporations, philanthropies and others already working to expand the number of languages available in AI tools that the Gates Foundation believes could combat global

inequality. The coalition aims to reach more than 3 billion people over ﬁve years by better coordinating existing efforts. It’s work that must continue “full speed ahead,” according to Gates Foundation CEO Mark Suzman, even as some of the largest AI companies urge their industry to slow down development of advanced models. Governments must regulate the impacts on cybersecurity or children’s development, he said, while they extend AI’s humanitarian applications to poor communities currently “shut out” from the technology. “Even if AI was frozen right now — which I don’t expect and I am not calling for — we would want to be building these language sets and making them usable with the tools

that we have available right now,” Suzman told The Associated Press. The collaboration follows last week’s Goalkeepers report, where the foundation committed $1 billion toward AI-focused efforts to improve health outcomes, upgrade educational tools and inform small farmers’ practices around the world. Unrepresentative language data could lead a model to mistranslate a pregnant Malawi woman saying her “water has broken” into the direct English that she’d “thrown away water,” the report warned. The “original sin” is that many AI tools were trained on language data scraped from the internet, according to Mozilla Data Collective CEO E.M. Lewis-Jong, whose company was incubated by the Mozilla

Foundation and is now a subsidiary of the not-for-profit Mozilla.org. The data-sharing platform seeks to help communities upload cultural and linguistic data sets on their own terms rather than have that data taken from the web without their explicit consent. “The internet is not a representative space,” she said. “Why would you think that you were going to get a culturally diverse and representative system out of something that was predominantly trained on Reddit?” Details such as the coalition’s governance are still getting hammered out, according to Suzman. A secretariat will track each signatory’s commitments and the Gates Foundation may nudge partners to ﬁll larger gaps when necessary.