VIDALIA — Following a public hearing two weeks ago and an attorney general’s opinion issued earlier this month, the Concordia Parish Police Jury voted Monday to keep maintaining Ferguson Road.

The road, located near Clayton, is in both Concordia and Tensas Parish, and the Tensas Parish side of the road is only accessible through Concordia Parish.

The road was abandoned in 2002, but a May judgment in the Seventh Judicial District Court reversed the abandonment after Tensas Parish landowners filed a lawsuit against the abandonment. The Tensas Parish owners said they were not given proper notice of the abandonment.

A Sept. 11 opinion issued by the attorney general’s office said the parish could not abandon the road if it still served a public purpose, including access to the Tensas Parish properties.

Approximately a dozen landowners showed up at Monday’s meeting of the police jury, but when the topic was broached, the discussion was brief.

“We appreciate all the pros and cons we have heard, but at this time, it is time for us to make a decision, so I am going to make a motion to make Ferguson Road remain open,” Police Juror Carey Cook said.

The motion passed 6 to 2, with jurors Joe Parker and Jerry Beatty voting against it.

Police Jury President Melvin Ferrington said he thought the jury made the right decision.

“In the past, if anyone ever opposed closing a road, we took that into consideration,” he said.

Attorney Dan Garrett, who was present on behalf of the Tensas Parish Police Jury, said the Tensas jury has voted to extend the offer of a cooperative agreement to the Concordia jury.

“Basically, y’all would be giving the Tensas police jury the authority to help maintain the road,” he said. “The public purpose for them is it facilitates getting to the rest of the road that dead ends into Tensas.”

Ferrington said he had discussed the arrangement briefly with representatives from the Tensas police jury and the Concordia police jury was open to such an arrangement.