St. George is set to become the newest city in Louisiana following Saturday’s vote to incorporate the southeast corner of East Baton Rouge Parish. St. George spokesperson Drew Murrell says the new city should be up and running by January 1st

“Generally, the vote will be certified by November 20th and the Governor should have thirty days at that point to appoint the interim mayor and city council,” said Murrell.

Murrell says the election results are like winning the Super Bowl to those who have been pushing the City of St. George movement for years.

“The desire was to form a school district and we were told at the legislature that if you want a school district, you have to go form a city.  So we started looking at that city process and what we discovered was we could run a better city, we could run a more efficient government,” said Murrell.

Murrell says the city now surpasses Lake Charles as the fifth largest city in the state.

“This is the largest incorporation effort in state history and, from what I’m told, the third-largest incorporation effort in American history.  It’s just not an everyday thing for a city of 86,000 people to be created,” said Murrell.

The population shift now means Shreveport overtakes Baton Rouge as the second-largest city in Louisiana.

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