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Jindal tanks again, Edmonson relieves Troop D commander, Troy Hebert in need of history lessons, personal time clock

Posted in ATC, Corruption, Ethics, Governor's Office, Huey Long, Legislature, Legislators, Politicians, Senate, State Police, Transparency on February 18, 2016| 13 Comments »

Bits and pieces picked up by LouisianaVoice while out and about in the Gret Stet of Looziana:

Yet another Jindal scheme backfires

Bobby Jindal’s gambit for a hoped-for selection as a vice presidential running mate or appointment to a cabinet post may have just been shot down by another Indian-American governor.

Jindal, following Rubio’s strong showing in Iowa but before he faltered in New Hampshire, executed a calculated ploy to reignite his own fading extinguished political star. But South Carolina Gov. Nikki Haley spoiled that fantasy, a dream which was about as likely as his winning the presidential nomination.

Right about now, Bobby has to be pretty much peeved at Nikki. She, after all, is a much more attractive prospect as a running mate. She is an articulate, conservative female who would give the ticket ethnic diversity—and her response to President Obama’s last State of the Union Address was far superior than Jindal’s response to Obama’s first one. She was actually coherent and he was, well….something else.

Oh well, as our friend Stephen Winham has said on more than one occasion, there is always the chance of a hostile takeover of the 700 Club by the one-time boy blunder.

 

Phone audits and changes at the top at Troop D

Meanwhile, we have learned from within Louisiana State Police that State Police Superintendent Mike Edmonson, or at least someone acting on his behalf, has ordered that a toll analysis be pulled on department cell phones, presumably in Troop D, to try and determine who may be talking to LouisianaVoice.

As we pointed out before, it’s a classic example of shooting the messenger. LSP, aka Edmonson, does not want to know about problems in his department (and there are many, as we shall examine momentarily); he only wants to punish those vocal few who want to see the problems addressed. “They just can’t help themselves,” our source tells us. “It is the only way they know how to do business.”

Well, Mike, you can conduct all the cell phone audits you like but I’m afraid you’re going to come up empty. First of all, I don’t believe any retired troopers are going to hand over their phones and the active ones aren’t stupid. They know better than to use state-issue cell phones for such purposes for the very reason we’re now seeing played out in your little witch hunt. They wait until after work hours and when they are well away from LSP headquarters to contact us.

All of which also raises this question: Is this the same professionalism shown when you carry out investigations into criminal activity? If so, the criminals must be having a field day.

At the same time, we have learned that that Capt. Chris Guillory has been relieved of his command at Troop D—and that Ronnie Picou may even get his job back when he appeals. (We requested the investigative report now that the investigation has concluded, but our request was denied by LSP.)

Picou, it seems, was terminated for lying and not for payroll fraud in connection with all those times he was home sleeping when he was supposed to be on duty.

Funny how that works out. A state Department of Children and Family Services case worker was not only fired, but is being prosecuted for failing to carry out mandatory monthly in-home visits with foster children. Inspector General Stephen Street said her misconduct was not linked to any cases of child abuse but her pending arrest is significant for the potential of abuse. http://theadvocate.com/news/police/14884056-32/arrest-warrant-accuses-state-worker-of-reporting-at-least-20-times-she-had-checked-on-foster-childre

Picou is not accused of endangering the public while he was snoozing, but the potential was certainly there. And Guillory allowed it to occur just as he allowed other activity to occur as previously documented by LouisianaVoice. https://louisianavoice.com/2015/09/05/state-police-launch-internal-affairs-investigation-of-troop-d-commander-after-public-records-requests-by-louisianavoice/

State Police HQ sat on harassment complaint against officer in Troop D, captain for year; IA now said to be investigating

Gift cards for tickets, payroll chicanery, quotas, short shifts the norm in Troop D; troopers express dismay at problems

State Trooper in LSP Troop D is reportedly terminated in aftermath of investigation into LouisianaVoice disclosures

Edmonson solution to multitude of problems at troubled Troop D: go after messengers with a withering vengeance

Speaking of lying, it appears that Guillory may have been relieved of command for being less than truthful to investigators when he denied that he refused to take a complaint from Dwight Gerst. Guillory was initially cleared of that but LouisianaVoice subsequently published an audio of Guillory doing just that. https://youtu.be/zd-JV3rKjko

Following our posting the audio, Gerst re-filed his complaint with LSP Internal Affairs last week and on Thursday (Feb. 17), Guillory was re-assigned to State Police headquarters in Baton Rouge, effective Friday, a move tantamount to placing him on administrative leave, pending the results of further investigation.

One question to Mike Edmonson: Why did it require a series of stories in the media to prod LSP brass into action when they have known for some time that there were disturbing irregularities occurring at Troop D? Concerned troopers have complained on numerous occasions but nothing was done until a glaring light was shone on the situation.

That speaks volumes about the quality of leadership at LSP.

