Home Care In Gonzales, LA

Los Angeles County leaders unanimously voted to fire Probation Department Chief Adolfo Gonzales on Tuesday, pledging it would be the first step in an overhaul of one of the county’s most troubled departments.

The vote brings an abrupt end to Gonzales’ tumultuous two-year term, in which the department careened from one crisis to the next. During his time at the helm, the department was faced with a dire staffing shortage, troubling findings from a state oversight body and allegations of officer misconduct.

County supervisors’ frustrations with Gonzales appeared to peak in February after The Times published a video of officers violently restraining a 17-year-old and revealed that Gonzales overrode an internal disciplinary board’s recommendation to fire the main officer involved. After The Times’ report, a majority of the Board of Supervisors called for Gonzales’ resignation.

The resignation never arrived.

On Tuesday, board Chair Janice Hahn said that the juvenile halls were in a clear crisis and that the time had come for a change at the top.

“The state has found them unsuitable, and they are at risk of being shut down. Youth are being hurt and are not attending school,” Hahn said. “Staff are being attacked, and many are not showing up to work.”

Supervisor Kathryn Barger said she supported sending in a “strike team” with the power to overhaul the Probation Department. She said Gonzales had lost what was left of her support during a visit to one of the juvenile halls a few weeks ago.

“Although I personally saw deficiencies and ensured they were communicated to the Department, over a week later nothing had been done,” Barger said in a statement. “This is just plain unacceptable.”

Chief Deputy Karen Fletcher, Gonzales’ second-in-command, has been named the interim chief of the department, according to spokespeople for Hahn and Barger. The Probation Oversight Commission called for both Gonzales’ and Fletcher’s resignations earlier this month.

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The commission applauded the supervisors’ action in a statement, saying, “We appreciate this necessary step toward our efforts to bring stability for all stakeholders of the L.A. County Probation Department and to achieve real reform for the youth and adults impacted and served by the Department.”

The Probation Department did not immediately respond to a request for comment.

Supervisor Lindsey Horvath called Gonzales’ removal “only step one.” Supervisor Hilda Solis said the next chief would need to address a “serious culture issue and lack of leadership within the department.”

“To that end, in the County’s next search for a new Probation Department Chief, we need someone who can take initiative and has the courage to make the necessary changes needed for our youth and adults in Probation’s supervision,” she said in a statement.

Gonzales was named the county’s top probation official in February 2021 after a five-year stint running San Diego County’s probation department. The L.A. County department was already troubled when he took over. The California Department of Justice entered into a settlement with the agency to reform its treatment of juveniles one month before Gonzales was hired. But it has been the subject of near-constant controversy during his run as chief.

In September 2021, the California Board of State and Community Corrections found the Probation Department was “unsuitable” to care for youths, the first time the oversight body made such a ruling against a juvenile institution in state history. When such rulings occur, an agency has 60 days to implement an action plan to improve conditions or the state can order juveniles to be relocated into housing beyond the Probation Department’s reach.

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Fearing another negative ruling from the state board in early 2022, Gonzales and other executives emptied Central Juvenile Hall and crammed nearly every teen in the department’s custody into Barry J. Nidorf Juvenile Hall in Sylmar, a chaotic and poorly planned move that resulted in violence and injuries to officers and children.

Gonzales and Fletcher had repeatedly denied reports in The Times that the transfer was done to sidestep an investigation by the state board, but the L.A. County Office of Inspector General confirmed the newspaper’s reporting late last year.

For most of 2022, probation officers often refused to come to work because of fear of violence in Central and Nidorf halls, leading to major staffing shortages and frequent lockdowns of both facilities. The situation led to a significant spike in fights and injuries to staff and had major effects on the mental health of the youths the department is supposed to be helping rehabilitate, a Times investigation found last year.

