Robby Carter

Robert Johnston Carter, known as Robby Carter (born  October 1960), is a lawyer from Greensburg, Louisiana, who is a Democratic member of the Louisiana House of Representatives for District 72, which encompasses  St. Helena, Tangipahoa, and East Feliciana parishes, all in the Florida parishes east of Baton Rouge.   

Background

  Carter graduated in 1978 from Greensburg High School in St. Helena Parish. He received his undergraduate degree from Southeastern Louisiana University in Hammond and his law degree from the Louisiana State University Law Center in Baton Rouge. He and his wife, the former Kerry Anthony, have three children.    He is the former chairman of the board of the Lallie Kemp Medical Center in Independence in Tangipahoa Parish, which is named for the wife of Bolivar E. Kemp, former member of the United States House of Representatives for Louisiana's 6th congressional district. Carter is a member of the Louisiana Cattleman’s and Forestry associations. He serves on the board of trustees of Greensburg Methodist Church.    Carter has also been the town attorney for Greensburg and Montpelier, also in St. Helna Parish.  

Political life

  Carter represented District 72 from 1996 to 2008 and again beginning on January 11, 2016. Sandwiched from 2008 to 2016 between Carter's terms was former Representative John Bel Edwards of Amite in Tangipahoa Parish, who was instead elected governor in the general election held on November 21, 2015. In that same election, Carter defeated another Democrat also named "Carter", Hunter Carter, 8,156 votes (63 percent) to 4,748 (37 percent).   Carter was first elected to the legislature on August 17, 1996, when in a special election he defeated the Republican Rhett Bergeron, 63 to 37 percent.The seat had previously been held by the Democrat Buster J. Guzzardo, Sr., who resigned mid-way in the first year of his third term. In 2003, for his third term, Carter defeated the Republican R. J. Saia, 82 to 18 percent.   In his first legislative stint, Carter was vice chairman of the House Judiciary Committee,  chairman of the Rural Caucus, and floor leader for then Democratic Governor Kathleen Blanco. He co-authored the Taylor Opportunity Program for Students, known as the TOPS program and named for the late New Orleans businessman Patrick F.Taylor. Carter worked to increase pay of teachers and university professors and to fund the Florida Parishes Technical College. He penned the legislation which halted the construction of an industrial landfill in St. Helena ParishHe pushed for completion of the Florida Parishes Arena in Amite, the FAARM Arena in Clinton, and the Interstate 55 Welcome Center in Kentwood in Tangipahoa Parish.   In March 2016, Carter joined a House bipartisan majority to enact a one-cent increase in the state sales tax. State representatives voted 76 to 28 for the tax hike, a part of the revenue-raising measures pushed by Governor Edwards. A House and Senate conference committee subsequently trimmed the duration of the tax from five years to twenty-seven months, effective from April 1, 2016 to June 30, 2018. Even the sale of Bibles and religious publications and Girl Scouts cookies are now subject to the tax.