April 21, 2005: A Newspaper Is Born

By Woody Jenkins, Editor Central City News

The Central City News has consistently been named Louisiana’s Newspaper of the Year by the Louisiana Press Association, and it has won more than 200 state and national awards from Best News Coverage to Best Investigative Journalism to Best Advertising Design to Best Photography to Best Editorial Writing and more.

However, the awards we receive are really more a reflection of the great community we serve than any particular skill on our part.

How This Paper Came About. This is the “inside story” of how the Central City News came into being.  It may surprise you.  The Central City News didn’t just pop up one day as a way to make money.  It was years in the making and it had a very specific purpose which had little to do with money.

Central incorporated in 2005, but for me the battle to create a city in Central began in 1972, 33 years earlier.  

In 1966, my future wife Diane and I launched the North Baton Rouge Journal as a community newspaper serving the north part of the parish, including Istrouma, Glen Oaks, Scotlandville, Baker, and Central. We were only 19 at the time. While covering Central, I developed many friendships.

In early 1972, I was elected to the Louisiana House of Representatives representing House District 66, the Istrouma area.  Gov. Edwin Edwards had also just been elected. That year, he was able to pass legislation calling for a Constitutional Convention.  Elections for delegate were held in the fall of 1972 with one delegate elected from each House district.  I ran and was elected as the delegate from House District 66.

The plan for the convention was to convene in early 1973 and complete its work by early 1974.

The public referred to the convention as CC/73.

The reason I ran for delegate was to try to create a model constitution that would enshrine principles of liberty and put our state on a trajectory of freedom for generations to come. I asked to serve on the Committee on Bill of Rights and Elections.

***

Just before CC/73 convened, I received a call from Mr. Acie Belton, the president of the 2nd Ward Voters League in Scotlandville and one of the most prominent black leaders in the parish.  

Mr. Belton said, “Rep. Jenkins, Scotlandville is an unincorporated area.  We are not receiving city services from the City of Baton Rouge, and we want the right to incorporate as a new city in order to control our own destiny.  However, the Louisiana Constitution of 1921 provides that there can be only three municipalities in East Baton Rouge Parish.  We would have to amend the Constitution in order to have a city.  Would you help include our right to incorporate in the new constitution?  This may be our only chance.!”

I told Mr. Belton I would research the matter and get back to him as soon as possible.

My research proved him right. The 1921 Louisiana Constitution had been amended in a very unusual way. While state law allowed citizens in every part of the state the right to incorporate new municipalities, there was one exception. The Constitution provided that in East Baton Rouge Parish, only the cities of Baker, Baton Rouge, and Zachary were allowed to exist!

***

I spoke with Mayor-President Woody Dumas, and he told me that he was responsible for amending the constitution to put in that language.  He sternly told me that if I tried to take it out, he would make sure I was defeated if I ever wanted to run for reelection to the House or anything else!  

Undeterred, I asked other delegates what they thought. Should other cities someday be allowed to exist in East Baton Rouge Parish?

Delegate George Dewey Hayes of Scotlandville and other black delegates said they shared Mr. Belton’s views.

When I reached out to Delegates Gary O’Neill and Harvey Cannon, who represented parts of Central, they told me that some residents of their district were already saying Central should consider having its own city.  Gary said Central wasn’t ready yet but that they would be someday.

I spoke to the Central Jaycees, and they were enthusiastic about the idea.

Later during the convention, the four delegates from the northern part of the parish — Hayes, Cannon, O’Neill, and I — offered an amendment removing the exception for East Baton Rouge Parish and thereby allowing the incorporation of new municipalities in any part of the parish. That provision was part of the Louisiana Constitution of 1974 when it was approved by the voters of the state.

This change allowed the incorporation of Central in 2005 and St. George in 2024.

***

In 1974, I drove out to Central to have supper with Donald Ray and Mona Kennard.  My purpose was to ask Donald Ray to consider running for the Louisiana House from Central area in the 1975 election.  He agreed to run and was elected.

Donald Ray and I became close friends. We were both conservatives, and the philosophy of our districts was very similar.

In 1980, we and other conservative lawmakers worked together to pass the Private Education Deregulation Act, which legalized home schooling in Louisiana and removed all regulations from private and Christian schools.  Soon there were more than 300 private schools in the state.

