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Archive for the ‘House, Senate’ Category

Caroline Fayard was right: some Republicans eat their own; π-yush teagues 2 GOP Appropriations Committee members

Posted in Ethics, Governor's Office, House, Senate, Legislature, Legislators, OGB, Office of Group Benefits, Politicians, Privatization, Teague on November 2, 2012| 13 Comments »

House Speaker Chuck “The Eunuch” Kleckley Friday removed House Appropriations Committee vice chairman Cameron Henry (R-Metairie) and Appropriations Committee member Joe Harrison (R-Gray) one day after each voted for a motion by Rep. Katrina Jackson (D-Monroe) that the administration opposed.

(Eunuch: (1) a castrated man placed in charge of a harem; (2) a man deprived of the testes or external genitals (3) one who lacks virility or power—Merriam-Webster Online Dictionary.)

Henry was reassigned to the House Civil Law and Procedure Committee while Harrison was moved to the House Commerce Committee.

When Sen. Dan Claitor (R-Baton Rouge) jokingly referred to himself as the “former member of the Senate Finance Committee” during Thursday’s joint hearings by the House Appropriations and the Senate Finance Committee, he was closer to the truth than even he wanted to admit.

Claitor had just objected to a motion by Senate President John Alario (R-Westwego) to defer action on the proposed contract between Blue Cross/Blue Shield (BCBS) and the state that called for BCBS to take over as third party administrator for the Office of Group Benefit’s (OGB) Preferred Provider Organization health coverage plan.

His objection forced a vote on Alario’s motion and the motion subsequently passed by a vote of 11-3 but the House never got a chance to vote because Commissioner of Administration Kristy Nichols pulled the contract from the committees’ agenda before the House members could vote on Rep. Katrina Jackson’s substitute motion to reject the contract.

Claitor, at this writing, still has his seat on the Senate Finance Committee but that, as Jindal has shown, is subject to change on very short notice.

The latest purge brings to four the number of legislators Gov. Piyush “The Putsch” Jindal has teagued this year for having the temerity to oppose the state’s absentee chief executive. Earlier this year, Reps. James Morris (R-Oil City) and Harold Richie (D-Bogalusa) were removed from the vice-chairmanship of their respective committees.

Morris was demoted from the House Natural Resources and Environment Committee for opposing Jindal’s decision to use one-time money to fund recurring expenses in the state’s General Budget. Richie opposed tax rebates for those who donate money to private and parochial schools.

Jindal has made it abundantly clear on several other occasions that dissention will not be tolerated in his administration. There is simply no room for dialog. This incredibly petulant governor has never learned that politics is the art of compromise. He has fired department heads, university presidents, physicians, attorneys, board members and rank and file employees at the slightest hint that they are not 100 percent on board with his agenda.

Jindal spokesperson Shannon Bates, of course, issued the standard denial that the administration had requested (read: demanded) that Harrison and Henry be removed.

The administration did provide a prepared statement from the governor who, as usual, is campaigning, ostensibly, for Mitt Romney in Ohio: Speaker (“Eunuch”) Kleckley is a fair-minded and proven leader,” Piyush (or Timmy Teepell or Kyle Plotkin—who knows who writes this stuff?) said. “We support the Speaker and the decisions he makes regarding the organization of House committees.”

While he didn’t say so, it is rumored that Jindal also has some ocean front property in Kansas that he’s willing to sell.

Just how long the legislature—and the state’s citizens—will stand for his unabashed grab for absolute control of every facet of state government is anyone’s guess but Henry and Harrison were livid over their ouster.

Harrison, interviewed by LouisianaVoice, said the occupants of the State Capitol’s fourth floor “are not people of good character. Their word is no good.”

Seven members of the Appropriations Committee are elected by members of the House—one from each congressional district—and Harrison was the leading vote getter for the position from the Third Congressional District when Kleckley (aka “Gelding”) approached him and asked that he withdraw as a candidate so that the second-leading vote-getter, Rep. Simone Champagne (R-Erath) could be on the committee. “He (Kleckley) said he would then appoint me and he promised that he would not remove me,” Harrison said.

