Natchitoches Mayor Ronnie Williams, Jr., who pursued a hastily-announced intention to tap controversial former LSP Lt. Col. Jay Oliphant to serve as his Chief of Public Safety, got a very cold reception from the Natchitoches City Council meeting of Monday, December 12, 2022.
Well, all we can say is, “What a difference five days makes!”
As we’ve reported, on Wednesday, December 7, 2022 at 2:30 p.m., Natchitoches Mayor Ronnie Williams, Jr., convened this impromptu news conference.
His purpose? To propose as his new Director of Public Safety Mr. Jay Oliphant, a retired Lt. Colonel at Louisiana State Police (LSP) who was in charge of patrol when a stunning number of problematic acts on the parts of LSP Troopers transpired. At this time, we want to present just a one-minute video clip of Oliphant touting him obtaining the position:
One-minute highlight from December 7, 2022 news conference held by Natchitoches Mayor Ronnie Williams, Jr., during which former Louisiana State Police Lt. Colonel Jay Oliphant expresses appreciation for Williams’ tapping of him to be his new Chief of Public Safety.
Five days later, on Monday, December 12, 2022, the Natchitoches City Council served Williams up a huge slice of humble pie. Let’s take just a couple of minutes to see highlights of that:
Natchitoches City Council meeting: Monday, December 12, 2022. One-minute highlight of Councilwoman-at-large Betty Sawyer-Smith expressing her reservations about hiring former LSP Lt. Col. Jay Oliphant at a salary of $85,000 to be the city’s new Chief of Public Safety.
Natchitoches City Council meeting: Monday, December 12, 2022. 2 1/2 -minute highlight of Councilman Eddie Harrington expressing his reservations about hiring former LSP Lt. Col. Jay Oliphant at a salary of $85,000 to be the city’s new Chief of Public Safety.
As the title to this feature indicates, Mayor Williams literally choked on the humble pie the Council served him.
He went on a dissertation that rambled on seemingly forever and went all over creation and bore little to no correlation to Oliphant and the proposed hiring.
We aren’t going to even dignify any part of it in a video. We will say this, however: many of his statements entailing Oliphant were nothing short of outright falsehoods! Chief among those falsehoods was stating that Oliphant, “rose to second-in-command at LSP.”
Most all of our subscribers by now know that the Chief of Staff of LSP is the only “second in command” which exists at the agency; furthermore, Oliphant never held that position.
Oliphant was a Lt. Colonel prior to being demoted back to Major soon after Col. Lamar Davis was tapped to be LSP Colonel.
Former Col. Kevin Reeves, who twice promoted Oliphant at breakneck speed, did have a top-heavy administration which included six (6) Lt. Colonels. Oliphant was one of his Lt. Colonels and, as we stated in the feature linked above, Oliphant was known to be extremely tight with and extremely loyal to former Col. Reeves.
As we stated at the outset, what a difference five days makes, huh?
Lastly, look for major news on the Ronald Greene front sometime tomorrow afternoon as outlined on the Baton Rouge NAACP’s Facebook Page, to wit:
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Well, La-te-da ! Maybe some people do read comments. Congrats to the city council members for doing the right thing. Thanks to Mr Burns for bringing this to light.