 

Troy Hebert just won’t go away

Also On Wednesday, Troy Hebert, former director of the state Alcohol and Tobacco Control Commission (ATC) appeared on the Jim Engster Show. http://www.jimengster.com/jim-engster-podcasts/2016/2/17/0217-wednesday-the-advocates-mark-ballard-republican-state-rep-chris-broadwater-former-senator-troy-hebert-assistant-editor-james-moran-of-tiger-rag

Hebert, who is flirting with becoming an independent candidate for the U.S. Senate seat being vacated by David Vitter, was his usual half-baked self on the show, both in terms of sheer hypocrisy and blatant ignorance.

During his 38-minute interview (which is more than double the time to which Andy Warhol said he is entitled), Hebert credited Huey Long for creating the state Civil Service system.

Wow. Huey Long? Really? The man who practically invented political patronage in Louisiana?

Troy, Troy, Troy. Try Sam Jones and Jimmie Davis.

Jones, who served as governor from 1940-1944, was the one who finally overthrew the Huey Long dynasty and is credited with restructuring state government into a civil service system which, by the way, was dismantled by Huey’s brother, Earl K. Long, when he became governor in 1948. Jimmie Davis reinstituted civil service for keeps during his second term, from 1960-1964.

Huey Long indeed. Troy, you need to brush up on your history.

You also need to brush up on consistency.

During his interview on Engster’s show, he also advocated that all state employees, including college professors, punch a time clock in order to qualify for their paychecks.

Except for college professors, who do extensive research, grade papers, give lectures, and advise students, all outside the classroom, a time clock isn’t such a bad idea in concept. It’s done in the private sector and in most public sector cases, it would work just as well.

It’s not such a bad idea to have legislators punch a time clock. As it now stands, they are paid per diem for entire legislative sessions, including the current special session. But those per diem payments are also paid on Fridays and weekends, days on which legislators do not meet except on extremely rare occasions. How do we justify paying them $149 per day for days on which they do not meet? How do we justify paying them when they do not show up to vote on key issues?

(Taking the current special session, for example, which began on Feb. 14 and ends on March 9, there are nine days—Fridays, Saturdays, and Sundays—on which the legislature does not meet. But each of the 144 members receives $149 for each of those days. That’s $193,104 in per diem payments for doing nothing.)

But… but… but, Troy, about those time clocks and your own attendance record at ATC…

How would you go about punching a time clock during the time you were out at the construction site when you were building that nice house on University Lake when you should have been tending to state business? We have it on pretty good authority that you were out there virtually the entire time construction was going on. Was there a time clock at the work site?

Was there a time clock at your apartment over the Copper Monkey Nightclub in the New Orleans French Quarter where you managed to spend quite a bit of time during working hours? Just asking.

Troy? Troy?

….Now where did he go?

 

 

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LouisianaVoice reveals pair of frustrating episodes that reveal problems of state hospital privatization, closures

Posted in Contract, Contracts, DHH, Earl Long, Governor's Office, Health Care, Higher Education, Privatization on February 17, 2016| 26 Comments »

Bobby Jindal: the gift that keeps on giving.

It’s bad enough that colleges and universities are facing the threat of temporary closures, cancellation of summer school, and loss of accreditation. But coupled with the bad news on higher education is an equally grim outlook for health care.

A sample of the legacy left us by Jindal’s hospital privatizations and closures:

In Baton Rouge, the closure of Earl K. Long (EKL) Medical Center had a ripple effect on the low income residents of North Baton Rouge. The emergency room patient care shifted onto Baton Rouge General Regional Medical Center Mid-City became such a money loser that it closed its emergency room on March 31, 2015. That moved emergency room care 30 minutes further away to Our Lady of the Lake (OLOL) Medical Center, located in largely white South Baton Rouge. One emergency room doctor confided to the author that it was his feeling that Jindal wanted to create “a medical wasteland north of Government Street.” Government Street, which traverses Baton Rouge in an east-west direction is a roughly-defined dividing line between South and North Baton Rouge.

Mid-City was hemorrhaging $2 million a month through its emergency room because Jindal refused to expand Medicaid and rejected any idea of putting up state money to keep the facility open. With the closure of its emergency room, residents of North Baton Rouge, which is largely low-income black in its demographic makeup, had few medical choices. With Our Lady of the Lake so far away, the alternatives were two urgent care clinics operated by the partnership of LSU and Our Lady of the Lake. The clinics were located on North Foster Street and Airline Highway. The North Foster clinic has no onsite doctor and the main Airline High clinic has a doctor onsite only until 7:00 p.m.

The same emergency room doctor who related the “medical wasteland” story told of the tragic case of an elderly African-American couple. “I felt sick reading this report,” he said. He said it involved “an old black couple who were paying $40 per month on their existing medical bill” to another Baton Rouge hospital.

The report read said the decedent was found “supine on bedroom floor. His wife told EMT personnel that her husband had congestive heart failure and that fluid had been building up. He did not go to the emergency room because the couple owed money to the hospital. She said he had been short of breath through the night and when she awoke, he was not breathing. CPR and advanced cardiac life support were initiated but were terminated after no response. “If he had gone to the LSU urgent care center, likely as not, no doctor would have been on duty,” the ER doctor said.