Ironically, Champagne was promoted by Kleckley to Henry’s old vice chairmanship.

“I agreed and when he called me on the phone to tell me I was no longer on the committee, I reminded him of that. I said, ‘So, you are not a man of your word.’

“He didn’t even show me the dignity of calling me into his office to fire me; he did it over the phone. And he wouldn’t even give me a reason,” Harrison said of Kleckley. “He just said some other Republicans had complained about me. I asked, ‘Which Republicans, Timmy Teepell?’ He said, ‘I don’t take my orders from Timmy Teepell.’ I said, ‘Yeah, right.’”

Harrison lashed out at the administration, saying, “Everything they do (on the legislative committees) is scripted. I’m not making this up; I’ve seen the scripts. They hand out a list of questions we are allowed to ask and they tell us not to deviate from the list and not to ask questions that are not in the best interest of the administration.

“That is not how the State Constitution defines the three branches of government,” he said. “We no longer have a legislative branch of government.

“I don’t mind following men, but I don’t follow boys,” he said in obvious reference to the gaggle of young aides with which Jindal has surrounded himself. “We’re being directed by a bunch of youngsters on behalf of a man not even in the state. How can we, in the critical financial situation this state is in, have inept youngsters telling us what the governor wants when we don’t even see the man?”

He then singled out Jindal’s former chief of staff Timmy Teepell who resigned a year ago to hed up the Baton Rouge operations of OnMessage, a political consulting firm out of Maryland. OnMessage has no Baton Rouge address or phone number and Teepell apparently runs his consulting business from the governor’s office on the fourth floor of the State Capitol.

“Teepell is the puppeteer in this administration. How can you have a man serving as de facto head of state government who never went to school and who never interacted with other people while growing up? The man is anti-social,” Harrison said.

Henry was no less critical of Jindal.

“It is the job of legislators, particularly those serving in leadership roles, to ask the difficult questions necessary to ensure that taxpayer dollars are spent efficiently and wisely,” he said.

“I have been at odds with the speaker and the administration over fiscal issues for the last several years, asking questions about the constitutionality of the state budget; use of one-time and contingency money, fund sweeps and disastrous mid-year budget cuts that impact healthcare systems like LSU, as well as higher education.

“This action by the speaker and the governor demonstrates that they are afraid of having legislators do the job they were elected to do. The people of Louisiana are suffering as a result.”

He said what he called a series of “irresponsible decisions by the speaker and administration” demonstrate that they are not serious about fiscal discipline and following the Constitution.

“The State Constitution contains clear and strict limitations on the budget process for a very good reason,” he said. “These sensible limitations on deficit spending exist so that we can craft realistic, fiscally-responsible budgets through a transparent and deliberative process. Following the constitution is the only way to have a stable, sustainable budget that best serves the needs of the people, families and businesses of Louisiana.”

He said he was disappointed but not surprised at the administration’s action. He said Jindal and Kleckley were trying to ensure they had “yes-men and yes-women” on important committees who would trust the administration and not challenge it.

“We didn’t get elected to trust people. We got elected to ask questions,” he said.

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OGB opponents of BCBS contract savor π-yush crash and burn following four-hour committee hearing on Thursday

Posted in Budget, Civil Service, Contract, Contracts, Economy, Education, Governor's Office, Health Care, House, Senate, Jobs, Layoffs, Legislature, Legislators, OGB, Office of Group Benefits, Privatization on November 2, 2012| 6 Comments »

Lyndon Johnson once said he had no use for any politician who, 30 seconds after entering a crowded room, could not tell who was for him and who was against him.

He would have little use for Gov. Piyush Jindal, the governor’s hand-picked committee chairmen or his chief budget officer, Commissioner of Administration Kristy Nichols.

