The State Treasurer discusses the Governor’s term with the Concordia Chamber
Published Saturday, March 25, 2023 at 7:00 am
Louisiana State Treasurer John Schroder presents his campaign platform at a Concordia Parish Chamber of Commerce event at the Clarion Suites Hotel in Vidalia. (Sabrina Robertson | The Natchez Democrat)
VIDALIA, La. – During Friday’s meeting and greeting of the State Treasurer at the Clarion Suites Hotel in Vidalia, hosted by the Concordia Municipality Chamber of Commerce, he told attendees he believed in treating your “pennies like a dollar.”
John Schroder, now in his sixth year as Louisiana State Treasurer, said of his candidacy, “I didn’t do it for a paycheck. I did it for a challenge.”
He wanted to see what he could do to “make the process work better” and recoup as much of the lost taxpayer money as possible. Schroder said he now feels he has done all he can in this position and could do even more as governor of Louisiana.
The 2023 gubernatorial election is scheduled for October 14, 2023. Incumbent Democratic Governor John Bel Edwards has reached his term limit and cannot be re-elected for a third consecutive term.
Prior to his position as Treasurer, Schroder served in the Louisiana House of Representatives for nine and a half years. He is a former drug sheriff’s detective and served as a special agent in the US Army’s Criminal Investigative Division. He and his wife Ellie are also small business owners in the real estate, housing construction and retail sectors.
As a businessman, Schroder said he believed government should be run and operated like a company.
A former law enforcement official, Schroder said every dollar lost to fraud is worth recovering and that every criminal belongs in prison.
Schroeder said he was fed up with politics hindering action.
There is no standstill.
“Either you move forward or you fall behind,” he said. “We are here every day to troubleshoot and solve problems. … I will not penalize lawmakers for disagreeing with me, because that penalizes you.”
Introducing Schroder to Chamber attendees, Vidalia Mayor Buz Craft described how Schroder helped him when he was elected mayor and found the city’s finances in a mess.
“I asked the legislative examiner to come into town and one of the first things they did when they came in was a detailed examination. The irony was that it took them two years to get their results out. Of course, after two years, we had made so much progress. When they first started releasing this information, they had Vidalia on a list of cities most likely to go bankrupt, which was absolutely not true,” Craft said.
Craft said Schroder helped the city secure a $7 million line of credit for a substation that would support the city’s industrial park, allowing Vidalia to woo big industries like Syrah and Vidalia Mills.
“Back then we were being courted by Syrah and Vidalia (Mills) and we didn’t have the power and I wanted our name cleared. John was the president of the Bond Commission for the state of Louisiana and I was able to sit in his office and go over my plan (for a substation),” Craft said. “He’s a very intelligent guy and he doesn’t pay me to tell you that. I’m just telling you what he is.”
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