New Lawsuit Challenges LSU’s Half-Billion Dollar Tax Scheme

A new legal challenge now confronts the LSU-adjacent arena financing plan. The lawsuit filed in East Baton Rouge Parish alleges that the project — and the special taxing district created to fund it — were allegedly structured to sidestep voters and divert public tax dollars to a private development that does not benefit LSU. The petition filed on December 17, 2025, in the 19th Judicial District Court challenges the legality of the so-called LSU Economic Development District (LSUEDD) and the one-percent sales and one-percent hotel occupancy taxes now being levied inside its boundaries.

The district conflates LSU into its name in a public relations effort to suggest that the University somehow benefits from this entirely private endeavour. As we previously covered, not only does this project not help LSU in any appreciable way, but it actually costs LSU something in return for nothing. And so, the plaintiff, Darrell Glasper, is asking a judge to halt tax collection entirely and to declare the district’s actions unconstitutional. If successful, the lawsuit could remove one of the key financial pillars supporting Charles Landry’s proposed $400 million arena project.

A District Drawn So There Would Be No Voters

At the center of the case is a stark allegation: the LSUEDD was drawn in such a way that there would be no voters inside the district at all. The lawsuit argues that LSU leaders and their partners intentionally created a district in a densely populated region that was somehow free of residents — and therefore of registered voters — so new taxes could be imposed without an election. This, the lawsuit claims, was not an accidental feature — it was the strategy.

This claim is not speculation. It is directly stated in the “LSU” district law authored by Cleo Fields. Louisiana Revised Statute 33:9038.76(B)(1)(c) reads, in part:

“All residential properties are deemed district exclusions.”

According to the lawsuit, the intent of the legislation was simple: Tax citizens more, but sidestep Constitutional requirements that such tax propositions be placed on the ballot.

According to the filing, discussions among “LSU” development officials and Baton Rouge attorney Charles Landry reflected an understanding from the beginning that the district would exclude all residential parcels. That was made possible through Act 203 of 2023, which explicitly prohibits residential tracts from being included in the LSUEDD. The measure passed the House by a vote of 85/5 and the Senate by a vote of 35/4.

And when it later became apparent that some LSU-affiliated addresses had registered voters — 125 in all — officials allegedly pushed ahead anyway. This ensured the district remained “voter-free” on paper for taxation purposes. Eliminate the voters, eliminate the vote. That is the heart of the accusation. From there, the lawsuit turns to the constitutional consequences of structuring a taxing authority without electors.

Constitutional Questions at the Center of the Case

The Louisiana Constitution generally requires voter approval for local taxes that support public improvements. The lawsuit argues that the LSUEDD structure — taxes without voters — violates that requirement. Article 7, Section 1 of the Louisiana Constitution, pertaining to the power to tax, reads:

“Except as otherwise provided by this constitution, the power of taxation shall be vested in the legislature, shall never be surrendered, suspended, or contracted away, and shall be exercised for public purposes only.”

Article 6, Section 30 of the Louisiana Constitution, pertaining to the taxing power of political subdivisions, provides:

“A political subdivision may exercise the power of taxation, subject to limitations elsewhere provided by this constitution, under authority granted by the legislature for parish, municipal, and other local purposes, strictly public in their nature.”

While Article 6, Section 32 of the Louisiana Constitution, which deals with special taxes, reads:

“For the purpose of acquiring, constructing, improving, maintaining, or operating any work of public improvement, a political subdivision may levy special taxes when authorized by a majority of the electors in the political subdivision who vote thereon in an election held for that purpose.”

The Constitution is straightforward. We can be taxed, but any tax MUST be for a public purpose, and there MUST be an election held for that purpose.

The lawsuit theory is likewise straightforward: If the arena is a public project, the taxes should have gone to voters. If it is a private project, public tax subsidies shouldn’t be used at all. Either way, the plaintiff says, the LSUEDD model collapses under constitutional review.

The Architects of No-Vote Taxation

According to the suit, on December 6, 2023, Charles Landry wrote to Steve Raborn, the Register of Voters for East Baton Rouge Parish:

“I received a call earlier in the week from Senator Cleo Fields asking about the status of your AG request.”

