Everyone has a story.
Each week, the Shreveport-Bossier Journal’s Tony Taglavore takes to lunch a local person – someone well-known, successful, and/or influential, and asks, “What’s Your Story?”
By TONY TAGLAVORE, Journal Services
He had been toiling for his dad all summer. All, long, hot, summer. One day, the high schooler got the urge to ask his father a question.
“Hey, I’ve been working. Am I going to get any money?”
His father answered matter-of-factly. “Son, you got some good clothes on, don’t ya?”
“Yes sir.”
“Your momma cooks a good meal every night, don’t she?”
“Oh, yes sir.”
“You know what? You don’t have to wash your clothes, and you sleep in a good bed every night, don’t ya?
“I understand, Dad. I get paid every day.”
The young man learned a valuable lesson from his father.
“He taught us to work, and not just for money.
Bossier City Mayor Tommy Chandler told me that story, and his story, during lunch at a place of his choosing, Cascio’s Market Bistro (in, of course, Bossier). The mayor had a grilled pork chop (which looked delicious), with mashed potatoes and baked beans, and iced tea. I very much enjoyed my Cobb Salad.
As expected, lunch with the mayor – who is very much a people person – did not go uninterrupted.
Waitress: “Your brother came in yesterday.”
Mayor: “The ugly one?”
Waitress: “That’s what he said about you.”
Tommy was born in Memphis, Tennessee. His family moved to Shreveport when Tommy was just two years old. Tommy’s mother died of a heart attack when she was only 57.
“My mother was the best mother anybody could have. Every morning, she would get our food ready to go to school. You came home, there was food on the table. Every day. Sunday, we would have a big family lunch . . . . My mother would cook a three-course meal. We would sit there and eat. We would go out and play games, then come back in and eat again. I had a great childhood.”
Part of that childhood was learning about honesty and integrity. Tommy’s father did most of the teaching.
“My Dad was a worker. He didn’t need a contract. A handshake was fine with him. He always taught me, my (three) brothers, and my (two) sisters, that your word is your bond. You do what you say, and you say what you do.”
Tommy’s father was in the demolition business. He came to Shreveport in the early 1960’s for one job, and never left. “He saw an opportunity with Interstate 20 coming through, and all the demolition that needed to be done.”
And while in school, Tommy saw an opportunity to play sports, which is where he developed his still- competitive nature. Tommy played ‘em all – football, baseball, and basketball. He also ran track. “Basically, I didn’t come off the field.”
And his brothers, even if they were not aware, provided Tommy’s motivation.
“Each time I played sports, I wanted to do better than them. I wanted to outdo them. They gave me a reason to do better. They were great, but I wanted to be better.”
Tommy worked with his father for several years before building his own successful business. What someone didn’t want, Tommy found someone who did.
“Anything in a building, anything in a house, I would reclaim it and resell it. Used commodes, used hot water heaters, used doors. Then, I would get this old wood . . . . My family would bid a job to demo. It would have a lot of good things in it. They would give me some time before they tore it down to come in there and reclaim all that stuff and get some of the good material out of it. The more stuff I got out of there, the less stuff they’ve got to take to the landfill.”
Tommy told me he has pretty much always had a “Don’t tell me I can’t do nothing” mindset. But that philosophy isn’t a guarantee for victory.
Some 20 years ago, Tommy ran to be a Bossier Councilman-at-Large. He lost.
“That was tough.”
How tough? Tommy didn’t sleep the Saturday night the votes were counted.
“I went home, laid in bed, and stared at the ceiling. It got to be one o’clock, two o’clock in the morning. I got to thinking, ‘Well, all those signs I put out through the whole city, there’s going to be people waking up and going to church, driving by my signs, and say, ‘He got beat. He got beat.’”
Tommy didn’t want anyone to think he was a loser.
“About three o’clock in the morning, I got in what I called my Bad Ass Red Truck – this old red truck I had – and I started going around the city by myself picking up signs on every street. Big signs. Little signs. I would fill my truck up, go to my (dump site), and I would drop them off. I would go back. About eight o’clock in the morning, I finally finished. I got home, relaxed, and said, ‘Nobody is going to see my signs and say I lost.’”
But the pain of losing that election a long time ago never went away, even though Tommy was elected to a couple of different political organizations. Then came a big opportunity – to run to become Bossier mayor. The incumbent had been in office 16 years. Tommy, a father of two children, thought the city “might need a breath of fresh air.”
“I would make me a sandwich or something like that, and I would go sit in the parking lot of City Hall, and just kind of watch people going in and out. Just thinking if I was here, (I could bring) different ideas, different things. I would write them down. I would go sit by a fire station, and drive by different parts of Bossier. (I said) if I’m going to do this, I’m not going to sit on my ass and not do anything. People got used to me sitting out in the parking lot and would wave to me every once in a while,” Tommy said, laughing.
So, with a chance to erase those painful memories from a lost election (I said, ‘Never, ever again.’), and against his family’s wishes, Tommy –married to wife Paula now 19 years – ran for Bossier’s top job.
“I ain’t lying. It was seven days a week. Daylight to dark—after dark. I walked the whole damn city. We went to every function we could. I never got tired because I was going to do it. If I lost, it was God saying I didn’t need to do it anyway. But I was going to make sure I put everything I could into it. (I wasn’t going to say) I should have done this, or I should have done that.”
He didn’t have to. March 20th, 2021, Tommy raised his hands in victory. He no longer sits in the city hall parking lot eating lunch, but the 64 year old doesn’t stay in his office much, either.
“I will go around, go into a fire station. ‘Hey guys, how ya’ll doin’?’ I will stay there a few minutes. If I see an officer on the side of the road, I say, ‘Hey guy. You doin’ all right?’ I see our (water) meter guys on the road, and I will say, ‘Hey, everything going good?’ These guys that are down in these mudholes diggin’. I stop by. ‘Hey, everything going good? Ya’ll need some help?’ They are there when I need them. I want them to know I will be there when they need me.”
Assuming the man who runs “the biggest business in the city right now – the City,” had more important things to do than talk with me, I asked Tommy my final question. As always, what is it about his life story that can be helpful to others?
“Don’t give up. I had a lot of family members say, ‘Don’t (run for mayor). Don’t do it.’ If it’s something you want to do, what if I wanted to run like I did, and I took the advice of my family members? I would have said, ‘What if I would have run?’ I would have always had that in the back of my mind. I believe if there’s something you want to do, don’t go half-ass. Go 100 percent. All the way. Do what you say and do it every day.”
Just like he was taught.
Do you know someone with a story? Email SBJTonyT@gmail.com.