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Archive for February, 2011

Jindal prison recidivism rates flawed

Posted in Governor's Office, Prison, Transparency on February 9, 2011| 2 Comments »

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BATON ROUGE (CNS)—Our Rhodes Scholar governor may have employed some rather unique mathematical machinations to arrive at what the Baton Rouge Advocate called a “stunning statistic.” Jindal, amending an earlier figure, now says the state’s first- and second-year prisoner recidivism rate has dropped by 33 percent.

Jindal used the figure to bolster his program to ease the release of some nonviolent prisoners as a cost-savings measure and to reduce recidivism (repeat offenders who are returned to prison).

The only problem is he used what he referred to as “first- and second-year recidivism” to arrive at his figure. Truth be told, there is no such thing as first- and second-year recidivism. Recidivism rate, by definition, means the ratio of the number of recidivists to the number of felons who return to incarceration “during the specified period,” usually five years, according to the California Department of Corrections and Rehabilitation.

Even Department of Corrections Secretary Jimmy LeBlanc said Louisiana normally uses a five-year comparison because it offers a more accurate picture. At a Jan. 20 new conference, for example, Jindal cited a five-year recidivism rate for the state of 48 percent, a figure he now considers too high.

LeBlanc did say that some states measure recidivism rates on a three-year basis. He said, however that five years “is a better reflection” of the true recidivism rate.

Corrections Department spokesperson Pam LaBorde said using a fewer number of years, as was done by Jindal, generally produces a lower recidivism rate.

For example, if 100 prisoners were released and 20 were back in prison the next year, that would be a recidivism rate of 20 percent. But if another 20 of the original 100 recidivated in year three, the recidivism rate of the original 100 would be 40 percent. Likewise if another 20 were recidivated the fourth year, the rate would be 60 percent.

Jindal press secretary Kyle Plotkin said Jindal used the first- and second-year rates because he has only been in office for three years. He said the 33 percent rate proves that some of the “reentry programs” begun by Jindal are working.

But, LeBlanc, appearing to refute his boss, said, “Some who do not come back after the first year may come back after the fourth year.” That being said, the “stunning statistic” to which the Advocate alluded may turn out to be “stunning” only in the clever use of smoke and mirrors employed to arrive at the figure.

As Mark Twain once observed, “There are three kinds of lies: lies, damned lies, and statistics.”

Like Louisiana Music? Be sure to check out Louisiana Rocks! The True Genesis of Rock & Roll! This book is the only complete history of all genres of Louisiana rock and roll. Re-live all those great old songs that used to play late nights on WTIX, WNOE, KAAY. Learn about all the great artists like Elvis, Johnny Cash, Jim Reeves, D.J. Fontana, Floyd Cramer, and Hank Williams who got their start on the Louisiana Hayride. Check your local bookstore or log onto http://www.louisianarockstomaswell.com.

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Time for Hebert and Sibille to resign from the University of Louisiana Board of Trustees–in open session

Posted in Higher Education, Lobbyist, Public Records, Regents, Transparency, tagged , , , on February 7, 2011| 2 Comments »

The late Supreme Court Justice Louis Brandeis, speaking of open meetings and above-board actions of elected and appointed officials, once said that sunshine is still the best disinfectant.

A metaphoric observation, of course, but nonetheless applicable in the case of the recent first-ever joint meeting of Louisiana’s five higher education boards.

Apparently at least two members of the University of Louisiana System Board of Trustees don’t see the necessity of making board decisions in the open and in public view.

Strangely enough, it took a suggestion from an outsider to inadvertently elicit remarks by the two ULS trustees that perhaps Louisiana should have no open meetings laws on the books.

Their utterances, whether made out of arrogance or ignorance, should anger every voter in Louisiana. Gov. Bobby Jindal’s “transparency in government” long ago turned into a sick joke, so there’s no need to add insult to injury.

Terry MacTaggart of the national Association of Governing Boards of Universities and Colleges (yes, it turns out even university governing boards have their own national lobby), served as moderator for the event and suggested to board members that they hold a “pre-meeting” in order to formulate policy.

Such “pre-meeting” would be in direct violation of the state’s open meetings laws which expressly prohibit any public body meeting in secret to discuss business. Board of Regents Chairman Bob Levy of Ruston, who also serves as district attorney for the Third Judicial District of Louisiana that includes Lincoln and Union parishes, was quick to set MacTaggart straight. He told MacTaggart, who works out of Washington, D.C., that Louisiana law strictly prohibits such activity.

