Two more employee grievances came before the Youngsville Municipal Police Civil Service Board on Wednesday, October 28, 2026. One involves Detective Tyra Dorsey. The other involves Officer Joseph Hardy. Both were listed for discussion and possible action, and the Board ultimately voted to authorize investigations into both matters.
Civil Service Boards consider employee grievances regularly. It exists to ensure employees are treated fairly and impartial processes are carried out. But in Youngsville, where complaints of misconduct have repeatedly been met with administrative maneuvering, questionable investigative practices, and resistance to public disclosure, the significance of these two agenda items extended far beyond the employees involved. The question is not whether Dorsey or Hardy will ultimately prevail. It is whether the allegations will be subjected to a meaningful and independent investigation at all. Given Youngsville’s history, that is far from a trivial question.
Transparency, Except When It Is Inconvenient
Just one day before the scheduled meeting, the Youngsville Police Department issued a final response to a public records request issued over a month earlier seeking a complaint filed by Officer Shane Ashraf against Sergeant Pedro Alexander and a grievance filed by Officer Joseph Hardy. The department refused to produce either record.
The explanation included an interesting assertion: “There is thus no manner in which to disclose any records without openly identifying the complainants.” Yet the Civil Service Board’s publicly posted agenda identifies Joseph Hardy by name and announces that his grievance being brought before the Board for investigation. Apparently, identifying a complainant is acceptable when announcing a public meeting but becomes an obstacle when a citizen seeks to examine the underlying records.
The Chief of Police, J.P. Broussard, has again chosen to withhold the records in their entirety, leaving the public unable to examine the allegations. This is hardly an isolated transparency concern. As previously documented in our September article, Transparency Delayed: Youngsville’s Pattern and Practice, Chief Broussard has repeatedly failed to produce records in a timely manner (if at all) relating to crime statistics, personnel matters, departmental communications, and other subjects of legitimate public interest.
As the Civil Service Board was scheduled to decide whether to investigate two more employee grievances, the public was once again being denied access to informative records. The public knows that complaints exist. It knows who submitted them. But when it comes to understanding what happened and how Chief J.P. Broussard responded, he has chosen to erect another barrier.
A Complaint Is Not an Investigation
Consider the complaint filed by Officer Shane Ashraf against Sergeant Pedro Alexander. According to records obtained by CNLA, which Chief Broussard is still withholding, Ashraf alleged that Alexander neglected his duties by failing to respond to a dispatched call. More seriously, he alleged that Alexander falsified information in a subsequent narrative, retaliated against him for reporting the matter, and contributed to a hostile working environment.
These were not allegations devoid of detail. Ashraf identified the date, specific times, dispatch activity, computer aided dispatch (CAD) records, and the officers involved. He also alleged that Alexander attempted to discipline him for reporting employee misconduct. One might reasonably expect allegations involving falsification of official documentation and retaliation against a subordinate to produce an investigation. Instead, the Broussard transferred Alexander to the more prestigious position of Supervisor over Investigations.
At a September 18, 2026 meeting, the administration allegedly chose to divert focus away from whether the alleged misconduct occurred. Instead, much of the discussion centered on whether the transfer had resolved Ashraf’s complaint of misconduct. Without ordering an investigation, Ashraf was confronted with questions regarding what he wanted. Did he want Alexander disciplined? Suspended? Fired? Ashraf simply advised that he wanted the problems addressed and the personnel involved held accountable. That answer seemed difficult for the administration to accept.
But there is a fundamental problem with asking the complainant to prescribe the punishment before determining whether misconduct occurred. The responsibility for investigating alleged misconduct does not belong to the person reporting it. It belongs to those entrusted with enforcing departmental policy.
The Board Has Been Here Before
The Civil Service Board itself is not without a history of similar concerns. In July 2023, a complaint submitted to the Board raised numerous allegations concerning personnel administration, retaliation, complaint handling, concealment of records, and other matters. The Board voted to accept the complaint but indicated that it needed to determine how to proceed with an investigation. No investigation followed.
Two years later, the Board was considering revisions to its procedures for receiving and investigating complaints. We examined those developments in our August 2025 article, Youngsville: Repeated Failures to Investigate. The concern then was whether additional procedural requirements would strengthen oversight or simply create another obstacle between a complainant and an investigation. Now, more than a year later, the Board considered whether to approve investigations requested by Dorsey and Hardy.
In Dorsey’s case, the allegations include an unresolved grievance against Assistant Chief Kenny Duhon, subsequent allegations involving anonymous correspondence sent to schools, and personnel actions she believes were retaliatory. As previously reported, she pursued the Department’s internal process before ultimately petitioning the Civil Service Board. The matter even prompted Mayor Ken Ritter to seek an Attorney General’s opinion outlining his role and responsibilities regarding hostile conditions affecting City employees.
A Familiar Promotional Dispute
Hardy’s grievance has not been publicly detailed in the records available to us.The Police Department’s refusal to produce the requested grievance makes it difficult for the public to evaluate the substance of that matter. However, Hardy’s grievance may be especially significant because according to his comments at the meeting the Board recently confronted similar allegations involving another Youngsville officer.
Sergeant Louvenia Landry previously challenged the selection process used by Chief Broussard, arguing that she had been improperly passed over for a position within the department. The dispute centered on the Chief’s authority to select among eligible candidates and whether the employee ultimately promoted satisfied the applicable seniority requirements.
At the Board’s July 2026 proceedings, Landry challenged the administration’s interpretation of the selection rules. She contended that the individual selected was not among the three most senior eligible candidates, meaning the Chief’s statutory discretion to select from among those candidates had never properly arisen. The controversy also revealed problems with the Board’s own records. Rather than immediately producing the seniority and promotional eligibility lists applicable at the time of the vacancy, the Board Secretary, Laurie Segura, advised that the records would need to be ‘recreated’ and verified.
At its subsequent July meeting, the Board sided with Landry and ordered the process to be conducted again. Chief Broussard had to conduct an additional selection process that considered individuals who were eligible at the time the flawed selection occurred. Now, Hardy has brought forward allegations described as substantially similar.
After correcting the previous flawed selection process, another vacancy required an additional selection. Employees were not made aware of the intent to select someone, and Hardy, who was eligible for consideration at this time, was not considered. The Board cannot reasonably ignore its own recent handling of a comparable selection dispute. If the procedures were improperly applied in Landry’s case, the question becomes whether those same deficiencies affected Hardy. And if they did, why did they occur again? At some point, incompetence and ignorance no longer seem like valid excuses. Intentional deviations from established processes in order to select a few favored candidates is more plausible.
That is precisely the purpose of independent civil service oversight: ensuring that selection decisions are governed by established legal requirements rather than personal preference, administrative convenience, or political patronage. Louisiana’s municipal fire and police civil service laws assign these boards responsibilities extending beyond approving personnel paperwork. They are charged with representing the public interest in personnel administration and possess statutory authority to investigate matters involving compliance with civil service law and rules. Those responsibilities exist for a reason.
The Board Decision
At its October 28, 2026, meeting, the Youngsville Municipal Police Civil Service Board voted to approve requests to investigate the grievances filed by both Officer Tyra Dorsey and Officer Joseph Carl Hardy. The decisions represent an important first step toward independently examining allegations that have worked their way through the City’s personnel and grievance procedures. But authorizing an investigation and conducting one are two different things.
The Board has previously accepted complaints without completing the investigative work necessary to establish what occurred. That history makes the next steps particularly important. Will the investigations proceed promptly? Will relevant witnesses be interviewed and records examined? Will the Board make findings supported by the evidence?
