I think I am able to say that there are current plans for the News Team to utilise the CA Official News forum. Obviously, it wouldn't be "official", but it would carry news from CA and open it up for discussion like that forum previously allowed.
The details are still being sorted by the relevant Director(s) and Hex.
As for CA, did you ever have any contact with Lusted when he was here, Halie? Could you be the one to reach out to him and clarify what has gone wrong.
I have no idea, but I doubt any official reason for CA's ignoring of TWC has ever been provided by the former to the latter.
The interview mentioned in the OP, also mentioned in Huberto's post
here, is illuminating. Lusted conveniently avoids referring to "Total War Center", instead referring to "the modding forums". I agree that that's saddening.