It was at this point that ULS board member Gerald “T-Boy” Hebert and board Chairman Winfred Sibille contributed their opinions that should demand their immediate resignations.

Hebert, a major financial contributor to the University of Louisiana Lafayette, responding to Levy’s reminder of the requirements of the state’s “vigorous open meetings law,” hinted that perhaps a “joint effort to lobby the Legislature will change the law.”

Wait. What?

Did he really suggest weakening or worse, abolishing the state’s open meetings law? Sounds that way to us.

But in a statement that dripped with irony, Sibille said, “The worst thing that can happen at a board meeting is a surprise.” That remark in itself was something of a surprise. Apparently all public meetings are supposed to go smoothly with no debate or open discussion. Sibille then underscored that sentiment when he added, “All problems should be resolved before the meeting.”

Perhaps not since the days of Huey Long has anyone been so brazen as to suggest that public input be shut out of the decision-making process by any public body in Louisiana.

Open political debate has been the hallmark of this country’s government since its founding nearly 235 years ago. In New England they still have town meetings which are nothing like the orchestrated, controlled town meetings held by presidents Bush and Clinton and our current governor. Those are sound bite opportunities. New England town meetings are the bedrock of democracy. At those events, local citizens actively participate in policy-making decisions. To suggest otherwise to the citizenry there would be an open invitation to a new American Revolution.

If Hebert and Sibille are so arrogant as to have even a scintilla of conviction in what they said in that joint meeting, they should resign immediately.

If they are so ignorant as to not realize the ramifications of their remarks, then they have no business serving on any public board—certainly not the self-parody of a board of higher education—and they should resign immediately.

In short, there is no logical reason for either man remaining on any board.

There is no room for public men to advocate private decision-making by a public, taxpayer-supported board out of the sight of the taxpaying public. Their comments should incite outrage among voters.

Conversely, Louisianans owe a debt of gratitude to both Regents Chairman Bob Levy and ULS board member Jimmy Faircloth.

Faircloth, former executive counsel to Gov. Jindal, fired his own volley when he said board members get agendas and background information prior to the meetings so they should be prepared to discuss issues going in. But the public doesn’t always get the full story, he said. “Some of the substance is not discussed in meetings,” he said. “News about higher education is distributed through carefully-tailored press releases.”

Faircloth said none of the board members are elected but instead are appointed, so they should be prepared to make tough decisions and not be afraid of speaking their minds. “It would be healthy for open discussions to be on the record,” he said.

Levy was even blunter. Many board members are afraid of open discussions at open meetings, he said.

That begs the obvious question: Why are they afraid?

We’d be interested in hearing their answers.

Like Louisiana Music? Be sure to check out Louisiana Rocks! The True Genesis of Rock & Roll! This book is the only complete history of all genres of Louisiana rock and roll. Re-live all those great old songs that used to play late nights on WTIX, WNOE, KAAY. Learn about all the great artists like Elvis, Johnny Cash, Jim Reeves, D.J. Fontana, Floyd Cramer, and Hank Williams who got their start on the Louisiana Hayride. Check your local bookstore or log onto http://www.louisianarockstomaswell.com.

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State contracts continue to proliferate

Posted in Campaign Contributions, Contract, Contracts, Education, Governor's Office, Higher Education, Legislature, Legislators, Lobbyist, Public Records, Transparency on February 6, 2011| 2 Comments »

The big news out of the nation’s capital last week was a Feb. 3 Washington Post story trumpeting the fact that the federal government spent $15 billion less on contracts for outside products and services during fiscal 2010, the first reduction since 1997.

The $15 billion cutback in contracted services will barely show up in the federal budget but the decrease from $550 billion to $535 billion is a start for those seeking ways to reduce the federal deficit.

The $550 billion spent on contracts during fiscal 2009 was more than double the amount awarded in federal contracts as recently as 2001. Federal contracts have gone unchecked for so long that the practice spawned its own organization. The Professional Services Council is a trade association (read: lobbyist group) formed specifically for the government professional and technical services industry.

Gov. Bobby Jindal and the Louisiana Legislature might be wise to take their cue from Washington for a change instead of continuing to snipe at the Obama administration—at least on this one issue. Obama’s fiscal 2012 budget will propose an additional reduction of 10 percent in federal contracts. That’s another $50 billion or so in cuts, something that should make fiscal conservatives weep for joy.