The final straw for Gonzales appeared to come last month when The Times published surveillance video of officers violently restraining a 17-year-old inside Camp Kilpatrick. The footage showed officers grabbing the teen by each limb and his neck and pinning him to a bed after an argument. Once the teen appeared subdued, a supervisor named Oscar Cross bent the child’s legs toward his head and yelled, “Stop resisting,” while the boy yelled out for his mother.

The inspector general and the Los Angeles County district attorney’s office have launched investigations into the footage, and the Probation Oversight Commission called for the department to fire every officer seen using force on the video.

On Feb. 27, Gonzales told a group of high-level probation officials that he would not step down and that the board would have to fire him, according to a law enforcement source who spoke on condition of anonymity to discuss the situation candidly.

Times staff writer Melissa Gomez contributed to this report.

GONZALES, La. (BRPROUD) — Several new projects are currently underway for the City of Gonzales in order to keep up with the high influx of people coming to the area.

The multi-million dollar projects are all happening inside the growing development of Heritage Crossing.

Gonzales resident Rachel Alayyadhi has lived in the area for several years and has noticed more buildings around the area. She said that with more buildings, Gonzales is becoming more noticeable.

“I feel like I blinked and it was just up and running,” said Alayyadhi. “Most things were building in Baton Rouge, and now they’re moving out and making Gonzales really great.”

One of the more exciting projects for the city is Price LeBlanc P.A.C.E. Center. A $10 million dollar investment funded by Price LeBlanc and other donors from Washington D.C. The new facility will be used as a conference and entertainment center.

Gonzales Mayor Barney Arceneaux said the new center is 60% complete. Arceneaux said his call volume for bookings has increased substantially within the last week. Several large groups have booked the facility for Mardi Gras balls and dance recitals.

“Numerous things that will take place right here,” said Arceneaux. “It not only offers the locals, but people that are coming out of town.”

Around the new P.A.C.E. Center are several more projects within the Heritage Crossing plaza. Construction is underway on building a new 300-unit apartment complex.

The plaza is also excited to offer a new Alexander’s Grocery store.

Arceneaux said three new roundabouts are planned for better traffic flow with the hope that the project will be completed early next year.

Arceneaux asked people living in the area to be patient for now.

“Please understand there will be some traffic tie-ups for quite some time now,” said Arceneaux.

One local business owner in the Heritage Crossings is Allison Woodfield, the owner of Louisiana Casual Living. She said the development has been a positive impact on her business.

“We were over by Cabelas for about five years and it was good traffic,” said Woodfield. “It was a great spot but people didn’t find us. Now over here, they can find us. We got great visibility.”

Officials call the area “A city within a City”. Woodfield said people having all their needs in one area makes it much easier.

“It’s just an easy location to get to. You don’t have to fight the traffic on Airline,” said Woodfield.

The Price LeBlanc P.A.C.E. Center is expected to be completed by the middle of December.

Heritage Crossing, the mixed-use development going up in Gonzales, is well on its way to becoming the walkable, lifestyle community developers envisioned for the site at the crossroads of La. 30 and La. 44, near Interstate 10.

"People are saying, 'Hey, this is going to be a gathering place,'" said Clay Stafford, president of the DD of Louisiana development company behind the 103-acre Heritage Crossing, which broke ground in 2019.

The development's first two commercial buildings are now leased out, with restaurants and retailers — a mix of national and local brands — open for business, Stafford said.

Businesses that opened to customers over the last two years are the Pho Viet Noodle House, Tropical Smoothie Cafe, Chicken Salad Chick, Orangetheory Fitness, Bronier Luxury Salon and Spa Suites, Hotworx fitness studio, Moreau Physical Therapy and the European Wax Center.

Others coming in the near future to the development are Agave Blue Tequila and Taco Bar, Sonny's BBQ, Crumbl Cookies, Jersy Mike's Subs, and Louisiana Casual Living Patio and Home store.

A 29,000-square-foot, freestanding Alexander's Heritage Market grocery store, now under construction, will anchor the development's retail offerings.

Single-family homes and apartments are being built, as well.

"Once residents get home in the evening, they won't have to get back in their car to dine out, get groceries or do some shopping," Stafford said.

