Grain elevator: Ruling lets slave descendants suit go ahead

By REBECCA SANTANA
Associated Press

EDGARD, La. (AP) — Descendants of slaves who lived in southeastern Louisiana have won a key ruling allowing their legal opposition to a grain elevator to be built along the Mississippi River to go forward. But a lawyer for the company building the grain elevator said they would likely appeal. The lawsuit brought by the Descendants Project has hinged on whether the land where the grain elevator would go was properly rezoned to industrial use. The zoning was changed in 1990, when Formosa Plastics Corp. wanted to build a rayon plant there. The former parish president was later convicted of charges connected with the sale of the land to Formosa.