For fiscal year 2008-09, the latest data available, Louisiana had 6,304 contracts for goods and services worth a whopping $5 billion, according to the state’s annual report for that year. That figure is somewhat misleading in that nearly $3.2 billion was in the form of 1,083 cooperative endeavor agreements ($2.9 billion), 468 interagency contracts ($213.4 million) and 495 intergovernmental contracts ($79.4 million). In other words, it was money simply shuffled between agencies.

But that still leaves 1,292 professional services contracts ($178 million), 160 personal contracts ($7.4 million), and 1,275 consulting contracts (an eye-popping $1.4 billion).

Like the federal contracts, state contracts have increased by 153 percent in dollar amount since fiscal 2005-06 when a paltry $2 billion in contract work was on the books. That amount made a quantum leap to $3.3 billion the very next year (a 64.6 percent increase), and jumped to $4.7 billion in 2007-08, an increase of another 44.5 percent.

Granted, much of that increase in 2006-07 was for contracts for recovery from two devastating 2005 hurricanes—Katrina and Rita—and granted, much of the money was from the influx of federal disaster relief dollars. But once the genie is out of the bottle, it’s hard to put her back. In 2008-09 the dollar amount nudged up another $337 million, helping to set the stage for the budgetary disaster now being faced by the Legislature and the Jindal administration.

The state has a $37.2 million interagency contract with the office of the attorney general for legal representation to various state agencies, boards, commissions, and departments but still sees the need for scores of private legal firms across the state to “provide legal services to various state agencies.” Only the top 50 contracts were listed in the report, but 41 of those totaled an additional $33.4 million. Eight of those contracts were for legal services totaling $18.3 million on behalf of indigents statewide, the report said.

Contracts, particularly professional service and consulting contracts are handed out by the state like so much candy on Halloween night and there appears to be little oversight. Fully half of all state contracts awarded during 2008-09 were not approved by the Office of Contractual Review (OCR).

The $5 billion for the 6,304 contracts approved by OCR is only part of the problem. Hidden away among all the numbers spewed out so far is another $655.5 million for 6,341 contracts that were awarded in fiscal year 2008-09 which were approved not by Contractual Review, but by the individual agencies awarding the contracts.

These contracts, awarded under an obscure state law that allows the OCR director to delegate authority to state agencies for approval of professional, personal, consulting and social services contracts. Typically, such contracts are for $20,000 or less but the statute also grants leeway to the OCR director to delegate that authority to any state agency as deemed appropriate.

Accordingly, 5,334 of those contracts awarded under the delegation of authority were for amounts below the $20,000 threshold. Those 5,334 contracts totaled $51.7 million, an average of $9,700 per contract. Another 1,007 contracts totaling $603.7 million, however, were also awarded under the delegation of authority.

More than half of that amount, $330.9 million, was accounted for in 383 contracts awarded by the Office of Group Benefits.

Group Benefits had another 32 contracts totaling $898 million approved by OCR. Other contracts approved by OCR included 282 for the Office of Economic Development ($629.6 million), and 1,080 awarded by the governor’s office through the Division of Administration ($2.3 billion).

One contract, for $68.9 million was apparently a major windfall for Cypress Realty Partners of Baton Rouge. The contract was for an alternative housing pilot program for the Louisiana Recovery Authority. An internet company profile of Cypress Realty said the company employed six people and had annual revenues of $410,000.

Two other contracts, both intergovernmental, were with out-of-state universities and totaled more than $900,000. Jackson State University of Jackson, Mississippi, was awarded a contract in the amount of $536,435 to “recruit, select and train teachers for placement in high need local education agencies/school systems.”

Clemson University of Clemson, South Carolina, was awarded a $375,000 contract to develop “active, selective catalysts for the conversion of natural-gas derived syngas (synthetic gas) to ethanol.”

Several contractors were paid to represent the state in other countries. Pathfinder Team Consulting received a $690,000 contract to provide foreign representative services in Europe while Access Marketing got a $234,000 contract to serve as a foreign marketing representative in Ontario Province and western Canada for the Office of Tourism.

A contract for $148,500 was awarded to Louis Bowden, dba Asia Capital to provide foreign representative services in China. Steve Lee and Hernan Gonzalez each received $75,000 contracts to provide foreign representation in Taiwan and Mexico, respectively. Ofihotel S.A. had a $60,000 contract to provide foreign representation in Central America.