The closure of EKL and the decision by Baton Rouge General Mid-City to close its ER necessarily imposed a heavier workload on OLOL which entered into a partnership with the state for treatment of Medicaid patients. That increased workload has understandably also produced greater pressure on doctors and staff which in turn has apparently led to lapses in quality of care.

Consider the following brief email thread:

“Please see the email below sent from one of vascular consultants to our Associate Chief Medical Officer Dr. (redacted). My purpose for forwarding this email to you is not to criticize anyone nor is (it) to elicit a string of email responses. The sole purpose is to make all of us aware of the perception some of our consultants and primary care teams have of us. Increasingly of late, I am getting this type of feedback, be it real or otherwise.

“Doctors, we must elevate our game to meet the expectations of all our physician colleagues. I know you guys are working hard, but I am asking each of you to pay attention to the finer details.

“As Dr. (redacted) aptly said to me last night, our physician colleagues are our customers; we need to put ourselves in their shoes, be their voice, the voice of our customer.

Dr. (redacted)”

The email to which he referred read:

“I had a very irritating call last night from the ER. It bothers me that the environment around our hospital is deteriorating into a stereotypical dysfunctional training facility that we are all too familiar with and probably chose to go into private practice to avoid.

“I received a call at about 11:30 p.m. The answering service informed me who the call was about. When I called back a resident picked up and started telling me about ‘an endostent that had an endoleak with pain, transferred from Lake Charles.’ Knowing I was on city call, I figured I’d investigate this to expedite patient care. The resident told me they had already spoken to a doctor but it didn’t make sense when I couldn’t get the specifics I was asking for. At that point, I asked to speak to the attending whom (sic) was able to figure out they got the wrong guy. However, it’s a little disheartening that he didn’t readily know who the surgeon was they had spoken to that was assuming responsibility for the patient. He did mention ‘Dr. (redacted)” who is our resident (redacted)—but I’m not sure he knew it was a resident. It’s my feeling that in a patient potentially critical as this one—the attending should have his finger on the pulse a litter better than it appeared last night.

“After those 15 minutes I again informed the attending I was Dr. (redacted)…returning a page. At this point the attending gave me to ‘Dr (redacted), first year (emergency room) resident.’ The resident reports a consult on a patient with WBC (white blood cell) 19, blisters on cellulitic foot…When I ask asking info, it turns out the patient ‘has been on the board over 7 hours.’ When I ask to speak to attending who saw the patient—no longer working. At this point, I’m given back to the same attending who gave me to the first year resident he was covering. This attending was covering the resident, had taken sign-out, and expected the resident to call me and report but had never seen the patient. This reminds me of something I would get from the old ER at Mid-City, not what I would have received from OLOL in first 12 years of practice.

“I do realize we are a training facility but you and I both recognize that happens to a private practice service when run by residents. I’m sure the ER has exploded with new personal (sic) during this growth phase, but part of their responsibility is to know who the doctors are that routinely admit to this facility. To say the least, I was discouraged at the attending’s ‘finger on the pulse’ of what he was responsible for last night.

“This email is not to condemn any individual but to raise flags over the environment. Please forward to the appropriate people.”

(Sender’s name redacted)

Such is life in the aftermath of Bobby Jindal’s grand state hospital privatization scheme.

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Dedications: Does eliminating them give Louisiana an easy way out of the state’s fiscal crisis? Is there an easy way out?

Posted in Budget, Ethics, Finances, Governor's Office, Health Care, Higher Education, House, Senate, Legislature, Legislators, Politicians, Taxes on February 16, 2016| 85 Comments »

By Stephen Winham

Every day we hear the same thing: “If we could just get rid of those dedications, we could fix the budget and not have to always hit higher education and health care so hard when times are tough. There are plenty of things we could cut without hurting anybody or anything.”

It sounds so easy. You hear, in very broad terms, how the budget has grown and how out-of-bounds spending has gotten. Our current budget totals about $25 billion, of which $10 billion is federal. I will focus on state funding in the official revenue forecast – about $10.4 Billion in the current year, with strongest emphasis on the $7.9 Billion in state general fund spending we can most readily control. The official forecast numbers for next year are $10.4 billion and $8.2 billion, respectively.

We hear about $4.3 billion in dedicated funds ($3.5 billion in the currently-proposed FY 2016-2017 budget) that could be eliminated and go a long way toward fixing our budget problems. What we rarely hear about is the additional $4 billion in the state general fund that is allocated and/or protected by the State Constitution.

For starters, almost a half billion dollars comes directly off the top of the general fund, but IS NOT APPROPRIATED. That’s right, you don’t see or hear much about this money because it is not appropriated – rather, it is a direct draw on the state’s general fund.

If you go to page 177 of the FY 2016-2017 Executive Budget, you will find Schedule 22, Non-Appropriated Requirements. This schedule allocates $496.5 million from the state general fund in the treasury, pursuant to the State Constitution, for the following:

$404.8 M – General Obligation Bond Debt Service

[IMPORTANT DIGRESSION: G. O. Debt service is increasing by over $211 million (109%) next year due to one-time savings utilized in the current year from defeasance of debt – In other words, this is part of the one-time “fix” in the current budget that has to be covered next year.]

