[StBernard] ACLU wants parish to forget cross

[Westley Annis]

Sunday, August 06, 2006 
 
By Karen Turni Bazile
 
Alarmed by newspaper reports that a hurricane memorial in St. Bernard Parish
will feature a cross bearing a likeness of the face of Jesus, the American
Civil Liberties Union of Louisiana is reminding parish officials of the
Constitution's separation of church and state. 
 
Never one to back down, Parish President Henry "Junior" Rodriguez has a
simple reply: "They can kiss my ass." 
 
In a July 28 letter to Rodriguez and other officials, Louisiana ACLU
Executive Director Joe Cook said that the government promotion of a patently
religious symbol on a public waterway is a violation of the Constitution's
First Amendment, which prohibits government from advancing a religion. 
 
Rodriguez did not say whether he has responded to Cook's letter, but in an
interview, he said he sees nothing improper about the memorial, which will
be mounted near the shoreline of the Mississippi River-Gulf Outlet at Shell
Beach. The cross and accompanying monument listing the names of the 129
parish residents who died in Hurricane Katrina are earmarked for what the
parish says is private land and are being financed with donations, Rodriguez
said. 
 
Nonetheless, Cook asked the parish to erect a religiously neutral symbol and
also voiced concern that the Parish Council was sanctioning a religious
monument. 
Returning Rodriguez's volley, Cook added, "It would be better if he would
kiss the Constitution and honor it and honor the First Amendment." 
 
The St. Bernard Parish Council voted several months ago to erect a monument,
but at the time did not offer specific plans. The parish recently announced
plans to dedicate the memorial on Aug. 29, the one-year anniversary of the
devastating hurricane. 
The cross is being designed and fabricated by Vincent LaBruzzo, a welder and
fabricator from Arabi. The stainless-steel cross will be 13 feet tall and 7
feet wide and will be lighted, according to a note on the parish's Web site,
www.sbpg.net LaBruzzo worked for the parish before recently taking a job
with Unified Recovery Group, the company clearing the parish's storm debris.
Rodriguez said he helped LaBruzzo get the job with URG. LaBruzzo did not
return phone messages seeking comment. 
 
Rodriguez and others like the idea of putting the monument along the banks
of the MRGO, because that waterway, dug by the federal government as a
shipping shortcut in the 1960s, is widely blamed in the parish for
accelerating the deadly flooding that accompanied Katrina. Over the years
erosion has widened the outlet, so the bank on which the cross will be
erected is on privately owned land, Rodriguez said. He added that the parish
is researching who owns the land on which the stone monument bearing the
names of the victims will sit, but he thinks that it is also privately
owned. 
Parish Councilman Tony "Ricky" Melerine and Charlie Reppel, Rodriguez's
chief of staff, said they are co-chairing the memorial committee on their
private time. 
 
"The memorial is being coordinated by a group of volunteers on their own
time, and no public money is going to the project that will be on private
land," Reppel said. "The committee members are all volunteers, including me.
We are putting in a lot of unpaid overtime." 
 
Other committee members include St. Bernard Sheriff's Office Chief Deputy
Anthony Fernandez Jr.; St. Bernard Tourism Director Elizabeth "Gidget"
McDougall; former Parish President Charles Ponstein, who is working with a
state agency on local business retention; Lorrie Allen, Reppel's assistant;
and LaBruzzo. 
 
As for the parish's statements that the memorial is being done outside
government's auspices, Cook seems unconvinced. 
 
While the ACLU thinks a memorial to the storm and its victims is "clearly
appropriate," Cook said, St. Bernard's is "still all very questionable. I
think there is official government involvement with the endorsement and
advancement of this clearly religious symbol." 
. . . . . . . 
Karen Turni Bazile can be reached at kturni at timespicayune.com or (504)
826-3335. 
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All I can say is I repeat Junior's comments to the ACLU.
JLY