ERIK SANZENBACH / L’Observateur / July 17, 1999

LAPLACE- Port of South Louisiana Executive Director Gary LaGrange has resigned effective Aug. 15. He is leaving his $106,000 a year positionafter being selected by the Mississippi State Port Authority to lead that state’s port into the new millennium.

The move will take LaGrange to Gulfport, Miss., where he will replaceAnthony Taormina, who has been director since 1994. Taormina announcedhis resignation in April.

LaGrange said his move from the Port of South Louisiana is strictly a career move he couldn’t pass up.

Commission President Cart Davis agreed.

“He’s just moving on to another job,” he said.

That is not to say that Davis is not disappointed in LaGrange’s departure.

“He is an excellent director. He turned this port around 180 degrees. Heturned the port in a positive direction,” Davis said.

Commission member Brent Tregre couldn’t agree more.

“I am very disappointed. I know we will all miss him,” Tregre added. “Heput the port in the right direction. But he has an opportunity for moremoney, and he took it.”Over 4,000 ships a year use the Port of South Louisiana’s 104-mile water frontage, which includes a 205-acre intermodal terminal facility and three industrial parks.

LaGrange said he is leaving the port in good shape.

“We have over $40 million in grants and development funds for future construction,” he explained. “That’s a lot of expansion.”He added sadly, “I kind of hate to leave just when big things are happening.”But big things have already happened under LaGrange’s tenure. Since March1997 when LaGrange took over as director, the port has become the largest tonnage port in the country.

“We also have the highest increase in revenue of any port in the U.S.,”LaGrange stated proudly.

The Port Commission has not yet decided on a successor to LaGrange.

Davis said, “We have nothing to say on that right now. We don’t even knowwhich direction we will be moving in that area.”

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