$90.0 M – General Revenue Sharing – goes to local governments as a partial offset for local property tax revenue lost due to the State Homestead Exemption

$ 1.7 M – The Interim Emergency Board – provides emergency funds during the budget year

Now I ask you, which of these would you be willing to vote out of existence? Eliminating or changing them would require constitutional amendments and a vote of the people.

The one of these three I would not cut, for sure, is our $405 million in debt service. Defaulting on our debt would cause immediate loss of a marketable bond rating and send a message to the rest of the country that we are truly bankrupt.

Cutting the other $91.7 million in non-appropriated items would have very serious implications, particularly for local governments. Even if you think local governments shouldn’t get the revenue sharing, how do you think they would make it up, if they didn’t?

In addition to non-appropriated allocations, the State Constitution also mandates general fund spending for a number of appropriations. The state’s Minimum Foundation Program for public elementary and secondary education is required by the constitution and has a $3.4 Billion state general fund appropriation. You might be inclined to cut administration and other programs in the Department of Education, but are you willing to vote for a constitutional amendment eliminating basic state support for our public schools, or even allowing for substantially reducing it? You may not directly use public education, but you have to agree we absolutely have to have it and it should be funded at no less than its current level. The education provided by our public schools is vital and is finally improving. We can’t afford to lose the ground we’ve gained.

So, between just the General Obligation Bond debt service and the MFP requirements for next year, we have $3.8 Billion of General Fund (46% of the total) expenses it would be simply stupid to cut.

In addition to the MFP, another $600 million of our general fund expenditures are currently required by the State Constitution. State supplemental pay for local law enforcement alone is $124 million of this. Also included are salaries of statewide elected officials and the costs of elections. You might not be happy with the salaries of your statewide elected officials, but we have to pay them and I don’t think you could possibly support not having the money to hold elections. If you think locals ought to fully fund the salaries of law enforcement personnel, where do you think they might get the money to do so?

[Digressing again and focusing on local government funding for a moment, what if we decided to cut it all? Except for capital outlay projects, we indirectly fund recurring local services, so we would, in essence, be shoving our problem down to the local level – and we all live somewhere.  If local governments were unable to raise local taxes to support the services, they would be eliminated or significantly degraded.  If they were able to raise local taxes to support them, how would the taxpayers see a difference?]

What other general fund expenditures, currently considered mandated should we consider cutting? How about the $130 million in appropriated debt service (in addition to G. O. Debt)? How about the $400 million plus it costs to incarcerate adult inmates in our state prisons? Or, the $157 million we pay local sheriffs to house state inmates? The $27 million we pay in District Attorney and assistants’ salaries? How much of the $73 million legislative and $160 million judicial general fund appropriations are we and the legislature willing to cut? How much of the $848 million in general fund we consider sacrosanct because of federal mandates should we cut and what will happen if we do? How much can we realistically cut from our Medicaid program and still attempt to meet the health care needs of our citizens?

Finally, how about the elephant hiding behind the sofa, our annual payments via the state payroll system toward the Unfunded Accrued Liabilities of our state retirement systems? I’m no actuary, but using the actuarial reports generated by the Legislative Auditor, I estimate annual payments toward this liability, in state funds, is no less than $600 million and growing rapidly because of the way the amortization is structured. The State Constitution requires this debt to be liquidated by 2029.

We often hear that 67% of our general fund budget is non-discretionary. Let’s pretend we don’t have to do a lot of these things and, just for the sake of argument, say only 55% should not be touched. That still leaves only $3.7 billion of state general fund on the table subject to cut and we certainly aren’t going to cut over half of that to solve a projected $2 Billion problem next year. And, by the way, remember that any of the current year deficit not liquidated this fiscal year will, by law, have to be added to that problem.

Take a look at John Bel Edwards’ first Executive Budget. It is balanced to the official revenue forecast of general fund revenue. Look at what is cut and where. Look closely.

http://www.doa.la.gov/opb/pub/FY17/FY17_Executive_Budget.pdf

For more details, look at the supporting document:

http://www.doa.la.gov/Pages/opb/pub/FY17/FY17ExecBudget.aspx

Now, finally, let’s get back to those dedicated funds. The Legislative Auditor has just released a comprehensive document detailing these dedications. He points out there were 370 dedicated funds in Fiscal Year 2013-2014 (the last year for which complete documentation is available), 344 statutory and 26 constitutional. Let’s see which ones of these we want to eliminate.

How about the $1.4 Billion Transportation Trust Fund? Our roads are in great shape, right? Plus, we blow part of this on public safety rather than roads and public safety certainly isn’t important, is it?

How about the $159 million in Lottery proceeds? Surely we can find a better use than education for that money. The $184 million in the Medicaid Trust Fund for the Elderly? We only have to change a statute to cut the old folks off. The Oil Spill Contingency Fund at $52.7 million? We never have oil spills, do we? And, why should we share $39 million of our severance taxes with the parishes where the minerals are severed? TOPS is draining us dry, so let’s free up that money and spend it elsewhere.