Louisiana was the first state to legalize home education, and it too began to take off.  There are currently 20,000 children in home school in Louisiana.

By the 1990’s, many members of the legislature from East Baton Rouge Parish were looking for solutions to the parish’s declining public school system.

Most of us felt the best path was to duplicate Texas’ system of having small independent community-based school districts, each with its own elected school board and tax base.

Baker School System

Sen. Mike Cross of Baker and I took the lead by introducing a constitutional amendment to create the City of Baker School District.  

Before his election to the Legislature, Sen. Cross served as Mayor of Baker and he was eager for Baker to escape from the East Baton Rouge Parish School System and have its own schools.

The constitutional amendment passed the Louisiana Legislature by a 2/3rds vote and then was approved by vote of the people statewide and in Baker.

Unfortunately, the East Baton Rouge Parish School System was under a federal court order, and the federal judiciary refused to allow the new Baker school system to go into effect.  

The case of Baker dragged on for years.  In the course of that period, thousands of residents fled the City of Baker and it was left a shadow of its former self.  When the courts finally allowed the Baker School District to go into effect, the city was mired in poverty.

While the fate of the Baker school district was languishing in the federal courts, members of the East Baton Rouge Parish legislative delegation continued to work to find solutions.

Zachary School System

Our next step was to create the Zachary Community School District. Rep. John Travis took the lead and introduced a constitutional amendment to place before the voters.

Rep. Donald Ray Kennard and I worked hard for the new school system. Surprisingly, we were joined by Sen. Kip Holden, who agreed to co-author the constitutional amendment.

Once again, our attempt to create new independent school districts in East Baton Rouge Parish ran headon into the federal courts. They delayed the plan, and it was beginning to look hopeless.

Then there was a break through! After more than 45 years, the federal courts lifted their control of schools in the parish.  

In 2003, the Baker and Zachary school systems were allowed to go into effect.  For Baker, it was late coming, but for Zachary, the new school system came just in the nick of time.

The new Zachary Community School District immediately rose to be the No. 1 school system in Louisiana, a place it has held almost continuously for the past 22 years.

First Central Petition Drive

The creation of the Baker and Zachary school systems gave hope to the people of Central that they could have their own city and their own community school system.

In 2003, Russell Starns and a group of volunteers formed an organization to promote creation of an independent school system in Central.  However, at the State Capitol, they were told by key legislators such as Sen. Kip Holden that they must first create a city.

Holden told them that while there was no legal requirement that a new school system be created around an existing city, that he would not support a new school system unless Central first had a city in place.

As a result, Starns and his group shifted gears and focused on creating the City of Central. They filed a petition with the Secretary of State officially starting a petition drive to put the issue on the ballot.  State law required that they get the signatures of 25 percent of the registered voters inside the proposed city limits within six months of filing the petition.

The incorporation movement soon got the required signature, and the Registrar of Voters certified the petition as complete.

However, Gov. Kathleen Blanco determined that the petition did not state that the boundaries of the city were contiguous. She refused to call the election.

Second Central Petition Drive

So it was back to the drawing board for Starns and his group.  They started a second petition drive and this time made sure that there were no problems with the boundary lines.  Once again, Starns’ group got the required signatures from 25 percent of the voters in the proposed city, and those names were certified by the Registrar of Voters.

Until this point, most of the public debate in Central revolved around the need for its own community school system.  The need for a new city was not high on people’s agenda.  Creating a city was seen as necessary only because some powerful people at the Capitol were demanding it.

Most people were happy to be part of a beautiful rural community without its own government if they could have a school system.

Campaign Runs into Problems

Gradually the narrative of the incorporation movement began to change.  Russell Starns and other leaders began to talk more and more about the need for a city and less and less about the need for a school system.  As they did so, public support for incorporation seemed to be declining, at least in my estimation.

It was at this point that I got involved in the fray.  I was no longer in the Louisiana Legislature.  I had completed my 7th four-year term in the House in 2000 and decided not to run for reelection.

In early 2004, I got a call from former Rep. Tony Perkins. Tony had worked with me at WBTR-TV and had been my seatmate in the House of Representatives  Tony had decided not to run for reelection in 2004 and he too was now out of elective office.

