Third of three parts. Read Part One here, Part Two here.
Tangipahoa, Washington, and St. Tammany Parishes make up the north shore component of LA-01. They are called the "Florida" parishes because they were part of Spanish West Florida. If you look at a map of the US and follow the northern boundary of Florida west to the Mississippi, you'll see the connection.
Come below the fold for an analysis of this portion of LA-01.
Tangipahoa Parish's largest city is Hammond. Prior to the storm, Hammond carved out its own identity between New Orleans and Baton Rouge. Its population increased dramatically post-storm, as companies relocated to Baton Rouge. Southeastern Louisiana University, located in Hammond, has seen an upswing in enrollment since the storm, due in part to this population increase. Hammond is located at the intersections of I-12 and I-55, so you have to go through it when driving east from Baton Rouge or north from New Orleans. It's not a true ex-urban city that you'd find in metro Atlanta or in DFW, because Hammond had an established identity and the sprawl is reaching out to it. Outside of the creeping suburban sprawl, Tangipahoa is primarily rural.
Washington Parish is a mixture of rural and industrial. Lumber is the main industry, and the trees feed the paper mill in Bogalusa. The lumber and paper mills are the parish's largest employers.
The combined populations of Washington and Tangipahoa are around 144K, but that's census data, so factor in a 20% increase as a post-storm guesstimate. That puts the current number at approximately 172K. Both parishes have a significant minority population, about one-third in each.
Outside of Hammond, the residents of these parishes are country folks. They're overwhelmingly evangelical Christians in terms of religion. There is a strong Catholic influence in Hammond that does not really extend out into the rural areas. Racial attitudes in most of these parishes would be considered to be far from progressive.
St. Tammany Parish was primarily a quiet, rural area until the 1950s. Before the Interstate highway system, the primary ways out of New Orleans were US90, west to Houma, Lafayette, etc., or east to the Mississippi Gulf Coast, US61 north-west to Baton Rouge, and US11, going North from eastern New Orleans, crossing the lake on the eastern side in St. Tammany, then progressing north to Jackson, MS. The Maestri Bridge was the only bridge across the lake until 1956, when the Lake Pontchartrain Causeway was opened. The Causeway links Jefferson Parish with the western part of St. Tammany, particularly the cities of Mandeville and Covington. Many believe the reason the Causeway was built in this location was because then-Gov. Earl K. Long so disliked the city of New Orleans and its mayor, Chep Morrison (who ran against Long for guv), that he would not agree to a more logical project that would have joined Orleans and St. Tammany together. When the bridge opened, wealthy New Orleanians began to acquire property on the north shore for weekend homes. As white flight built up Jefferson Parish in the 1960s, St. Tammany grew also. In the 1970s, the area became increasingly popular, as folks from other parts of the country moved to the area to work in the oil/gas industry. Many of them were already used to one-hour commutes and wanted to live in a less-densely populated area.
The 1980s saw an interesting phenomenon take place in the metro area. Instead of population shifting from the city to St. Tammany, many people from Jefferson Parish migrated north. In some cases, the attraction was to subdivisions with 1-2 acre lots. Others moved to St. Tammany because--get this--there were too many blacks in Jefferson Parish. Not that Jefferson was being overrun with the Eebil Coloreds, mind you, but there were a lot of folks who were so racist that they didn't even want to shop at the mall or the grocery with black folks. As a result of this second wave of white flight, St. Tammany became overwhelmingly white (90%) and overwhelmingly Republican.
In terms of government, St. Tammany is Everything That Is Wrong With Conservative Government. There's a story from the late 1980s, of a subdivision in Mandeville where a hog got loose and was hit by a car. The carcass remained in the street for several days, because the parish had no animal control department. There really wasn't a need for one in rural St. Tammany, since farmers and ranchers took care of their own situations. These followers of Grover Norquist created a suburban nightmare prior to the storm that has only gotten worse in its wake. Many of the major roads in the parish, such as US190, LA21 and LA22 are two-lane for long stretches. Traffic snarls are common, and drunk teens in SUVs often kill themselves and others at night. Schools are often overcrowded; in the 1990s, Mandeville High had to operate in "platoon" shifts, where essentially two separate student bodies and faculties used the same physical plant, one operating from early morning to the afternoon, the other from the afternoon into the night.
None of the anti-government attitude of St. Tammany stops these folks from wanting their share of federal pork, however. Like many conservatives, they feel they pay sufficient income taxes tht they want it back directly in terms of local programs and funding.
"Family values" is the tie that binds Catholics and Evangelicals together in St. Tammany (well, that and hatred of blacks). The Christian Coalition made serious inroads into parish government in the late 1980s/early 1990s, to the point where the parish school board voted to ban the book Voodoo and Hoodoo, by James Haskins, from public school libraries in 1992. The ACLU sued, and the Fifth Circuit tossed the appeal (backed by the Louisiana Christian Coalition) in 1997. The case gave national exposure to a segment of the metro area population already locally considered to be unhinged. Video poker gaming, legalized statewide in the 1980s, is outlawed in St. Tammany.
The racial makeup of St. Tammany is 90% white, and that's most likely higher post-storm. Unable to get traction for his message any longer in Metairie, David Duke moved to St. Tammany, which is now his base of operations.
In terms of Congressional races, St. Tammany has always had to take a back seat to East Jefferson, but several candidates from across the lake are considering the race, including former Governor Dave Treen (who now lives in St. Tammany), State Rep. Tim Burns, and Slidell Mayor Ben Morris. The best way for any of these candidates to GOTV will be to attack the Jefferson Parish candidates, such as State Sen. Steve Scalise and Parish Councilman John Young. There's a lot of bad blood between St. Tammany and Jefferson residents, mainly over the Lake Pontchartrain Causeway. A significant portion of St. Tammany residents work on the south shore, particularly in New Orleans. To get there, they have to cross the Causeway, drive down N. Causeway Blvd. to I-10, then take I-10E into town. The drive on the bridge is 30 minutes long, and the run on I-10E into town can be anywhere from 15-30 minutes depending on traffic. It's the in-between part that creates the bad blood, however. N. Causeway Blvd. is a very busy local street, and Jefferson residents regularly oppose any changes to it that would favor the north-south traffic flow at the expense of the neighborhood. In the 1990s, the St. Tammany Parish Council offered to fully fund (in conjunction with state and federal financing) a project to make N. Causeway an elevated, limited-access highway between the bridge and the interstate. The opposition from Jeff parish residents was so fierce that there is still an overall lack of cooperation between the two parishes to this day.
A St. Tammany candidate looking to mobilize his base would do well to capitalize on the anti-Jefferson sentiment among voters. The logical blowback from this tactic will no doubt anger Jefferson voters and make them more inclined to come out for candidates from their side of the lake. If the Republican primary boils down to St. Tammany versus Jefferson, there will be a significant portion of the electorate who will be angry on March 4th, angry enough to stay home on May 8th. The evangelical/wingnut voters may also find some of the sordid details of the private lives of several candidates a turn-off. Unhappy wingnuts have a history of sitting elections out, and this may be one of them.
It's this north-versus-south dynamic that gives Gilda Reed such a great shot at this seat. The Republican primary is going to get ugly and bloody. Hopefully it will get ugly enough to drive would-be Republican voters to the other side.