Construction of the first two buildings of a total of eight for the Waters at Heritage apartments is underway; monthly rents will range from approximately $1,300 to $1,800, according to the website for the apartment complex.

The first single-family homes, designed in a variety of architectural styles, are "going up right now," Stafford said in early February.

Home prices will be in the range of about $644,000 to $749,000, according to a real estate website.

"At the end of the day, there will be 75 single-family homes, 17 townhomes and 300 apartments," Stafford said.

To ease traffic demands on the already heavily traveled La. 30 and La. 44, a new road now under construction in the development, St. Francis Parkway Extension, will offer motorists an additional east/west route through the area and ultimately connect with La. 30 at three intersections: Darla Avenue, St. Elizabeth Boulevard and Roth Street.

When completed, the parkway will connect the two busy state highways.

In the midst of Heritage Crossing will be the $10 million Price LeBlanc Performing Arts and Events Center.

The city of Gonzales, in 2019, selected Heritage Crossing out of three contenders to be the site of the performing arts center, which is under construction now and will stand next to a lake in the community's main square.

The center is expected to be completed in October. A long-term goal for the Price LeBlanc PACE center, over the next several years, is to produce 24 events each year that will attract more than 20,000 visitors annually to Gonzales, city officials have said.

"We're already getting calls for reservations," Gonzales Mayor Barney Arceneaux said last week.

Events already reserved and scheduled for the center, when it opens, include performances, a dance recital, business meetings and a Mardi Gras ball, Arceneaux said.

"We think Heritage Crossing, with it all it will offer, is going to be the jewel of Gonzales," he said.

After years of negotiations and legal tangling with landowners in the area, state highway officials opened bids this past week to build three two-lane roundabouts near the I-10 interchange despite an continuing legal fight with Tanger Outlets over the plan.

Barriere Construction Co. has the apparent low construction bid of just less than $29 million, which is almost $3.75 million over the state estimate, bid records show.

Two roundabouts would be on either side of the I-10 interchange, where traffic lights currently control vehicles going on and getting off I-10 and passing under the I-10 overpass.

The third roundabout would be just to the west of I-10 at La. 30's intersection with South Robert Wilson Road and South St. Landry Avenue. Traffic lights are there also.

The dual roundabouts on either side of I-10 would mimic a design that the state Department of Transportation and Development has already applied to interstate interchanges in Walker, Hammond, Rayville and West Monroe, state officials said.

The project would also be yet another roundabout planned in Ascension Parish, where DOTD and parish government officials have embraced the circular, continuous flow intersections as a way to move traffic and improve safety. They don't have traffic lights.

DOTD bid openings Wednesday also included another long-sought roundabout in Ascension, north of Gonzales at Churchpoint and Roddy roads. The construction bid was $1.94 million, state bid documents say.

Gonzales city officials have been supportive in the past of roundabouts at La. 30 and I-10 and, on Friday, welcomed the prospect of them being built.

"The City is excited to see construction begin on La. 30 at I-10 to help relieve heavy congestion in this critical, regional corridor," Mayor Barney Arceneaux said in a statement.

Construction is expected to take two years once it starts, state highway officials said.

Mallett, the state highway spokesman, added that typically, construction starts three to four months after a bid letting, though the time frame can be slightly longer if a contractor runs into delays getting specialty materials.

But the bid opening comes as state highway officials and Tanger Outlets, a major sales tax contributor for the city, are battling in court over the plan.

Tanger is one of a handful of business owners in the area who have raised concerns about the impact the roundabouts and related restrictions of left turns would have on customer access.

Representatives of Ascension's Robert family, which has gas stations and land in the area and owns a fuel distribution business, have aired similar concerns about these proposed and other already built roundabouts in the parish.

Tanger's main entrance, which would be between the two new roundabouts west of I-10, would only allow right turns in and out.

People leaving Tanger and trying to go left — back to I-10 — would first have to head right, or west, to the outer roundabout at South Robert Wilson. Then they would have to loop back to head east back to I-10.