Landry indicated that Fields also inquired about the questions Raborn asked the attorney general’s office. The issue was that Raborn was unable and unwilling to certify that the district had no voters, because he had already decided that it clearly did. Landry wrote to Raborn again on December 13, 2023, “Senator Fields would like to know your contact at the Attorney General’s office.”

Raborn’s office sent Landry the list of addresses (which we’re requesting) within the LSU EDD district that had registered voters. On April 28, 2025, the Attorney General’s office reportedly sent Raborn a memo “relating to the economic development districts created by Act 203.” We don’t know what the memorandum says. Still, the lawsuit suggests the Attorney General’s office may have assisted Fields and Landry with a workaround, since Raborn’s fiduciary duty prevented him from certifying that the district had no voters.

To understand how a structure like this comes together, you have to understand the political ecosystem that helped shape it. Few figures have been more central to Louisiana political life over the past three decades than Cleo Fields, the former state senator and current U.S. Representative (thanks to the legislature-approved “Cleo District”), who authored Act 203. Fields has long been a master at aligning coalitions, shaping district outcomes, and making sure political structures reflect the strategic priorities of the left. Well, at least the upper echelon of the political elite.

Charles “Pro Bono” Landry

Charles Landry is the Baton Rouge attorney whom the Greater Baton Rouge Business Report famously profiled as the “Godfather of Growth.” Landry’s influence doesn’t come from a title — it comes from relationships. He has become a central broker in Louisiana’s taxpayer-funded development deals. While “growth” may not be a four-letter word, it should be. That’s because the results often mean growing taxes, growing government, and growing monetary interest, which largely influence election outcomes.

At the East Baton Rouge Metro Council meeting on August 27, 2025, Charles Landry addresses concerns about the LSU Economic Development District at the 32-minute mark. He made a point of emphasizing his role:

“I’m here as a volunteer.
I’m not being paid.
I don’t represent the EDD.
I have an interest in our community and a big interest in what happens at LSU.”
…
“…Because I was doing this Pro Bono, and I was going to do the documents…”

Those statements were not new. Landry made a remarkably similar “pro bono” speech during the December 17, 2019, debate on voter-free tax districts in Lafayette. That’s where he helped orchestrate the creation of five special taxing districts using the same exclusionary model now under judicial review in Baton Rouge. Public records show that in the eighteen months between January 2024 and June 2025, Lafayette’s Downtown taxing district — despite being promoted as “pro bono” — routed more than $66,668.00 in administrative and legal fees to insiders, including Charles Landry’s law firm, Fishman Haygood, and others.

Small Numbers Add Up To Big Profits

The math on fees for just Lafayette’s downtown tax district works out to about $44,500.00 per year. If the other four districts (which have yet to respond to our repeated records requests) are operating under similar circumstances, the total administrative fees paid to insiders could be about $222,500.00 per year. Since inception, that would put the cumulative total approaching a million dollars ($1,112,500.00) extracted from the local economy just to pay people like Charles Landry for “compliance.” In other words, “pro bono” appears to describe only the setup. The administrative maintenance required for continuation falls under an entirely different standard that’s certainly not free.

By the way, Landry himself isn’t a party to this lawsuit. But the web of consultants, donors, political operatives, developers, and institutional players surrounding this case is a taxpayer-subsidized ecosystem he has helped build. When millions are at stake, and public policy intersects with private profit, this is the ground Landry knows best. Where the public sees a legal battle, Landry — and others like him — see leverage being recalibrated and profits to be extracted. And in Louisiana, leverage has a way of deciding outcomes before a judge ever gavels a courtroom to order. Loose lips sink ships! A toast to Charles Landry!

A Suspiciously Compressed Timeline

The lawsuit also highlights the speed at which this arrangement was activated, something we pointed out previously. Though LSUEDD was created in June 2023, the board did not publicly meet for nearly two years. Then, suddenly:

• June 19, 2025 — first board meeting
• July 17, 2025 — new taxes approved
• August 2025 — Metro Council signs off

In barely sixty days, a district that had existed only on paper became a functioning taxing authority — just in time to support a half-billion-dollar arena deal. The lawsuit suggests the public process was essentially a formality, and the real decisions had already been made.

