
Coach Sid’s Inaugural Address
I am extremely honored and humbled for all the love and support. It would be impossible to adequately thank everyone who has been part of this. Without even attempting to do that, I want to recognize my family because they had to sacrifice the most during the election season.
I love you all so very much! Thank you to my parents, my wife, my children — they are all here and it involved everyone. I am very grateful.
My First Speech — Ever! Before I start I have to confess that in my entire life of 61 years, I have never given a speech! All I do is get up front here and I roll. But my team said, “Coach, you’ve got to
give a speech. This is important!”
Over to my left, I’d like to ask for a big round of applause for all the [public officials] who have given their lives for the people. [Applause]
Our Metro Council was sworn in this morning, and I was honored to be there with them.
So here goes: For me to give a speech, I have to read it, which for me is unnatural. However, there is a little part in here where I can freelance! And being from North Baton Rouge, I can say whatever the hell I want. [Applause and laughter]
We Did the Unbelievable. Let me say that we have done the unbelievable! Did you hear me? WE have done the unbelievable! I’m not talking about winning the position of Mayor-President. In fact, the truth be told, a lot of people sitting in the room this afternoon probably believed that was impossible. I’m not talking about the campaign. I truly believed that with hard work and prayer, we would be successful. And we were! A great and heartfelt thank you for all of you who made this possible. Thank you very much!
So what was so unbelievable about this campaign journey? It is unbelievable that I made it through this entire campaign without doing what I said — giving a speech! Yes, I spoke off the cuff and answered questions and shared my views, but I never actually made a speech. A real speech. So this is my first speech and depending on what you think, it may be my last! [Laughter]
A New Beginning. I hope that together we can be inspired to create success in this City-Parish government. Today is a new beginning. It’s a new beginning for the year 2025. It’s a time for New Year’s resolutions and a time for new commitments. It is also the new beginning of a mayor’s administration. Today starts the first day of the Sid Edwards administration.
But I hope and pray that this will be the cornerstone of my conversation with you, which begins today. A new beginning for our city and parish.
Planning, Hard Work, Vision. There’s always excitement about the first day and about new opportunities on the horizon. But we must remember that new beginnings also take planning, hard work, determination, and vision.
Let’s be honest with each other. Are we really ready for this new beginning? I want you to know that I am ready, willing, and prepared to lead us to the best and brightest days ahead.
We are about to take these first steps into this new era. To achieve this new beginning, we will need to think with a new purpose and vision. We must change East Baton Rouge Parish for the better. We must restore, rebuild, and revive.
Let’s start today. We must restore Baton Rouge to its rightful place as one of the cleanest, safest, successful, vibrant capital cities in America.
Our goal during the campaign was to make this place a Shining City on a Hill.
Fix What Needs Fixing. Are you with me on cleaning up this city? We must restore a spirit of pride, respect and love for our city as we rebuild the great things about our hometown and fix the things that are wrong with it.
For a lot of people, everything is wrong. No, no! There are many good things about our city, and I want to take this opportunity to say Mayor Broome has done a lot of beautiful things for this city.
It’s just certain things that we think need to be cleaned up. It’s really that simple. We know the problems. We see them every day.
All we need is to get to work and do what needs to be done.
Restoring Pride in Our City. As we restore the spirit of pride in our city, we want to tell it to others, we will want to sell it to others, and to invite others to come here to live. We have to have pride in our talents, how we conduct ourselves in good faith, how we treat our neighbors, how we work with diligence, how we play with enthusiasm, and worship and live in harmony.
Let’s be happy and proud to be from East Baton Rouge Parish. We seek to be a City-Parish where God is honored, life is respected, families flourish, and opportunity abounds for everyone — for everyone of our citizens.
Break Chains of Division. During the new campaign, I visited Mount Zion Baptist Church. At this church, which was the center point of the civil rights movement in this parish, I was moved by an uplifting yet challenging message from the pastor who said we must break the chains of division in our city. We can call it whatever we want, but we’re divided — almost the mirror image of our country. We can be divided by party. We can be divided by race, by economic status, by religion.
I ran on the premise that I’m a great unifier and a turnaround specialist. I’m gonna do my very best. I pledge to you today that I will work every day to break the chains of division in our city.
We Need New Ideas. Today is new beginning in our hometown. Let us commit anew to rebuild our City-Parish with new ideas and thinking outside the box, which is a specialty of mine. Give us your ideas. We want to hear from you. There’s somebody sitting in the audience saying, no you don’t. I tried three weeks ago to reach you, but trust me I’m beginning a new life. We will reach out to you. Give us your ideas on traffic, pedestrian travel, building codes, economic development, tourism, affordable housing, education, and it goes on and on.