The legal fight is ultimately over the forced purchase of Tanger's land, known as expropriation, court papers show.

Tanger officials have argued that the roundabouts won't sufficiently help traffic flow without a parallel project that is not being constructed and, without that added project, DOTD doesn't have a sufficient basis to establish the necessary public purpose to buy the land.

That additional project would build a new route between La. 30 and the I-10 overpass at Cornerview Road to the northwest of the I-10/La. 30 interchange.

The proposed new route and a related, new I-10 interchange, which would also replace the I-10 overpass over Cornerview, would remove industrial traffic from the La. 30/I-10 interchange and send it on a more direct route to plants on the Mississippi River.

In court papers, Tanger officials have pointed to DOTD's own feasibility analysis, arguing it found roundabouts alone wouldn't move traffic sufficiently. They needed the companion alternate route and the new I-10 interchange at Cornerview to make the grade.

During a public meeting on the roundabouts and two non-roundabout alternatives in 2016, DOTD officials presented the roundabouts and the proposed connection between La. 30 and I-10 at Cornerview as two necessary parts of one alternative.

DOTD went ahead with the roundabouts alone in 2021 and 2022. In court papers, the agency has maintained it has a clear public purpose and argued Tanger was also too late anyway in making its objections over the lack of an alternate connection between La. 30 and I-10.

After a hearing in January, Judge Steven Tureau of the 23rd Judicial District Court rejected on Feb. 6 Tanger's attempt to dismiss the land purchases for the roundabouts. Tanger formally told the court late this week that it planned to appeal the ruling.

The filing of the appeal won't legally halt construction for now, though DOTD could still choose to wait to see how the litigation plays out. Rodney Mallett, DOTD spokesman, and George Fagan, an attorney for Tanger, both declined to comment Friday about the lawsuit.

When asked about the Tanger lawsuit and its allegations about the roundabouts, Mayor Arceneaux said city officials weren't aware if "another roadway is required to ensure the roundabouts function properly." He declined to comment any further about the lawsuit, saying, "The City is not a part of those proceedings and is not aware of pending litigation."

David J. Mitchell can be reached at [email protected] or followed on Twitter at @newsiedave.

GONZALES, La. (BRPROUD) — A local business in Gonzales adds a new way to help with mental health and possible anger issues.

TRM Throws has opened a rage room for local residents wanting to decompose their feelings.

“Instead of them wanting to punch somebody in the face, or you know, drive their car off a cliff. They can come in here and let loose whatever feelings they have. They can scream as loud as they want or whatever, and just leave here with a better sense of a better peace of mind,” said co-owner of TRM Throws Rage Room, Raleigh Weber III.

Weber said there are different types of rages and he wants to help with that problem.

“You have a minimum rage, medium rage, massive rage, blackout rage, red rage,” he said. “Sometimes you just want to smash something and sometimes you just want to break something. It just helps release.”

Weber deals with mental health issues and said the rage room has helped him in many ways, which is why he encourages others to use it.

“I want people to feel better,” he said. “I don’t want people to walk around in the world with a chip on their shoulder when I could do something to help them feel about it. And I just feel like this kind of goes hand in hand with, you know, mental illnesses and anger issues.”

TRM Throws Rage Room Co-Owner Timothy Kyles said the room has been open for two weeks and it has received massive positive feedback.

Kyles said those who can take advantage of the rage room must be at least eight years old and have to be accompanied by a guardian or parent, and each session consists of 15 to 30 minutes long, for a price of $30 per person.

Available items to break are anything from glass bottles, televisions, printers and more. The price includes 15 to 20 items to break per person and two people at a time can be inside the room. Participants can also bring their own items as long as they don’t have any chemicals in them, according to Kyles.

TRM Throws is located at 12616 Airline Hwy in Gonzales, and the rage room is open from Thursday to Saturday from 6 p.m. to midnight. Walk-ins are available, along with appointments that can be made here.