Following is a partial list of contracts for fiscal year 2008-09:

• V- Vehicle Company, Ouachita Parish ($87 million);

• Foster Poultry Farms, Union Parish ($50 million) as inducement to purchase and operate poultry production and processing plant and provide 1,100 jobs;

• Lafourche Parish Council ($24.8 million), repair, rebuild, replace hurricane-damaged infrastructure;

• Bayou Lafourche Fresh Water District ($17.5 million) to clear debris from Bayou Lafourche;

• Lafourche Parish School Board ($480,000) to provide academic assistance in literacy and/or math, enrichment, recreation, technology, tutoring parental involvement and family literacy activities;

• Lafourche Parish Council, Office of Community Action ($319,964) to provide services and programs in accordance with the Community Service Block Grant Act of 1981;

• Terrebonne Port Commission ($10 million) for bulkhead, land improvements and other related infrastructure improvements, planning and construction;

• Terrebonne Parish Consolidated Government ($2.2 million) to provide intensive residential treatment program, provide funding to assist with design of a ring levee to surround Chabert Medical Center;

• St. Mary Parish Government/Council ($3.55 million) to operate a 52-bed inpatient treatment programs to individuals with addictive disorders; to operate a 12-adult bed and 21-children’s bed for TANF-eligible women and their dependent children;

• Vermilion Parish School Board ($9.2 million), rebuild, repair, replace hurricane-damaged primary and secondary public school infrastructure;

• Vermilion Parish Police Jury ($5.5 million) to repair, rebuild, replace hurricane-damaged infrastructure;

• St. Martin Parish School Board ($302,784) to provide comprehensive/preventive services to registered students;

• Jefferson Davis Parish Police Jury ($310,821) to complete strategic prevention framework planning process for substance abuse;

• West Feliciana Acquisition, LLC ($6 million) for acquisition, improvement, and operation of a paper mill in St. Francisville, creating 200-375 jobs;

• City of Ville Platte ($675,000) to provide juvenile delinquency prevention/diversion services to youth;

• City of Hammond ($367,728) to provide juvenile delinquency/diversion services;

• Southeastern Louisiana University TIP Comptroller’s Office ($2.1 million) to provide a continuum of family preservation, community based family support services;

• Lallie Kemp Regional Medical Center ($785,000) to provide Ryan White Care Act Aids Drug Assistance program;

• Grambling State University ($106,601) to provide educational opportunities for persons committed to entering or continuing in the field of child welfare;

• Louisiana Tech University ($1.2 million) to provide lessons to youth ages 11-14 to prevent/reduce addictive disorders;

• Southeastern Louisiana Area Health Education Center ($5 million) to provide system point of entry services for St. Mary, Terrebonne, Lafourche, Tangipahoa, and Washington parishes;

• First Steps Referral and Consulting ($2.8 million) to provide system point of entry services and provide site development workshop training to school leadership and teachers in Acadia, Evangeline, St. Martin, and Vermilion parishes;

• Families Helping Families at the Crossroads of Louisiana ($2.7 million) to provide point of entry services in LaSalle, Avoyelles, and Winn parishes;

• Youth Empowerment Project ($1.3 million) to provide system point of entry services for reintegration services for youth and counseling for families in Acadia, Evangeline, St. Martin, Vermilion, Jefferson Davis, and Allen parishes.

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Leadbelly video of ‘Goodnight Irene’

Posted in Book Review on February 5, 2011| Leave a Comment »

Below is a video link to a Louisiana legend: Leadbelly.

Leadbelly is featured in my book, Louisiana Rocks! The True Genesis of Rock & Roll. He is just one of about 300 Louisiana artists profiled in the book. Born in Mooringsport near Shreveport, his real name was Hudie Ledbetter. He was incarcerated for murder in the Texas state penitentiary where he is rumored to have sung his way out of prison. He sang for the governor of Texas who then pardoned him. Leadbelly later was sentenced to Angola State Penitentiary in Louisiana for another murder. It was there that he was discovered by folklorist John Lomax who got him another pardon, hired him as his driver, and promoted his singing career.

Record executives tried to turn him into a blues singer which he hated. He considered himself a folk singer and often appeared in concert with another folk singer, Pete Seeger.

Leadbelly wrote four songs which most people will recognize immediately. The first is Good Night Irene, featured in the video below. The other Three are The Rock Island Line, The Midnight Special, and In New Orleans. The latter three are each listed among the “500 Songs that Shaped Rock and Roll,” as compiled by the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame although In New Orleans is listed by its more familiar title, The House of the Rising Sun, a song made famous by the British group The Animals in the mid-60s.