I’m being facetious, but, seriously, don’t you think there is a constituency for every one of those 370 dedications (except maybe the 21 that have no revenue or expenditures)? How many times have dedications been studied and how many have been eliminated so far? The Joint Legislative Committee on the Budget has reviewed 25% of these dedications every other year since 2009, but has made no recommendations for modifying or eliminating any of them.

Whatever we do with dedicated funds can’t and shouldn’t be done overnight. Many of them support local governments, but the Transportation Trust Fund is the largest of them all and, in addition to the Department of Transportation, other state departments and agencies derive substantial operating funds from dedications, most notably the Public Service Commission, the departments of Environmental Quality, Wildlife and Fisheries, Economic Development, Agriculture and Forestry, Natural Resources and Public Safety Services.

Shouldn’t we look at each dedicated fund in depth to determine it source, its purpose, and the extent to which collections exceed needs? Isn’t this just what the Joint Legislative Committee on the Budget should have done? Wouldn’t it have made a lot more sense to examine the historical inflows and outflows of each of these dedicated funds before creating a $442 million Overcollections Fund from their balances in FY 2014? This was yet another statutory dedication and a big reason statutory dedications spending rose so much. Worse, we then used the Overcollections Fund to pay for recurring expenses elsewhere – a significant part of why we are in our current mess.

Obviously, some collections in excess of needs should revert to the general fund. Others, justifiably, should not. In many cases, these funds are created from fees people pay for which they expect certain services. Some dedications to locals are used to service bonds.

Should we continue to look at potential modifications or eliminations of statutory dedication as a partial solution to our problems? Absolutely, but given our history and the realities of today, should we place an inordinate amount of blame for our current problems on them, or expect a miraculous cure to emerge from further study? I frankly don’t see why we would.

I urge you to look at the Legislative Auditor’s report here:

http://app.lla.state.la.us/PublicReports.nsf/0/13D9277344A19B9086257F560076E83A/$FILE/0000CAA1.pdf

It will give you a much better understanding of the dedications and is formatted in such a way as to drill down from a relatively high level to a very detailed level, so you can stop where you’d like and still gain valuable insight.

Let’s face it, as Gov. Edwards has said, if it is so easy to cut the budget, why has it not been cut to size long before now? This is particularly true in light of the fact we had a governor who travelled the United States for the past 8 years professing to be a budget cutter extraordinaire. If he actually cut expenditures to meet revenues and wrought such an economic miracle why do we find ourselves so out of whack? No, Virginia, it’s not just oil prices.

State Treasurer John Kennedy and others point to things the administration should do to eliminate fraud, abuse, and waste in state government. Who can disagree? To the extent these occur, we are all losers – the biggest are the intended beneficiaries of the services.

It is important that citizens believe their tax dollars and fees are being spent as wisely as possible or, at the minimum, that somebody is consistently and comprehensively trying to ensure this is the case. In my opinion, the accountability for this lies with the administration, not the legislative auditor or anybody else.

The administration has not yet provided specifics or even examples of what it plans to do about specific contracts that make no sense, bureaucratic structures that may be bloated, and more effective and efficient delivery of health care services. Gov. Edwards has said he will do something about these things, but he is yet to provide even anecdotal evidence like Kennedy and others to support his claim.

The executive branch needs to hold its appointed officials to the highest standards and demand they investigate dedications and everything else in the departments they are paid well to manage toward doing everything they possibly can to make our government as efficient and responsive as it can be. The public needs to know this is being done. They should not have to see an increasing succession of negative findings by the Legislative Auditor or, worse, disturbing reports of mismanagement and abuse in the media and elsewhere that go largely unanswered.

But, all that said, can these efforts bear fruit overnight? Can they come close to eliminating the gap? Look deeper than the rhetoric and you have to answer “no” and “no.”

One more link is below – an excellent presentation by the Louisiana House Fiscal Division done just a month ago. Check it out:

http://house.louisiana.gov/housefiscal/0112_16_OS_FiscalBriefing2.pdf

There is a lot of really good information out there from a variety of sources inside and outside government. Our decision-makers need to use it.

 

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LouisianaVoice, guest columnists unite in effort to hold Louisiana Legislature accountable during special session

Posted in Contract, Contracts, Corruption, Elections, Ethics, Finances, Governor's Office, Guest Columnist, Higher Education, House, Senate, Legislature, Legislators, Politicians, Revenue, Taxes, Transparency on February 14, 2016| 35 Comments »

The time has come to stop blaming Bobby Jindal. (Yeah, I know, I probably won’t. The man simply spread too much carnage during his eight clueless years occupying one office in theory while running for another in runaway delusional fantasy.)

But now it’s a new day and the torch of ineptness has been passed to his enablers, holdover members of the Louisiana House and Senate.

Legislators convened in Baton Rouge Sunday in special session to address a $900 million budget deficit for the remainder of this fiscal year and to take steps to head off a $2 billion budgetary shortfall for the next fiscal year, which begins July 1.

They have one chance to get it right. One chance, and one only.

