Severance payments made by the Robideaux administration may have violated state law, our media partners at The Advocate report.
The newspaper's investigation looked into severance payments amounting to 160 hours - or four weeks of pay - were made to four directors who did not keep their jobs when Josh Guillory took over the Mayor-President position from Joel Robideaux, the newspaper reports.
The payments to four employees - $12,031 to Mark Dubroc, public works director; $8,615 to Shanea Nelson, community development director; $7,003 to Marcus Bruno, governmental affairs officer; and $5,932 to Kate Durio, chief cultural officer (CREATE) - may have violated state law because they weren't earned, the Advocate reports.
Employees are paid for their accrued sick leave and vacation time because that is earned and owed to the employees, the paper reports. Civil Service law does allow severance pay of 80 hours to Civil Service employees. None of the four in question are Civil Service employees. Rather, they are at-will employees.
To read The Advocate's whole story, which includes details of their investigation into Louisiana law on the subject, click here.
