“I just want to tell all you Exxon folks we’re glad you’re here. Tell your management the business-unfriendly attitude ends at the Mississippi River, and we will take any project that our economic-illiterate friends in East Baton Rouge don’t want.”

– West Baton Rouge Parish Council Vice Chairman Barry Hugghins, at a council meeting last week in reaction to the attacks on the area’s largest employer as it sought approval for tax exemptions for capital investments under the ITEP program.