[3] In 2003 during the campaign for city-parish president, candidate Joey Durel expressed in a Chamber of Commerce debate with his opponent that he would not be in favor of LUS competing in the private sector.

The questions asked and the raw results of the telephone poll were requested by interested parties in the public but were never released.

The announcement of the project came within 4 months of Durel's inauguration, just one day after the closing of submission of new bills in the state legislature.

[9] The Lafayette city-parish council voted to adopt the study and proceed with the sale of bonds by resolution in December 2004 and opted to forgo a referendum.

While some accused the group of being shills for Bellsouth and Cox, the three were of backgrounds in oil and gas leasing, home building and oilfield engineering respectively, had never met prior to November 2004 and had no ties to the communications industry nor local government.

The decision was based on the judge's determination that the city had used the incorrect set of Louisiana State laws to seek a sale of bonds that precluded a referendum mechanism.

The district court decision further ruled that the petition used by Fiber411 was written to appeal to the correct set of state laws that the city should have been using.

The council members of the city-parish government before 2005 had stated that they did not want a "media bloodbath" between the city and the incumbents, which was their reason for denying a referendum.

In the end, the city of Lafayette hosted a series of "Town Hall" meetings where the Fiber project was discussed.

The suit was won by the city in district court but an appellate court panel ruled 3-0 that the city's ordinance to sell bonds violated the Local Government Fair Competition Act's requirement that the money to fund the fiber project must not be subsidized by funds from the existing utilities system.