It took them four hours Thursday to determine there were not enough “fer-votes” to push through an administration-proposed contract that would have Blue Cross/Blue Shield of Louisiana serving as the third party administrator (TPA) of the Office of Group Benefits (OGB) Preferred Provider Organization (PPO).

The upshot was a four-hour hearing that instead of ending with celebratory fireworks for the administration, ended first with considerable confusion over Mason’s Rules of Order, and then a whimper as Nichols pulled the bill from the flames just before it was reduced to a pile of metaphorical ashes.

At the end of the day, State Rep. Katrina Jackson (D-Monroe) had Nichols, House Appropriations Committee Chairman Jim Fannin (D-Jonesboro) and Senate President John Alario (R-Westwego) circling the wagons in a desperate attempt to avoid further embarrassment.

But Jackson had lots of help. Several members of the two committees, primarily from the House Appropriations Committee, peppered Nichols with a barrage of questions with several legislators indicated that they had heard from hundreds of constituents and no one supported turning over the administration of the PPO to BCBS.

One of those, Rep. Rogers Pope (R-Denham Springs), a former Livingston Parish School Superintendent was critical of what he termed a lack of communication between the administration and education officials about the proposed changes.

But it was Mary Patricia Wray, legislative director for the Louisiana Federation of Teachers, who delivered the most withering criticism of the proposed contract, coupling it with a blistering attack of the Jindal administration’s onslaught against public schools.

“Some say the school districts will save money,” she said. “Some have mentioned savings of $35 million but one important fact has been overlooked. Many who tout these savings to school districts are the very parties who have crafted policies that have starved our public schools of the funding they so desperately need.”

Noting that while public school systems have received no increase in their per-pupil funding (Minimum Foundation Program funding) for more than four years, she said, “millions of dollars of funds constitutionally dedicated to our K through 12 public schools are going to leave this year to go to non-public schools of inferior quality.

“Moreover, this legislature approved a policy that provides un-capped tax rebates for donations to non-public schools while simultaneously our governor vetoed a bill that would have provided reasonably-capped rebates for donation to our inadequately-funded public schools.

“These priorities created the same emergency that their supporters now frantically want you to believe will be partially undone with your vote today—if you vote yes.

“So while the policies of the same administration that now asks you to support this contract have been consistently, habitually, and unapologetically to place funding public education at the very bottom of the priority, it seems a bit odd that they would take this moment to become proponents for the adequate funding of K through 12 education in our state.”

Wray called the proposed contract “fixing something that is not broken” and that it was “high on the administration’s list—and not because they suddenly care about adequately funding public schools they denigrate or supporting the institutions in which the teachers they humiliate are educating the next generation of Louisiana citizens.”

She said the policies of the Jindal administration “have starved government at every level. The lack of planning on their part should not and must not constitute an emergency for the people you serve. This contract may seem inconsequential but to the people served by OGB and to the people who elected you, it about doing the right thing, setting the right standards. Our public servants are more valuable than the rhetoric of the moment. They are more important than the flip-flop policy making that constantly puts them and their benefits in the crosshairs of our state’s budget crisis.”

But the real fun occurred over the last few minutes of the four-hour session.

It all started when Alario, after apparently realizing the numbers were there for concurrence by both the House Appropriations and Senate Finance committees, said, “We all know that change is difficult,” a rather odd observation given the Jindal administration has never considered the difficulties involved in change when he had the votes on such matters as education.

“I think we probably need to give a little more thought and a little more time on this issue,” he continued. “I’m going to suggest that we defer action on this matter today.”

Fannin immediately made an identical motion on behalf of the Appropriations Committee.

