FERRIDAY — Several Ferriday board of aldermen candidates got a surprise last week during qualifications for municipal races.

Because the town failed to submit its redistricting plan in time for U.S. Department of Justice approval, aldermen elections will not be on the spring ballot.

Aldermen candidates were not allowed to qualify alongside mayoral candidates last week.

The town must await a response from the U.S. Justice Department to determine an exact time for elections, said Oliver Schulz of Oliver Schulz & Associates in Monroe, who handled the redistricting plans for both Ferriday and Vidalia.

The Justice Department has 60 days from last week to either send a letter of no objection or request additional information.

If there is no objection, the aldermen elections could be slated for a Nov. 6 primary with a general election on Dec. 1.

Concordia Parish Clerk of Court Clyde Ray Webber said a request for additional information could put the town back in square one.

“You just never know what the justice department will say,” Webber said. “Obviously, we won’t know those kinds of things until we are officially informed.”

Since redistricting is handled independently through Ferriday, Webber said the office had no idea the candidates wouldn’t be able to qualify until they showed up.

“When we got ready to qualify them, there wasn’t a place to qualify them,” Webber said. “We just had to tell them, ‘You’re not on the ballot.’”

While the plan Schulz submitted to Ferriday was adopted quickly, he said the process did not begin soon enough.

“We didn’t start on it until after it was too late,”

Schulz said.

The major change takes an area in District A, located around Bateman Avenue and Lake Drive, and moves it to District C.

Another change takes an area in District C, located around South 5th Street, and moves it to District D.

Districts B and E had no changes.

Schulz also handles the redistricting for Vidalia and said no changes had to be made to that city’s plan.

Since no changes were made to Vidalia’s plan and the board of aldermen adopted the plan on Nov. 8, Vidalia aldermen were able to qualify for this election cycle.