Chiefs: Stay-at-home order mostly obeyed

Local police and the St. Martin Sheriff’s Office report that residents are generally following Governor John Bel Edwards’ stay-at-home order. Edwards issued the order, effective as of 5 p.m. on March 23, in response to a sharp increase in COVID-19 cases in Louisiana.
Sheriff’s Office spokesperson Ginny Higgins told the Teche News that no complaints about public gatherings have been received by the office.
Higgins says she has been encouraged by the efforts of local businesses who have taken steps to enforce the recommended six-foot “social distancing” space between customers. Spacing marks, she said, have been placed on floors in check-out lines in most local grocery stores to remind customers about the guidelines.
St. Martinville Police Department Information Officer Adam Touchet said “The community has been very supportive and are observing the guidelines on their own. Things have really improved in recent days.”
Touchet added that steps such as closing the parks were needed to prevent the risk to officers and the public that would be created by officers having to go in and determine who was breaking the rules and who was not. “We had to eliminate that headache altogether, for everybody’s sake.”
Breaux Bridge Chief of Police Rollie Cantu said that there has been talk of violations but no official reports had been received.
Cantu added that he was told a group of 25 to 30 people had gathered in the Gold’s Gym parking lot on Rees Street over the weekend, but the group had broken up by the time an officer reached the scene. “It’s possible,” he said, “that one of our officers or a sheriff’s deputy may have come along and asked them to leave without an actual complaint being called in.”
On a few occasions, children playing basketball have been asked to leave local courts and were advised about the risk to themselves as well as adults they may come in contact with.
Henderson Chief Leroy Guidry told the Teche News that, like in the other municipalities, people are voluntarily cooperating with the order. He said that, while gatherings on private property are covered by the governor’s orders, his officers are not out looking for offenders.
“We don’t want to add unnecessary risks by initiating contact with residents unless we really need to.”
Village of Parks Acting Chief Reginald Clues said that, to his knowledge, there have been no instances of Parks residents violating the governor’s order in the village.