By JEAN L. KAESS

There are a few things happening right now that you should be aware of.

Patterson has mold. I’m not talking about the helpful kind that people smarter than myself use to make penicillin. I’m talking about funky mold, different varieties of funky mold — the kind of funky mold that can cause health problems for sensitive populations.

Actually, I’m making a lot of it and having a go at Patterson because it’s not every day that you will get to see city hall shuttered and tented.

City leaders seem to be doing a good job of handling the problem quickly and efficiently. It remains to be seen how long the process of cleaning and rebuilding actually will take.

Berwick has been pretty quiet. It’s usually quiet in Berwick. Actually, I’ve been told that nothing happens in Berwick.

Since Berwick is so quiet, perhaps they can focus on a cause I’m championing for a little while. What I wish for Berwick is a soccer team. I don’t know what shape that should be in, but I really want to see one.

OK, I’m not being entirely truthful. I want a soccer team at Berwick High School. I know there are protocols and procedures in order for that to happen. I also have been told by a lot of people that it probably won’t happen. So, I’m just putting it out there.

I want a soccer team to be formed at BHS.

What do I need to do to make that happen?

On to school board … I’m just going to throw this out there for discussion: We are one parish, right?

Why does the school system have to have a different districting map than the parish council?

Someone please explain this to me because I have never understood the reasoning. Yes, there are a different number of seats, etc. But, honestly, why?

We are the same parish with the same population. Why does one board have to reinvent the wheel?

What if we took the parish council’s single member districts and tried to get the Department of Justice to approve that? It would make just as much sense as the four different plans that currently are on the table for school board consideration.

Some of them divide Patterson like grandma’s apple pie and others do the same to Centerville. One of them even puts a district line right in front of Centerville High School so that residents who live literally across the street are in a separate voting district from the school.

Then there’s the “nutria rat district,” District 6, that wiggles and worms its way across the parish picking up population here and there to make up another minority district. I understand and support the need for minority districts, but I think they need to be legitimate districts — not created ones.

And this district is in the current plan, the one that your school board members ran under in the last election.

It’s a broken system, to be sure, and I think we can do better. Maybe I’m on the wrong track, but I don’t think they’re on the right track either.

So, let’s sum it up:

—Patterson has funky mold.

—Pleeeeaaaasseeee, Principal Buffy Fegenbush.

—Fix the school board districts.

—These are the main boards I cover, so Morgan City got off easy, this time …