HAMMOND — For the second time this year, Tangipahoa Parish voters rejected a sales tax that Sheriff Gerald Sticker said was critical to boosting staffing and wages inside the sheriff’s office.

Saturday’s proposal, a three-quarter-cent sales tax that would have raised nearly $25 million a year for the Tangipahoa Parish Sheriff’s Office, failed 57% to 43%. That margin was even wider than the perpetual tax increase voters turned down in March.

Election maps show support concentrated in the parish’s two largest cities. The strongest “yes” votes came from the Hammond and Ponchatoula areas, while the most decisive opposition came from rural communities, particularly north of Roseland and southwest of Hammond.

“It was a significant landslide,” WBRZ political analyst James Hartman said. “I was surprised by the gap between the favorable and unfavorable responses.”

Sticker, elected in November 2023, has said he inherited a strained budget and needed the tax to hire more deputies and raise pay. He spent weeks meeting with voters one-on-one to sell the plan.

“Having worked in law enforcement myself and having known Sheriff Sticker for 30 years, it’s obvious to me that that agency needs more funding,” Hartman said.

But despite Sticker’s efforts, Hartman says the message never fully clicked with voters.

“Were they messaging that they needed more manpower to keep people safe, or were they messaging that deputies needed a raise? Or both?” Hartman said.

He argues the defeat was driven less by crime concerns and more by a lack of trust.

“Tangipahoa has long had a crime rate per capita higher than many places, and that’s still holding true,” Hartman noted. “What we’re dealing with here is not an anti–law enforcement sentiment. It’s an anti-tax sentiment, or a lack of trust, feeling that the agency isn’t spending dollars wisely.”

Minutes after the results were announced, the sheriff’s office posted a message to Facebook that drew immediate attention. It read:

“Sleep tight tonight, Tangipahoa, while just 9 deputies work to protect all 139,000 of you.”

Hartman believes the timing and tone may have hurt the sheriff politically.

“I don’t want to criticize Sheriff Sticker, because I don’t think he actually made that post,” he said. “It was not very politically correct. It was not a good move, and that can come back to haunt him and the agency later.”

According to Hartman, that sharper message would have had more impact before Election Day.

“That would have been a good message two months ago,” he said. “A great message to try to sell people on the tax. It’s not a great message after losing.”

Sheriff Sticker declined WBRZ’s request for an interview on Sunday. It’s unclear whether another tax proposal will be brought before voters.