We also highlighted another allegation raised in the lawsuit concerning Oak View Group (OVG), the same developer selected for the LSU arena. OVG submitted a proposal valued at roughly $375 million. Then, in July 2025, OVG co-founder Tim Leiweke was federally indicted for alleged bid-rigging and fraud tied to the University of Texas Moody Center project. Yet Baton Rouge continues forward, unfazed.

Taxpayers (but certainly not voters) are expected to trust that the same system — and some of the same players — will somehow behave differently here. We know better!

Boundary Problems and Other Defects

The plaintiff also challenges whether LSUEDD meets the most basic legal requirement of any taxing body: clear and definite boundaries. We recently “Schiff-ted” gears to our neighboring parish of St. Landry as we were encouraged to look further into activities involving the Opelousas Downtown Development District. The LSUEDD lawsuit argues the district relies on fuzzy historical lines, evolving internal maps, and inconsistent parcel treatment.

If the government can’t even define who is being taxed, the lawsuit asks, how can the tax possibly be valid?

The filing also points to Louisiana’s constitutional 3% cap on local sales taxes, arguing LSUEDD’s new taxes may push some areas above that limit. This is something we have been monitoring for some time, as taxes are layered one on top of the other, by layers of government “growth”, orchestrated by the Godfathers of Grift.

While Article 6, Section 29 of the Louisiana Constitution states:

“Except as otherwise authorized in a home rule charter as provided for in Section 4 of this Article, the governing authority of any local governmental subdivision or school board may levy and collect a tax upon the sale at retail, the use, the lease or rental, the consumption, and the storage for use or consumption, of tangible personal property and on sales of services as defined by law, if approved by a majority of the electors voting thereon in an election held for that purpose.  The rate thereof, when combined with the rate of all other sales and use taxes, exclusive of state sales and use taxes, levied and collected within any local governmental subdivision, shall not exceed three percent.

However, the legislature, by general or by local or special law, may authorize the imposition of additional sales and use taxes by local governmental subdivisions or school boards, if approved by a majority of the electors voting thereon in an election held for that purpose.”

If you want to know where our legislature has allowed local government subdivisions to exceed the threshold (of course, with voter approval in what was likely a low-turnout election), look at your shopping receipts. Some prime examples in the Lafayette area are Youngsville, Breaux Bridge, and St. Martinville. (Didn’t St. Martinville just get a new economic development district?)

The suit further questions whether the district’s governing board meets statutory composition requirements. And then there is Louisiana’s constitutional ban on gratuitous donations of public funds — the so-called “Cabela’s Test.” If public tax money flows to a private venture, the public must receive measurable value in return. The lawsuit argues LSU has stacked the deck in favor of private gain instead.

A Broader Pattern — No-Voter Taxation

This case is not happening in isolation. Across Louisiana, “no-voter” development districts have quietly become the preferred tool for steering public money without risking a ballot-box rejection. Lafayette also offers multiple examples — including districts created to subsidize retail gas stations — in which residents are carefully excluded so that a tax can be imposed without their consent.

This is the same model we are witnessing in Baton Rouge — at a scale and visibility the state has never seen. The lawsuit asks the court to strike down LSUEDD’s taxes, halt their collection, and bar the transfer of revenues tied to the arena project. If that happens, the arena’s financing structure suffers a blow that it may not survive.

The question is not just whether the arena gets built. The question is whether the deal was intentionally manipulated from the start to exclude voter input from the decision.

The Core Question for Louisiana

Did powerful political actors and development insiders design a tax system where the public helps pay for private projects but never gets a vote? Supporters call it “economic development.” Critics call it democracy-avoidance by design. We call it government! The only institution that can exempt itself from the rules and do things that, if committed by private individuals, would constitute crimes, in the furtherance of terms like “general welfare” or the loftier “economic development.”

Now the issue moves to a courtroom, where — for once — the public may finally get an answer.

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