Baton Rouge News

While there are many Mardi Gras balls and parades in the Capital City, none causes as much hoopla as the Spanish Town celebrations.

Jennifer Carol Overton and Leander Joseph Lavergne III exchanged wedding vows on Friday, February 10, 2012 during a 7:00 p.m. ceremony at St.

Before a parade in 2004, filmmaker Jim Gabour heard a Mardi Gras Indian and turned on his camera, as he has done for more than three decades.

Advocate file photo by PATRICK DENNIS Mayor-President Kip Holden, left, and Mayor Pro Tem Mike Walker stop to have a chat after a press conference in the council chambers in 2010.

BATON ROUGE, La. - A 23-year-old man whose pit bull killed her miniature schnauzer needs help and guidance, a 92-year-old woman told a judge.

Christine Berry, director of the University of Louisiana at Monroe's insurance studies program, will give state lawmakers a lesson on how Louisiana regulations and other factors affect the industry and rates in the state.

Alexandria city leaders insist they're not backing down from the city's expanded smoking ordinance that went into effect at the beginning of the year. However, they might have to relax one area to comply with already existing federal and state laws. The Alexandria City Council this week passed a resolution authorizing City Attorney Chuck Johnson to request an opinion from Louisiana Attorney General Buddy Caldwell to see how the city's anti-smoking ordinance fits in with the state's nursing home residents' 'bill of rights.' Louisiana Revised Statute 40:2010.8 outlines the bill of rights, which reads in subsection A-19 that a resident has 'the right to use tobacco at his own expense under the home's safety rules and under applicable laws and rules of the state, unless the facility's written policies preclude smoking in patient rooms.' Johnson said he was not aware of the bill of rights for nursing home residents, which was first passed by the state Legislature in 1985, when the council passed the anti-smoking ordinance last year. However, he received a complaint letter from the Baton Rouge-based Louisiana Nursing Home Association that said nursing homes should be exempt from the anti-smoking ordinance because the residents have the right to use tobacco in their rooms. 'Federal and state governments recognize that residents of nursing facilities have the right to smoke if reasonable precautions are taken to protect non-smokers and if the facility did not have a pre-admission 'no smoking' policy,' Joseph A. Donchess, executive director of the Louisiana Nursing Home Association, wrote in a letter that was addressed to Alexandria Mayor Jacques Roy. Donchess requested that a waiver from the anti-smoking ordinance be granted to nursing homes, and threatened that legal action could be taken if residents were 'denied the right to smoke.' The waiver request applies only to residents, Donchess said in the letter. 'The laws and regulations cited hereinabove apply to residents of nursing facilities and have no application to employees and visitors, and we recognize that the ordinance is fully enforceable against persons who are not residents of the facilities,' Donchess wrote. Any state statute would pre-empt the city's ordinance, Johnson said, and he wants to find out from the attorney general if the City Council needs to make an amendment to the ordinance. 'If we have to exempt these folks, I think we just have to do it,' Johnson said.

In a turn of events that threatens to lay waste to the central theme of the GOP challenge to Barack... If chocolate's the thing for your sweetie on Valentine's Day, why give plain old candy when you can... BATON ROUGE, La.

TransGenRx, a Baton Rouge biopharmaceutical maker, will make several growth-factor proteins for use in human biopharmaceuticals under a seven-year contract with Novocyt LLC.

Photo provided by Chapel on the Campus Flora 'Miss Flo' Baugh stands with the the quilt given to her by the Chapel on the Campus in honor of her 30 years of work in the church's nursery.

A 42-year-old Denham Springs man has been sentenced to nearly four years in federal prison after admitting he defrauded Fidelity Bank of more than $1.2 million.

President Barack Obama announced on Friday some changes to his birth control policy.

Five people were killed in a four vehicle crash that happened just before 3 a.m. Friday morning.

Five people were killed in a four vehicle crash that happened just before 3 a.m. Friday morning.

Five people were killed Friday morning when a driver going the wrong way crashed into another vehicle on Interstate 10 outside New Orleans.

Twenty-four hours a day, seven days a week, red light cameras in Baton Rouge shoot and flash.

The Army Corps of Engineers says it's keeping an eye on Mississippi River levees because the river is high.

The Alcohol and Tobacco Control Commissioner says a Baton Rouge bar is not responsible for an accident that killed a bicyclist and left another severely injured.

The OCS girls soccer team didn't go down easy, tying the score early in the first half, but No.

An attorney for former LSU quarterback Jordan Jefferson entered a plea of innocent Thursday on Jefferson's behalf to a charge of misdemeanor simple battery that stems from an Aug.