St. Pierre: Parish vehicles costing too much money

Parish paid $119,000 in fuel, oil in May. St. Pierre now forced to keep some employees from

Some parish workers will no longer be able to take their government-owned vehicles home with them anymore because it was costing tax payers too much money.

The parish paid approximately $119,000 for fuel and oil during May 2008, according to acting Finance Director J. Charles Oubre III.

Parish President V.J St. Pierre said the parish would benefit from decreased maintenance and fuel expenses for vehicles pulled out of the take-home rotation.

Three of the six members of St. Pierre’s executive staff have access to parish vehicles, including St. Pierre.
“Our goal was to streamline the decision-making process across the board,” St. Pierre said. “Now that we have this set of rules, it’s going to be much easier to eliminate abuse and determine the best use for the vehicles we already maintain.”

The policy also forbids any use of a parish-owned vehicle for personal business, but makes exception for errands done while traveling to and from work, provided the errands are along the normal route.

The new criteria has eliminated approximately 15 take-home vehicles in the Department of Planning and Zoning, four in Workforce Investment and two in the Department of Parks and Recreation.

The parish previously authorized 80 take-home vehicles.

“With gas prices being the way they are, I can understand the implementation of the policy,” Kim Marousek, director of Planning and Zoning, said. “It doesn’t really impact us that much.”

Marousek says her workers will conduct business in the parish vehicles as they normally do.

Individual department heads will enforce the policy, and any employee in violation may be prohibited from using parish-owned vehicles, reprimanded or even terminated.

Some employees are currently assigned take-home vehicles  and are taxed each pay check for their use. Other employees have access to parish vehicle pools or can be reimbursed for mileage in their personal vehicles.

The current reimbursement rate is 50 cents per mile.