Before they could vote on Alario’s motion, however, Jackson offered a substitute motion to vote on the contract immediately. That motion passed the Appropriations Committee by a vote of 16-9. Voting for her substitute motion were Reps. Cameron Henry (R-Metairie), James Armes (D-Leesville), Jared Brossett (D-New Orleans), Henry Burns (R-Haughton), Roy Burrell (D-Shreveport), Brett Geymann (R-Lake Charles), Joe Harrison (R-Gray), Jackson, Edward James (D-Baton Rouge), Walt Leger (D-New Orleans), Helena Moreno (D-New Orleans), James Morris (R-Oil City), Pope, John Schroder (R-Covington), Patricia Smith (D-Baton Rouge) and Ledricka Thierry (D-Opelousas).

Voting no on Jackson’s substitute motion were Reps. Fannin, John Berthelot (R-Gonzales), Robert Billiot (D-Westwego), Chris Broadwater (R-Hammond), Simone Champagne (R-Erath), Charles Chaney (R-Rayville), Lance Harris (R-Alexandria), Bob Hensgens (R-Abbeville) and Anthony Ligi (R-Metairie).

In the voting along party lines, seven Republicans were evenly split on Jackson’s motion with seven for and seven against. Two Democrats voted no and nine voted yes.

Reps. Patrick Connick (R-Marrero), Franklin Foil (R-Baton Rouge) and Jack Montoucet (D-Crowley) were absent.

After that vote, presiding chairman Sen. Jack Donahue (R-Mandeville) attempted to call a Senate Finance Committee vote on Jackson’s substitute motion before being informed that someone from Finance had to make a similar motion. When no one did, Jackson’s motion died.

When he finally realized that the next vote needed to be on Alario’s motion to defer action, he announced the motion and asked if there were any objections and Sen. Dan Claitor (R-Baton Rouge) voiced his objection, forcing a roll call vote.

Claitor was able to inject some gallows humor into situation. When he voiced his dissent, he referred to himself as a “former Senate Finance Committee member” in reference to two other legislators—Reps. Harold Richie and Morris—who were demoted from their vice chairmanships of the House Committee on Insurance and House Natural Resources and Environment Committee, respectively.

They opposed Jindal and were summarily demoted. Richie opposed tax rebates for those who donate money to private and parochial schools while Morris fought Jindal over the governor’s decision to use one-time money to fund recurring expenses in the state’s General Budget.

The Senate members then voted 11-3 in favor of Alario’s motion to defer action. Those in favor of deferral included Donahue, Norby Chabert (R-Houma), Bret Allain (R-Franklin), Ronnie Johns (R-Lake Charles), Gerald Long (R-Natchitoches), Fred Mills (R-New Iberia), Dan “Blade” Morrish (R-Jennings), Greg Tarver (D-Shreveport), Francis Thompson (D-Delhi), Mike Walsworth (R-West Monroe) and Bodi White (R-Baton Rouge).

Voting against Alario’s motion to defer were Sens. Sherri Smith Buffington (R-Keithville), Claitor, and Ed Murray (D-New Orleans).

Sen. Eric LaFleur (D-Ville Platte) was absent.

Before a vote could then be taken on Fannin’s motion to defer consideration of the contract for one week, Jackson threw another curve at the proceedings by making a second substitute motion—this one to reject the contract outright.

That brought things to a screeching halt as it appeared no one knew what to do: a vote would be suicidal to proponents of the contract since the House committee seemed almost certain to go along with Jackson.

Morrish, after several minutes of total confusion, was finally recognized and asked, “What happens if the House votes to reject? If the substitute motion passes, where will the contract stand?”

“The contract is rejected,” responded Donahue.

“Even without a Senate vote?”

“With no Senate vote,” Donahue repeated. “If either body votes to reject, the contract is rejected.”

As more confusion reigned and amid the chatter that was reminiscent of a crowded room scene from a movie (only without the rattle of ice and the clinking of drink glasses), the barely audible word “adjournment” was suggested by someone on one of the committees at least twice.

Finally, after a full five minutes of idle chatter, Donahue explained that because it was a joint meeting of two individual committees and not a meeting of the Joint Committee on the Budget, “the rules are different.”

The only thing that needed to be done, however, was to call a vote on Jackson’s motion to reject the contract which, of course, would be a disaster for the administration.