You may learn more about my book by logging onto:

wwwlouisianarockstomaswell.com

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Too Big to Fail

Posted in Business, Economy on February 4, 2011| Leave a Comment »

By John Sachs
Guest Columnist

In his book Too Big To Fail, Andrew Sorkin provides the reader a blow-by-blow account of the words, actions, and intrigue surrounding the financial crisis in the fall of 2008. The book does not delve into the financial products and practices that led to the crisis. Sorkin has left that task to others, including me, as you will see in the text below. He deals extensively with the personalities of the participants who managed the crisis by providing details as to what each one said and did in the heat of battle. This particular battle, like all battles, revealed the real measure of each man or woman.

Keeping up with the characters, the institutions they represented, and their responsibilities was confusing, or at least it was to me. Nevertheless, I found that if I kept reading and “listening” to each character, the real story unfolded. And it is a story that reveals a truth about all of us: among us, there are good and intelligent folks — and then there are those who are not so good or intelligent.

The following is my brief sketch of the origins of the financial crisis.

The crisis had been festering for a number of years. For more details, I recommend that you read Wikipedia’s account of FNMA and FHLMC, or Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac, as they are more commonly known.

Unlike GNMA (Ginnie Mae) which provides a secondary market financing source only for federally insured mortgages, Fannie and Freddie were free to provide mortgage financing funds to mortgage loan originators through the purchase of, among others, pools of risky subprime loans. And as many of you know, unscrupulous lenders were making home loans to borrowers who had little or no chance of repaying those loans unless their homes appreciated — and/or the rates on their adjustable rate mortgages stayed at or lower than the rate at origination.

Those subprime loans were combined (pooled) to form what is known as securitized loan packages. Then those securities were sold in the financial marketplace to the public: folks like you and me and our 401(k) retirement accounts, banks, mutual funds, etc.

Then along came 2006 and 2007 when many adjustable rate mortgages repriced at significantly higher rates than the borrowers could afford. That led to foreclosures. A significant number of foreclosures created a glut of available housing, and the laws of supply and demand came into play. Housing values fell. When values fell, those homeowners who needed or wanted to sell their homes found that the value of those homes had fallen below the amount they still owed on their mortgages.

Being “under water” led to more foreclosures, more of a housing glut, and then even lower home values. The line of dominos began to fall.

The collapse in the housing market then led to a collapse in the value of those securities that had as their basis the value of the pools of mortgages. Matters continued from bad to worse not only in actual home values, but also for investors who owned the securitized mortgages on those homes — as well as those who had insured the repayment of the loans. It was huge. It was unprecedented. And it continues to this day even though the federal government has come to the rescue of nearly everyone who was affected. The government’s involvement reduced a worldwide financial crisis to simply a terrible ongoing problem with which we continue to cope.

However, not everyone involved in the crisis was destroyed. Those folks not harmed had had the good judgment to recognize the risks associated with the fallacious assumptions that housing prices would always go up and that interest rates on home mortgages would always stay low. They had prudently managed their risks by not loading-up on risky, high-yield, mortgage-backed securities.

Those firms that did not get greedy and that managed their risks wisely included Bank of America, Wells Fargo, JP Morgan, and Goldman Sachs. Those that bet the bank and lost included Bear Stearns, Lehman Brothers, Merrill Lynch, Wachovia, and AIG.

This brings us to the point I wish to make and that is that all too often the virtuous suffer because of the faults of others. How so, you may ask? In this instance, the global financial markets are dominated by only a very few institutions. As much as we wish that they themselves could police this critical marketplace, they cannot and will not — if for no other reason than they are housed in and regulated by numerous countries, and in some instances managed by greedy and/or incompetent managers who cannot be controlled by others.

Then there is the matter of associated risk and its management. We know now that some financial products are too complex and involve significant risk for even the most sophisticated investors. Such products should be placed off limits to other than avowed gamblers and even then only in manageable amounts. No regulated investment banker, broker dealer, or government entity should be allowed to involve itself in such risky product markets.

In conclusion, where “Too Big To Fail” is a consideration, regulation must exist in order to manage the risks that affect everyone. We, the prudent masses, should never again be asked to bail out the greedy and incompetent few.

Like Louisiana Music? Be sure to check out Louisiana Rocks! The True Genesis of Rock & Roll! This book is the only complete history of all genres of Louisiana rock and roll. Re-live all those great old songs that used to play late nights on WTIX, WNOE, KAAY. Learn about all the great artists like Elvis, Johnny Cash, Jim Reeves, D.J. Fontana, Floyd Cramer, and Hank Williams who got their start on the Louisiana Hayride. Check your local bookstore or log onto http://www.louisianarockstomaswell.com.

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