Bubby Lyons

Edward Paul "Bubby" Lyons (born June 16, 1929, in Houma, Louisiana) was chosen by the city council of Mandeville, Louisiana, on October 17, 2009, to serve for five months as interim mayor.^[1]

Lyons has formerly held several public offices including mayor of Houma, president of Terrebonne Parish, and member of the former Terrebonne Parish police jury. After retiring to Mandeville, he served for five months on the Mandeville City Council in 2000 to complete the unexpired term of Homer Fouquier after Jack McGuire did not seek reelection. Lyons, in applying to be interim mayor, agreed not to be a candidate in the 2010 March 27 special election to select a mayor to complete the term to which Price had been elected and which ended in 2012.^[2]

In 1988, the Democrat Lyons polled 16 percent of the votes cast in the nonpartisan blanket primary for the District 2 seat on the Louisiana Public Service Commission. Victory went instead to another Democrat, later lieutenant governor and then Governor Kathleen Blanco, who defeated a Republican, Kernan "Skip" Hand in the general election for the position held in conjunction with the 1988 U.S. presidential contest.

Lyons is retired from Duplantis Truck Lines, Quality Shipyards, and Benton Casing Services, all companies in Houma of which he was a part-owner. He has served on the boards of Terrebonne General Hospital, Terrebonne Parish Library, Louisiana Energy Power Authority, Florida Parishes Retirement District, and Saint Tammany Parish Events District. Lyons is married to Joan Ortego Lyons (born 1932).^[3] Growing up in originally francophone Houma, Lyons was the first member of his family to have English as a native language.^[4]

Lyons is known for his dancing, singing, and storytelling abilities. Often, when given a mere word or topic, Bubby Lyons can immediately recall a story from the 1940s in vivid detail.

On February 1, 2014, Lyons was inducted into the Louisiana Political Museum and Hall of Fame in Winnfield because he is thus far the only person to have served as mayor of two different Louisiana cities, Houma and Mandeville. Seven others, all Democrats, were also honored.^[5]

Notes

1. Lyons took office that same day, replacing Eddie Price III, who had resigned on October 9 upon criminal conviction. Cindy Chang, "Mandeville mayor resigns under fire" in Times-Picayune, 2009 October 10, pp. A1, A11; "Mayor Price's resignation" in Times-Picayune, 2009 October 10, Saint Tammany Edition, p. B4; Cindy Chang, "Council to pick interim mayor: Mandeville then will call special election" in Times-Picayune, 2009 October 12, Saint Tammany Edition, pp. B1, B2.
2. Kia Hall Hayes, "North Shore city selects leader" in New Orleans Times-Picayune, 2009 October 18, Metro Edition, pp. A1, A8.
3. Suzanne Le Breton, "Lyons named interim mayor for Mandeville" in St. Tammany News, 2009 October 18 (Vol. 5 No. 21), pp. 1A, 6A (accessed 2009 October 20). Other finalists for the position of interim mayor were Ray Baas, Clayton Borne, Adolph Ringen, Christina Rukavina, and Glen Runyon; eliminated in the first round were Clifford Bergeron, Stephen Fisher, Phillip Lynch, Leah Martin, Wayne Morgan, Robert Newell, and Maurice Prevost.
4. Cindy Chang, "Fresh breeze invigorates Mandeville City Hall" in Times-Picayune, 2009 October 25, Metro Edition, pp. A1, A14.
5. "Who's famous?, October 2, 2013". Bossier Press-Tribune. Retrieved October 2, 2013.