Donahue, obviously in a quandary, began stalling. At that point, the two committees had been in session for four hours and five minutes.

At precisely 4:09:40, Nichols quietly slid back into a seat at the witness table in front of the committees looking defeated. Again, the word “adjourn” rose above the din from someone on one of the committees.

But right on cue, at 4:10:32, Donahue called on Kristy. “Commissioner, do you have anything you want to bring to the agenda at this time?”

It was almost as if his line was scripted.

“Mr. Chairman, I’d like to ask that the committee allow me to remove the contract from the agenda at this time,” she replied.

“I don’t think you need permission. You don’t need permission. You can just pull it from…”

“We’d like to come back at a later date,” she interrupted abruptly. “We’d like to pull it.”

It took another ten seconds for some to make the formal and more audible motion to adjourn.

In the words of the delightful Yogi Berra: It ain’t over ’til it’s over.

And in the immortal words of Walt Kelly in his wonderful Pogo comic strip: To be drug out.

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Let’s ask our state leaders: What were you thinking? Have you thought your actions through to a logical conclusion?

Posted in BESE, Boards, Civil Service, Commissions, Contract, Contracts, Education, Ethics, Governor's Office, Higher Education, House, Senate, Layoffs, Legislature, Legislators, OGB, Office of Group Benefits, Politicians, Privatization, Public Records on October 27, 2012| 17 Comments »

Whenever I see a story about some stupid criminal I find myself wishing I could be alone in a room with the poor sap just so I could ask him three questions:

• What was your thought process?

• Did you think this through to its logical conclusion?

• Did you ever, at any point in time, think this would end well for you?

That’s all. Just those three questions.

Until now, I had always limited this wish to stupid criminals:

• Like the guy who pulls up at the drive-through window of a bank and slips a note in it saying “This is a holdup.” The teller, pulls the drawer in, reads the note, flips it over and writes on the back, “I don’t see a gun,” and sends note back to the guy who obligingly puts his gun in the drawer and sends it in to the teller;

• Like the guy who writes his holdup note on any piece of paper with his name and address on it or who is wearing a work uniform with his name tag fully visible;

• Like the guy who tries to outrun police on the interstate;

• Like any idiot who tries to resist a half-dozen police officers;

You get the picture.

But now I have expanded my sentiments to wishing I could pose the same question to some of our bumbling state politicians—particularly our self-promoting, egocentric, ambitious, absentee governor who insists—with a straight face, no less—that he has the job he wants even as he ignores a multitude of problems at home while auditioning for any job that will promote his shameless career goals.

But there are others:

• Any legislator (like Noble Ellington or Jane Smith) who runs for office on the promise of looking out for the folks back home but then accepts a six-figure salary in some department for which he or she has zero qualifications. What were you thinking?

• Any agency head (like Louisiana Workforce Commission Executive Director Curt Eysink) who sends out an email saying there will be no merit raises for employees because of budgetary constraints while almost simultaneously approving a 41 percent increase for a single employee. What were you thinking?

• Any agency head (like Department of Health and Hospitals Secretary Bruce Greenstein) who would attempt to withhold the name of the winner of a $300 million contract with DHH from a legislative committee charged with confirming his appointment as secretary. What were you thinking?

• Any agency head (like Department of Natural Resources Secretary Scott Angelle) who would resign in the middle of a major crisis involving a potentially toxic sinkhole in order to selfishly run for a public office that he thinks will set him up for a run for governor in 2015? What were you thinking?

• Any agency head (like Alcohol and Tobacco Control Office Commissioner Troy Hebert) who would send a uniformed agent to inspect bars where she had recently worked undercover and purchased drugs from dealers. What were you thinking?

• Any agency head (like Superintendent of Education John White) who, on the night before he was to testify before a legislative committee about the New Living Word school in Ruston, sent emails to the governor’s office that he would try to “take some air out of the room” and to “muddy up” the narrative over the his approval of 315 vouchers for the school that had no classrooms, no desks and no teachers. What were you thinking?