If their performance over the last eight years is any indication, they won’t. Here’s why:

Louisiana elected officials who have signed the Americans for Tax Reform pledge
Paul Hollis* State Representative Republican
John Alario State Senate President Republican
Jack Donahue State Senate Finance chairman Republican
Gerald Long State Senator Republican
Fred Mills State Senator Republican
Barrow Peacock State Senator Republican
John Smith State Senator Republican
Steve Carter State Representative Republican
Greg Cromer State Representative Republican
Cameron Henry State Representative Republican
Dorothy Hill State Representative Democrat
Valarie Hodges State Representative Republican
Sam Jones State Representative Democrat
Dee Richard State Representative No Party
Alan Seabaugh State Representative Republican
Scott Simon State Representative Republican
John Schroder State Representative Republican
Kirk Talbot State Representative Republican

*Paul Hollis signed the federal Americans for Tax Reform pledge when he was running for U.S. Senate. He is not listed as one of the people who signed onto the state government pledge.

These are returning legislators who swore an oath to a man who does not live in Louisiana, who has never held office. Yet, he appears to command loyalty from a handful of legislators who feel it is more important to serve his interests over those of their constituents, the ones who elected them to office. (Rep. Dee Richard of Thibodaux told LouisianaVoice last year that when he signed the pledge, he had no idea who Norquist was and had never heard of him.)

The late C.B. Forgotston called it “the lowest of a lot of low points” in Louisiana’s sorry legislative history. He said legislators, who had “already abdicated their constitutional responsibility to Bobby Jindal” were pleading with a non-resident of Louisiana “for help doing their jobs.”

Eleven state representatives—we called them “The Elastic Eleven” at the time—turned their collective backs on their constituents in particular and on the state in general in order to suck up to Norquist and to advance their own political agenda. In short, they were afraid to take a bathroom break without Norquist’s permission.

Their letter to Grover Norquist sought his blessing before they voted to pass the Student Assessment for Valuable Education, or SAVE credit program, which created money out of thin air via a higher education tax credit to cover a nonexistent student fee. https://louisianavoice.com/2015/06/08/eleven-republican-members-of-house-ways-and-means-committee-go-groveling-to-grover-norquist-for-direction/

Now, thanks to that little shell game, Louisiana’s colleges and universities teeter on the brink of unmitigated disaster. It’s not as if we were never warned: https://louisianavoice.com/2015/06/05/save-guest-columnist-wonders-if-grover-norquist-holding-compromising-videos-of-louisiana-legislators-bobby-jindal/

So why should we expect a different outcome now?

For one thing, we no longer have a delusional governor hell bent on leaving Louisiana in the broad daylight for the White House. Now we have a grownup on the fourth floor and not a gaggle of adolescent Milton Friedman theorists who refuse to acknowledge the obvious.

LouisianaVoice offers a guest column by Dayne Sherman on the threat to higher education as well as this link to Stephen Sabludowsky’s Bayou Buzz political blog: http://www.bayoubuzz.com/bb/item/1061467-jon-bel-edwards-dogged-by-kill-lsu-save-the-tigers-mentality

Dayne Sherman resides in Ponchatoula. He is the author of two novels and he blogs at http://talkaboutthesouth.com/

Below is his guest column:

Don’t blame the messenger for TOPS crisis

Similar to Rip Van Winkle, Louisiana just awoke from a long sleep. Eight years to be exact. While Jindal wrecked the state, the citizens snoozed, except for a few political watchdogs here and there howling in the night to no avail.

The moment Louisiana resurrected was Thursday, Feb. 11 at 4 PM. Louisiana Gov. John Bel Edwards announced TOPS payments to universities were being suspended. TOPS, college scholarships, is the most beloved socialist welfare program in Louisiana history.

Residents went from deep slumber to screaming in minutes. With college football also on the chopping block, we now know the dead can indeed rise from the grave.

It’s time to face the facts. Louisiana has an enormous structural deficit, approximately $1 billion this year, and $2 billion next fiscal year.

However, despite a Republican governor in Jindal and a Republican dominated House and Senate who created this fiscal crisis, some are incredibly, amazingly, and even ignorantly blaming the new governor—just a month in office—for these cuts.

It can’t be said enough, as everyone should realize, Jindal and the senators and representatives we elected are to blame for this fiasco. John Bel Edwards was one of those heralding voices who fought the foolishness, and he was elected to fix the mess.

Look, Edwards wants to protect TOPS and higher education. But Louisiana can’t cut its way to prosperity, nor can the state print money. The special legislative session ironically starts on Valentine’s Day, though love will not be in the air.

This budget crisis can be fixed with responsible tax increases and realistic cuts, which is all Edwards has suggested. It’s simple but will take intestinal fortitude.

The Republicans in the House, led by Taylor Barras (the figurehead Speaker) and Cameron Henry (the real Speaker), have done nothing but try to hamstring the Edwards administration in order to score political points. Sources say plans have been crafted to end the session as soon as it starts and go home with nothing accomplished as a way to cripple the new governor.

Therefore, I am calling for a new Speaker vote on the first day of the session. Remove Barras and send Henry to the kiddie table where he belongs. I don’t care which Republican takes the helm, as long as he or she is willing to work with Edwards and quit playing obstructionist games detrimental to Louisiana.

