About
Meet Milton Arceneaux.
Milton Arceneaux was born and raised in Lafayette. He came home to Grand Coteau, his wife Dawn's hometown, and the family has built its life here for the past six years. He isn't chasing a political career. Grand Coteau is home, and serving it as mayor is the only office he wants.
He founded Encoded Noire, a Louisiana creative agency he built into a working business serving clients across Acadiana: a longtime Lafayette insurance firm, a regional healthcare practice, a Louisiana spice company, and one of the oldest zydeco festivals in the state. Real clients, real budgets, and his own books to keep straight every month.
He builds institutions, and never alone. Alongside others, he helped create Louisiana Creole Culture and Vues de Culture, the nonprofits behind Creole Culture Day, now in its fifth year. He helped launch the REFRAMING Cinema Film Festival, the first minority film festival in Acadiana, and co-directed Built on Zydeco, a documentary that won on the festival circuit and premiered at the New Orleans French Film Festival. His latest film as director, The Old Way Still Cuts: A Creole Boucherie, premieres October 1 in St. Landry Parish. He has written three books on Louisiana Creole heritage. He has also helped win public funding: the $25,000 #CreateLouisiana French Culture Film Grant, supported by TV5MONDE USA, Cox, Louisiana Economic Development, and CODOFIL; and a Louisiana Project Grant, funded by the National Endowment for the Arts and the Louisiana Division of the Arts and administered by the Acadiana Center for the Arts, awarded to Vues de Culture for Creole Culture Day. Outside money, brought home to St. Landry Parish and accounted for to the dollar.
He is also building something new: Cipher Group, a firm that helps small businesses across Louisiana win the government, university, and corporate contracts that grow real, lasting revenue — guiding them through the certifications (Hudson, LAMSDC, MBE, WOSB, HUBZone, 8(a)) and bidding systems too many local companies get locked out of. It's the same instinct he would bring to Grand Coteau: find where the money is, and bring our businesses to the table.
That work has earned an ArtSpark Award — a creative-economy grant funded by the Lafayette Economic Development Authority and the National Endowment for the Arts and administered by the Acadiana Center for the Arts — along with international recognition as a portrait photographer, coverage across Louisiana media, and formal recognition from the Louisiana Senate and the City of Lafayette.
The record
- Founder, Encoded Noire — Louisiana creative agency
- Louisiana Project Grant — National Endowment for the Arts & Louisiana Division of the Arts, administered by the Acadiana Center for the Arts — for Creole Culture Day
- Louisiana Senate Resolution — commending Built on Zydeco (Sen. Gerald Boudreaux, District 24)
- City of Lafayette Proclamation — Creole Heritage Month, 2024 (Mayor-President Monique Blanco Boulet)
- $25,000 #CreateLouisiana French Culture Film Grant — supported by TV5MONDE USA, Cox, Louisiana Economic Development & CODOFIL
- ArtSpark Award — Lafayette Economic Development Authority & National Endowment for the Arts, administered by the Acadiana Center for the Arts
- Founder, Cipher Group — helping small businesses win government & corporate contracts (launching 2026)
- Co-founder, Louisiana Creole Culture — cultural organization
- Co-founder, Vues de Culture — cultural nonprofit
- Producer, Creole Culture Day — now in its fifth year
- Co-founder, REFRAMING Cinema Film Festival — now in its third year
- Co-Director, Built on Zydeco — award-winning documentary
- Director, The Old Way Still Cuts: A Creole Boucherie — premiering October 1 in St. Landry Parish
- Author of three books on Louisiana Creole heritage
Why it matters here
The experience to actually do the job.
A town in financial trouble needs a mayor who has helped build something real, managed a budget with consequences, and helped bring outside money in. Milton Arceneaux has done each of those — with the people around him, which is how a town gets run, too. Not a promise. A record.
He has worked with every kind of business and every part of this community, and delivered for all of them. Grand Coteau deserves a mayor who works for the whole town, not one part of it.
He isn't running to become a politician or to reach for higher office. This is the job he wants, and the only one. He brings the same discipline to public service that he brings to everything else: do the research first, build it right, and answer for the result.