Move into 21st Century. We need to move our city into the 21st century where future possibilities are not that far away. Surround us today — in the here and now — with the love and peace that we need for our city. We want your thoughts and ideas. We are listening. Our new team is listening. Government is listening to you.
Rebuilding Economy. We must rebuild our economy. The greatest economic plan is a job. A job brings dignity, wealth and security. A job brings hope. We must create and sustain good high paying jobs.
We cannot rebuild North Baton Rouge without them. We need to expand opportunities throughout our entire parish with a strong, innovative economic plan that brings new business and industry while supporting and encouraging our existing businesses.
We must develop a culture of being helpful towards small business owners and entrepreneurs in our community. We heard it on the campaign trail all along that sometimes people didn’t feel that way. They are backbone of our local economy.
We should shout from the rooftops that Baton Rouge is open for business. Bring your economic development and jobs and we will assist you for success in the capital city. Let me clearly remind you once again the best way out of poverty and hopelessness is a good paying job and hope for families.
Fixing Crime: Our First Goal. Crime is an issue that impacts us all. Our jobs, our possessions, our families, our children — all are at risk from this wave of crime that has attacked our parish. While crime is just a symptom of many things that need to be fixed, this can no longer be our excuse.
Fixing the crime problem is our first goal and ending the crime that washes across our homes. Certainly, it will take more police officers. I said that on campaign trail at every stop, but it will also take a change in attitude on the part of our citizens.
Accepting crime as a part of life must change. We must decide that we will no longer let our neighborhoods, our streets, and our hearts be ruled by fear. We must expect safety and law and order as the first responsibility of government — to keep us safe.
Understanding Who I Am. I want to bring up my son Chase. This is Chase. Chase let me know yesterday that he has a dream. He’s looking for a Time Machine. He wants a time machine to travel back in time and what he told me yesterday was he wanted a time machine so he can go back to 9/11 to save the people who were killed. Is that right, Chase?
A little bit about who I am. There’s a lot of ways I can describe who I am. A lot of people tell me, Coach, you’ve won a lot of ball games. And I’ve always told them, you can’t place wins at the foot of Jesus.
I’ll tell you an influence on me on my coaching career — all of my children but especially our two [autistic] boys. I’d like to tell our council members, former mayors, and judges, and all of the people in the audience, they made me who I am.
We Can Do So Much More. I want you to picture me at practice and a young man telling me what he can’t do. “I can’t run another lap.” “I can’t throw that far.” Why did you get a D in Miss Smith’s class? I tell them I can’t hear you.
How can one of my players tell me as a coach what they can’t do when I live with [two autistic sons] who really can’t. They changed my perspective on life I spent many years, trying to fit them into my world, and I failed miserably. I learned their world is so much more beautiful. Let me tell you why. There’s no angst. There’s no hate. There’s no divide. Everything is pure and good. There’s no arguments.
Picture if that’s how government was.
I’ve said I’m not a politician, but someone called me that the other day. I was like no. But there’s nothing wrong with being a politician.
However, there’s something to be learned about what we are doing and who we are doing it for.
God Had Hold of Campaign. I can tell you this. We talked about unbelievable. You do understand that this was God. This is the Lord — only God could’ve done it.
There are some funny stories. I’m not gonna be here all night. My campaign has a thousand stories.
I’m a drive-through guy. Jack Ryan likes me to ride him around at night, especially drive-throughs. Chief LeDuff, I have a detail now. I hid from them for a week but they finally caught me. They follow us to the drive-throughs.
We go to the drive-through, and the guy behind said “Hey, hey, you’re running for Mayor, right?” and I said I am. He said, “You’re my favorite guy! He said I’ll tell you right now, you’ve got my vote! I’m voting for Sid Bel Edwards!” [Laughter]
I’ll get used to riding with the detail. They got air conditioning and heating! Not like the hoopties I’ve been driving!
Faith: Evidence of Things Unseen. The beginnings were very humble. Cody and some Istrouma Indians and me there in 70805. We had to raise money to become mayor so we raised $382 and went to the sign shop. I asked how many signs can I buy for $382? They told me. When we got them, I realized we needed to have poles!
So we got our poles and started there and it grew and our team grew! And God got into it. I can write a book just on the campaign.
I got a lot of my coaches involved and it went from there!
We Must and Will Succeed. It’s a new beginning for the capital city. We must and we will succeed. We will succeed but only together. We will show Baton Rouge what it’s like to win again!
Thank you. God bless America. God bless the great State of Louisiana and our beautiful home, East Baton Rouge Parish. Thank you to our Lord Jesus Christ!
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