My advice for those who care about Louisiana is to go see their legislators. Look them straight in the eye and say the Washington-style politics is over. Fix the budget and protect TOPS or resign. Raise taxes, craft a responsible budget, and save the state. No more failures. No more excuses. Put Louisiana first.

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Sorry Jindal legacy lives on in threat to accreditation of Louisiana colleges and universities for lack of funding

Posted in Budget, Corruption, Economy, Education, Ethics, Finances, Governor's Office, Higher Education, House, Senate, Legislature, Legislators, Lobbyist, Politicians, Revenue on February 12, 2016| 72 Comments »

The fecal matter is poised to strike the Westinghouse oscillating air manipulation device (the crap is about to hit the fan) and the citizens of Louisiana have no one to blame but Bobby Jindal (sorry, but I still can’t bring myself to call him governor) and the brain-dead legislators who, like so many sheep, for eight years obediently allowed him to lead the state off the fiscal cliff into the abyss.

In an LouisianaVoice exclusive, we have received a copy of a two-page letter from the Southern Association of Colleges and Schools Commission on Colleges (SACSCOC) which, by comparison, is to Gov. John Bel Edwards’ warning Thursday as Black Sabbath is to Pat Boone. SACSCOC LETTER

The letter, dated Feb. 11 (Thursday) was addressed to Commissioner of Administration Jay Dardenne with copies to Edwards, Senate Finance Committee Chairman Sen. Eric LaFleur, House Appropriations Committee Chairman Rep. Cameron Henry, Louisiana Commissioner of Higher Education Joseph C. Rallo, Ph.D., the Louisiana institutional members of SACSCOC, and SACSCOC Board of Trustees Chairman Mark E. Keenum, Ph.D.

At least one source told LouisianaVoice that Edwards possessed the letter at the time of his televised statewide address on Thursday but chose to attempt to soften the impact of the letter’s contents as much as possible while still sending a clear message to the legislature and the citizens of Louisiana.

SACSCOC is the regional accrediting body for 800 public, private and for-profit institutions of higher education in 11 southern states, including Louisiana. It is one of seven regional accrediting bodies recognized by the U.S. Department of Education to assure quality in higher education and to serve as the gatekeeper to federal financial aid (Title IV) for students in the region (emphasis ours). http://www.sacscoc.org/

The letter was signed by SACSCOC President Belle S. Wheelan, Ph.D.

“SACSCOC has become aware of the fact that because of the lack of financial resources from the state, the institutions the commission accredits may have to cease operation prior to the end of the current semester,” she wrote. “This would mean (1) students would not be able to complete classes and, subsequently, earn no credit for courses taken this semester, potentially impacting their financial and eligibility, and (2) payroll will not be met and bills would not be paid placing employees in an untenable financial situation as well as negatively impacting the credit ratings of the institutions.”

She said federal regulations dictate that any institution suspending operations or closure in the next several months must provide SACSCOC with a plan for how students can continue at another college or university. The commission, she said, would have to approve such a plan and could send students to another state. “This would create a tremendous hardship on students who might be unable to get a job because the completion of their degree is needed or, worst case scenario, they might drop out of college all together (sic).”

She said if the schools are unable to demonstrate continued financial stability or continue to enroll students, “the board of SACSCOC would have to consider a public sanction of the institutions or a withdrawal of their accreditation. Public sanctions have a chilling effect on the enrollment of potential students and withdrawal of accreditation results in the loss of federal financial aid.”

Wheelan served as president of two institutions and as Secretary of Education for the State of Virginia. As such, she said, “I am painfully aware of the difficulty state leadership has in making budgetary decisions but the lack of state funding is putting Louisiana colleges and universities in serious risk and placing students’ academic careers in jeopardy. I know the challenges are many but I believe it is important for you to know the impact your decisions will have before you finalize your plans.”

Here is the response to the letter which Gov. Edwards gave LouisianaVoice on Friday:

“The previous administration’s choice to make the largest disinvestment in higher education in the nation over the past seven years was a choice that would inevitably lead to devastating results. It is time to turn that around. If the legislature chooses to raise no new revenue in the special session starting Sunday, universities and colleges across our state together will face more than $200 million in cuts this fiscal year—and will have to implement those cuts over the next four months. Even if the legislature chooses to raise the revenue I am proposing, higher education still faces $42 million in cuts and a $28 million TOPS funding shortage this year. This is unsustainable. I am working with our legislature to develop solutions to stabilize Louisiana’s budget this year and going forward. These responsible steps can only help us maintain accreditation for our higher education institutions, as our students deserve.”

Edwards, in his address Thursday, said that the TOPS scholarship program had suspended payments because of the state’s pending $870 million budget deficit and the looming $2 billion budget hole facing legislators for the next fiscal year which begins on July 1.

In order to awaken anyone who might have been dozing off or who were ticked off for missing Family Feud or Wheel of Fortune (one Baton Rouge TV station opted for Wheel instead of carrying the governor’s speech, choosing instead to stream the speech on its Web site), Edwards also threw in the biggest threat of all: the possible necessity of (gasp!) cancelling collegiate football in 2016.

