BATON ROUGE — Less than a month into his tenure, newly elected East Baton Rouge Parish Mayor-President Sid Edwards is preparing to meet with Governor Jeff Landry to request assistance in combating the parish’s escalating crime problem.
Addressing crime was central to Edwards’ campaign, a mission rooted in personal tragedy. As a football coach at Istrouma High School, Edwards lost one of his players to gun violence.
Now, as mayor-president, he faces the issue head-on.
“I’m reading an article Unfiltered writes about the shooting on the levee that just occurred, and I’m going through it. I lost one of my children—my football players—at Istrouma on January 1 last year, walking down Evangeline Street, and he was gunned down and murdered,” Edwards recalled at January’s St. George Rotary Club meeting.
“I get to read that the young man—one of the young men that was shooting on the levee—is the same young man that murdered my football player. Make that make sense to me. Now, I know there’s a process. I understand it, okay, but our criminal justice system is broke. We have a crime problem in the parish.”
Edwards outlined several initiatives aimed at tackling the issue, emphasizing that crime is no longer isolated to specific areas but has spread throughout the parish. One of his strategies involves collaborating with Governor Landry to explore solutions modeled after Troop NOLA, a crime-fighting initiative introduced in New Orleans in 2024 that proved effective ahead of the Super Bowl.
MORE: Landry ran as a tough on crime governor. Is he doing enough to keep Baton Rouge safe?
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“We plan a meeting with the governor and his staff for some help in other areas. You know that they’ve helped in New Orleans. So everything that we can do, we’re putting it together,” he said.
Despite the rapid transition from his December 7 election win to his January 5 inauguration, Edwards has already formed 10 transition teams, each led by a chair and co-chair. These teams are set to submit their findings and recommendations by mid-March.
One key appointment is former Baton Rouge Police Chief Jeff LeDuff, who now serves as Assistant Chief Administrative Officer and leads the Public Safety transition team. LeDuff has been meeting with local law enforcement officials and working long hours to address critical challenges, particularly the department’s struggle with recruitment and retention.
“I spoke to our young police academy. There were 13 signed up, which is a very low number. I was there the first day. I was going to speak to them at 9 a.m., and they started at 7 a.m. When I got there at 9 a.m., they were down to 12. Okay, one had already said, ‘I’m out right now.’ They’re at eight. We lost two more since then.
“So the recruitment and retainment of our officers is crucially important. Money drives everything. How are we going to pay them when he’s starting out at $39,000 a year, and you’re asked to do that job? My goodness, we have to have more officers on the street here again.”
Edwards and LeDuff are also exploring ways to re-engage retired officers, particularly those who left due to low morale but still have “gas in the tank.”
“There are a lot of officers who have left the department and are retired but still have gas in the tank. We’re talking to them, and we’re trying to work out something right now to get these retired officers back to the department.”
However, Edwards acknowledged that policing is only one layer of a multifaceted crime issue. Once arrests are made, the burden shifts to the district attorney’s office, which is overwhelmed with roughly 22,000 cases and only 55 assistant district attorneys.
“They’re underfunded, they’re understaffed. They don’t have enough people. The young man that was murdered on December 23 still does not have anyone from the district attorney’s office assigned to the case as of two weeks ago.”
In an effort to address violent crime, Edwards announced plans to increase Crime Stoppers rewards for tips on murders received within 48 hours. He also intends to collaborate with local pastors and churches to develop extracurricular activities for youth, aiming to keep them off the streets.
One contentious topic is the idea of merging the Baton Rouge Police Department with the East Baton Rouge Sheriff’s Office to form a metro department.
“I am not a big advocate to combine the two forces. I think that would take a decade or more, and it would really mess with people’s pensions and livelihoods and retirements. I am far for collaborating—which they do some—but possibly merging some units, like the narcotics unit, street crimes unit, and gang units. We’re in negotiations with that.”
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3 Responses
i have a lot of suggestions . if we can mandate sex offenders to get castrated start by mandating people that continue to have children but they have killed or neglected ones they have can’t bond out unless they are mandated to have a vasectomy or tubes cut and tied. look at the statistics of those male and female that have been arrested for abuse or neglect like a child playing with a gun or overdosing or being murdered that go to jail get out on bond or do a short sentence only to get pregnant or get someone pregnant and have more children they can’t take care of and those kids end up in in gangs at young age doing some of the same crimes if you start this then population of criminals would be reduced !
The mayor , the police , the DA do the best thy can to react to crime , but more needs to be done prevent crime. That’s where family and I think just important the church comes in . Crime is just not a physical problem but it is mostly spiritual. I know no one wants to speak on the record about this but this where crime begins , in someone’s heart and no public official is willing to go that route. Bethany Church has a mentorship program that has been at the mayor’s school for years and if the truth be told has been very effective at changing students perspectives on life . I think a program like this at every school will nip a lot of what’s going on in our community with young people in the bud.
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