Critics of the plan to vote on the issue of whether to fully restore the New Iberia Police Department or to retain the Iberia Parish Sheriff's Department as the primary law enforcement agency in New Iberia are missing the point: The issue is not money (whether or not the city has sufficient funds to reinstate its own police force), but democracy (whether or not voters in New Iberia should have a voice in who polices them).
Law enforcement in New Iberia became a controversy, and unnecessarily so, because some city leaders ' most of whom have since been voted out of office ' took what they regarded as a good idea (police consolidation) and forced it upon New Iberia residents.
As a result, whether or not the idea was good became less important to many voters than whether or not they had a right to determine how they should be governed.
Come October 15 these voters may well choose the arguably more expensive option of fully reinstating the New Iberia Police Department ' and they may well do so purely as a defiant act of independence from heavy-handed government.