Tony asked that I call Russell Starns and offer to help with the campaign for incorporation.  The next day I received a call from my friend Rep. Donald Ray Kennard also asking me to get involved in the pro-incorporation campaign.

That night I called Russell Starns, and we spoke for over an hour.  I gave him my perspective on how to win the campaign. My most important point was that the movement should refocus once again on the need for a new school system. Even though people would be voting on incorporation of a city, their real goal was a school system. I emphasized that focusing on schools would motivate people to go vote.

Listening to Central Leaders

Russell liked my idea and asked that I come out and meet the next day with his 30-member organizing committee.  I came to a meeting at the Greenwell Springs Library and met the leadership of the incorporation movement including Russell Starns, Louis DeJohn, and others.

I sat through the meeting taking notes and without saying much. I attended a second meeting and then a third meeting.

Listening to the leaders of the incorporation movement, I learned how much they loved Central and what great ideas that had for the future of their community.

It made me realize what an incredible opportunity was opening in Central. Not just an opportunity to start a new city and a community school system. Those are very big things that can change a community for generations to come.  But there was even more to it.

The Chance for a Model City

I saw in the incorporation of Central the opportunity to create a  city based on traditional conservative Christian values that could be a model not just for Louisiana but for the entire nation.  

I saw in the proposed school community system the opportunity to create high achieving schools that would go back to basics and restore the values in our young people that have been systematically removed from public schools. I saw that this new school system, representing the people of Central, could also be a model for the nation.

During my third meeting with the organizing committee, Russell Starns asked me to stand and say a few words about what direction their movement should take.

As I stood to speak, my mind focused on the opposition and misinformation the committee was facing. The opposition was playing on peoples’ fear of the unknown and they seemed to be winning. The media in Baton Rouge were very hostile to the incorporation of Central, and there was no objective source of information to tell the truth about the need for incorporation and the need for a new school system.

Until that moment, I had given little thought to the need for a newspaper in Central.  I hadn’t been in the newspaper business since we sold the North Baton Rouge Journal in 1969.  I had been in the TV business. We launched WBTR-TV in 1987 and sold the station early in 2005.

I started by saying, “It’s been an honor to sit here for the past three meetings and listen to all your hopes and dreams for Central.  I came with some skepticism.  However, after hearing how passionate you are and how much you love this community,  I wholeheartedly agree that you do need a city, and you certainly do need a school system.”

“Legislators have said you must have a city in place before you have a school system, and they are right. That’s because it is of utmost importance that you have control over planning and zoning.  Otherwise, your new school system can be destroyed almost overnight.”

“Yes, you need a city and a school system. However, there’s something you need even more than a city or a school system.  You need a newspaper!  With a newspaper, you have a voice.  With a newspaper, you can get yourself a city or a school system, because you can inform and motivate public opinion.  Right now, everything in Central is rumor and hearsay.  You have no authoritative source of information to let people know the truth. You certainly can’t depend on the Baton Rouge media, which oppose what you are doing.  You need your own newspaper; yet, it needs to be independent of you.  That’s because if you win these battles and get your own city and your own school system, many of you will be in the government, and you will need someone to watch you too!”

There was some applause and nodding of heads.  Russell said, “Great idea!  When is your first edition?”

“What do you mean?” I asked.

Russell said, “It needs to be done, and you’re the only one we have who can do it!”

After the meeting, my wife Diane and I talked long into night.

I was no longer in the legislature.  We had just sold WBTR-TV and had a little money to work with.  What intrigued me was what could Central become?  What could we be part of?  Could Central be that shining city on a hill?  Could it be a role model for what communities could do anywhere in America?

The News Hits the Street

Four weeks later, on Thursday, April 21, 2005, 10,000 copies of the First Edition of the Central City News hit the streets!  It was just in time to give the people of Central the facts on incorporation.  Two days later, the people of Central went to the polls and voted overwhelmingly to incorporate Central as Louisiana’s newest city.

The rest is history!

Today we celebrate the 20th anniversary of the First Edition of the Central City News. In June, we will publish our 500th edition!

Over the next few issues of the newspaper, I will write more about what happened in those early days after incorporation and more about the City of Central and the Central City News’ role in covering the incredible events of the past 20 years in Central.

The 20th Anniversary Edition will be July 18, 2025.