Well, if losing TOPS didn’t do the trick, you can bet your school jersey that got the attention of Louisiana’s masses. I mean, how could we possibly survive without watching a bunch of oversized, tutored adolescents strut around on the field after pile-driving an opposing quarterback head first into the turf at Tiger Stadium to the delight of 100,000 screaming maniacs?

Why, it would be downright unamurican!

Sure enough, Internet news pages predictably latched onto the football hook in covering Louisiana’s fiscal implosion. http://www.msn.com/en-au/sport/golf/lsu-football-in-danger/vp-BBpqNEV

http://sports.yahoo.com/blogs/ncaaf-dr-saturday/louisiana-budget-crisis-could-threaten-lsu-football-183232215.html

At least we now know what’s really important in this state (like we didn’t before?). Certainly it’s not the deplorable condition of the academic buildings falling down around LSU students that Bob Mann has been documenting in recent weeks on his outstanding blog post Something Like the Truth. http://bobmannblog.com/2016/01/24/sinking-flagship-a-new-look-at-lsus-middleton-library/

http://bobmannblog.com/2016/01/20/the-disgraceful-windows-of-lsus-hatcher-and-johnston-halls/

http://bobmannblog.com/2016/01/15/lsu-librarys-decay-is-symbolic-of-louisianas-misplaced-priorities/

http://bobmannblog.com/2016/01/29/mired-in-mediocrity-has-louisiana-higher-education-lost-the-battle/

But hey, who ever paid admission to watch a physics professor teach—other than students faced with ever-rising tuition costs?

And just how is all this legislators’ and Bobby Jindal’s fault?

The explosion of corporate tax breaks that were handed out during his administration, for openers.

Generous corporate tax incentives bleed revenue from state treasury, provide little other than political bragging rights

And there is the excellent series on corporate tax breaks published by the Baton Rouge Advocate: http://blogs.theadvocate.com/specialreports/

Along with the handouts to his corporate friends and supporters, Jindal also cut higher education more than any other state, another issue covered in depth albeit somewhat belatedly by The Advocate. State support to colleges and universities was cut by 55 percent during Jindal’s eight years with cuts having to be made up by painful tuition increases.

http://blueprintlouisiana.org/index.cfm/newsroom/detail/618

LSU President F. King (I would absolutely change my name—or drop the initial) Alexander fired the first real warning shot across the legislature’s bow last April with he revealed he had already drawn up plans for financial exigency (bankruptcy) as yet another higher education budget cut loomed.

It worked, in a fashion. The legislature responded by passing a phantom tuition increase offset by a phantom tax credit which was supposed to fix the problem (who bought into that?), but only after consulting with the god of No New Taxes, Grover Norquist. Norquist has never held public office but yet he mysteriously controls the puppet strings of legislators and congressmen as if holding the sword of Damocles over their collective heads with his idiotic “No New Taxes” pledge. Did the Republicans learn anything from George H.W. Bush’s infamous “Read my lips: no new taxes” promise in his 1988 nomination acceptance speech? Apparently not.

And therein lies the real problem. Why in hell did our legislators, led by a delusional man who would be president if only he could break the 1 percent barrier in the Iowa polls, answer to someone like Norquist and not the citizens of this state? That question needs to be addressed repeatedly to every legislator who went along with that shell game last year. “Mr. Legislator: why did you acquiesce to Grover Norquist like some pathetic, starving little puppy begging for table scraps?”

“For years, Louisiana’s colleges have stabilized funding with tuition and fee increases to offset declining direct support from the state,” said Public Affairs Research Council (PAR) President Robert Travis Scott when shown the letter by LouisianaVoice. “But we’ve reached the limits of those tactical maneuvers. Now we need a strategy to provide long-term financial stability for higher education while also getting a streamlined and accountable educational product in return,” he said.

State Rep. J. Rogers Pope (R-Denham Springs), a member of the House Education Committee, said the letter “makes you want to throw up.” He said the message in the letter is “devastating to all parents and students as well as our colleges. I don’t see that the legislative body will permit that to happen.”

Pope, a former school principal and retired Superintendent of Livingston Parish Schools, said he hoped that the legislature and Edwards can “forget partisan politics and work together to get us out of this deep hole dug by the previous administration. Losing accreditation is a major blow to the state’s financial and workforce capabilities.”

Another source said the situation “is dire” and that was why football was mentioned by Edwards in Thursday’s address. “If we lose accreditation, it’s all over regardless of how much money TAF (the Tiger Athletic Foundation, which helps support LSU athletics) has.”

The source, who asked not to be identified said, “This is the beginning of the multi-institutional collapse of historic proportions I’ve been predicting for years.”

As I have said here before, if you, the citizens of this state, choose to sit idly by and not question the actions, motives and obligations of legislators to lobbyists and corporate contributors, then you have become as much of the problem as Jindal and the legislators.

It’s up to you to hold your elected official accountable. If you don’t, if you can’t pull yourself away from football or Wheel of Fortune or Bachelor long enough to learn what your elected officials are doing, then stop whining.

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