DERIDDER — Shouts of outrage accompanied the adjournment of the Beauregard Parish Police Jury meeting Tuesday after the panel upheld a motion to ask New Orleans for a Confederate statue. 

Members of the packed audience chanted “Progress, not regress” at police jurors as they left the meeting room, and local pastor Mike Harris reaffirmed his stance against the statue’s presence in DeRidder.

“This is not what we want for our city,” he said. “You are holding us back, and you are forcing your community members to stay in the past.”

Police Jury President Rusty Williamson said he introduced the resolution to request the statue of P.G.T. Beauregard, the namesake of the parish.

“My only intention was to keep the statue from being destroyed and, if possible, to allow us the opportunity to get it,” Williamson said. “We have not even discussed an area to put the statue because we know it may not even happen.”

Police Juror Mike Harper said the statue is the subject of litigation and that it’s future is unknown.

“We know that our parish could never afford to purchase such a statue or have one made,” he said. “This resolution, however, would allow us the chance to acquire such a statue at no charge, so we felt like at least making an attempt to get it.”

Carlos Archield, the only police juror to vote against the resolution, said there were other, less controversial pieces of DeRidder history that could be the focus of efforts.

“It’s a part of our history that we have fought hard to overcome and want to move beyond,” he said.

“This statue is not what we want people to see when they learn about DeRidder, and it is not what I want for the community that I have grown up in and love. We want to focus on the future for our families, not the past. And if they want to preserve the statue, then I believe it should be placed in a museum. It does not belong in DeRidder.”

A statue of Confederate general P.G.T. Beauregard is removed just after 3 a.m. Central Standard Time Wednesday, May 17, 2017, from the entrance to City Park in New Orleans. The Associated Press