A bill that clarifies some things with the Downtown Development District has passed out of committee and will go to the House floor next week, says state Rep. Gene Reynolds.
“It’ll probably be on the floor at the end of next week or the first of the next,” he said. “There was very little discussion on the bill. It was passed really easy.”
Reynolds says the bill clarifies membership to the Main Street Commission and who has the right to hire and fire the downtown development executive director.
Mayor Tommy Davis went to Baton Rouge Thursday to plead the case for the bill’s passage. He says the problem was no one on the commission met the requirements, which made the commission unconstitutional.
According to the new bill, for potential members of the commission to qualify, they must either be a registered voter of Minden or hold a majority interest in a business or property located in the Downtown Development District.
It also changed some language in the bill, because Minden has a downtown business district but not a Retail Merchants Association.
The downtown development district begins where Dennis Street intersects with Highway 80 and ends around Pennsylvania Avenue with properties in between.