Getting your Trinity Audio player ready...

FERRIDAY, La. — The Town of Ferriday has been awarded $19.5 million in no-match capital outlay funds, which includes $8 million for sewer system upgrades and $10 million for a new complex to house the town hall, police and fire departments.

The funding was announced recently after a meeting between Ferriday town officials, State Rep. C. Travis Johnson, State Sen. Katrina Jackson-Andrews and, State Sen. Glen Womak, and engineer Bryant Hammett who is on the state’s Interim Emergency Board.

Mayor Alvin Garrison has said he would like to see the new complex be built at the old Ferriday Police Department across from Ferriday High School or at the old shopping center where FPD is currently housed. Garrison said Bryant Hammett and Associates will be the engineers for the project, which is expected to break ground in early 2025.

According to the funding specifications, the first $700,000 has to be designated and the project break ground within one year, Johnson said.

During the prior administration, when Rydell Turner was mayor, $19 million in capital outlay funding was applied for to build an auditorium on Louisiana Highway 15.

The funds were appropriated to build the auditorium over multiple sessions in 2021, 2022, and 2023, Rep. Johnson said, noting as a Ferriday native he pushed it through but did not understand the need.

“I wasn’t too keen because I didn’t understand how it would be sustained. It didn’t make financial sense. I was not passionate about it but I still supported what my mayor wanted to do,” Johnson said.

When it had come to the point that the funds could be awarded to Ferriday, Garrison was elected and a discussion began with officials to change the project scope for a “highly needed” municipal complex, Johnson said.

A meeting in recent weeks with the Interim Emergency Board allowed the funds to be diverted.

A bill also previously passed the State legislature that towns with a population under 6,000 would not have to pay any matching money for capital outlay grants, Womak announced, meaning Ferriday would not have to supply a 25 percent match on the new sewer system or municipal complex.