• Any agency head (like White) who, within a matter of a few weeks, would hire a $144,000 part-time public relations officer from Florida and a consultant from Los Angeles to serve as a shill for the Department of Education’s (DOE) computer Course Content at a salary of $146,000—both of whom are allowed to commute and/or work from their homes. What were you thinking?

• Any agency head who, while giving no merit increases for three years and while even laying off rank and file employees, continues to give healthy salary increases to employees already earning in excess of $100,000 per year. What were you thinking?

• Any legislator who sees nothing wrong with private Christian schools receiving vouchers but who goes ballistic when it is learned that an Islamic school applied for vouchers under the same program. What were you thinking?

• Any governor who, while busy traveling all over the country promoting his aspirations for a cabinet position should Mitt Romney be elected president, approves closures of and budgetary cutbacks for state hospitals where cutbacks and closures result in the loss of treatment availability for indigent citizens. What were you thinking?

• Any governor who, while spewing outright lies in his many out-of-state visits about how he has the most ethical, most transparent and accountable administration in the country, continues to hide his office behind a veil of secrecy, refusing to provide public records or to grant media interviews. What were you thinking?

• Any inaccessible, unreachable, unavailable, unaccountable governor who, in an attempt to further shroud public agencies from having to answer directly to Louisiana citizens, attempts to force disputes with state agencies to be handled via telephone hearings instead of face-to-face hearings. What were you thinking?

• Any legislator who allows this governor and these bureaucrats to snub their collective noses at the citizens of this state with their arrogant actions and their attitude of defiance and mockery.

• Any citizen of Louisiana who would rather watch Dancing with the Stars than hold these sorry excuses for public servants accountable.

What the hell are any of you thinking?

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Administration moving forward with presenting OGB layoff plan to Civil Service despite shortage of votes on Thursday

Posted in Attorney General, Governor's Office, Health Care, House, Senate, Legislature, Legislators, OGB, Office of Group Benefits, Privatization, Transparency on October 18, 2012| 7 Comments »

LouisianaVoice has learned that Gov. Piyush Jindal plans to move forward with submitting a layoff plan for the Office of Group Benefits (OGB) to the State Civil Service Commission despite failing to obtain sufficient votes to gain legislative approval of a contract with Blue Cross/Blue Shield (BCBS) for the privatization of the agency.

The Jindal administration has been trying for more than a year and a half to privatize the agency that provides health and life insurance coverage to some 226,000 state employees, retirees and their dependents.

Along with efforts to privatize the agency, Jindal is attempting to lay off 177 OGB employees in a move he claims will save the state $20 million despite an initial cost of $70 million of the current OGB fund balance that will be used to pay BCBS to become the agency’s third party administrator (TPA).

State Rep. Katrina Jackson (D-Monroe), who has been lobbying her fellow House members to oppose the BCBS contract, said Jindal has provided no supporting documentation for the projected savings despite several requests that he do so.

“The Office of Group Benefits does not cost the state any money,” Jackson said on Wednesday. “It is a healthy plan that has always remained viable while offering state employees excellent health care benefits.”

The problem with any effort by the administration to gain approval of its anticipated layoff plan is that justification for any layoff approval is limited to two factors found in chapter 17 of the civil service rules.

http://www.civilservice.la.gov/publicationsnotifications.asp

To approval a layoff plan, the Civil Service Commission must have irrefutable evidence that there is either:

• A lack of funds to continue paying the employees;

• A lack of work sufficient to justify retaining the employees.

The administration, of course, could push the argument that with the contract with BCBS, there would be insufficient work for the 177 employees to perform at OGB.

That argument, however, would revert back to an attorney general’s opinion that legislative concurrence would be required before the contract with BCBS could become effective.

That attorney general’s opinion was initially requested by Jackson who contended that the legislature should be a part of the decision-making process.

And that brings everything back to Thursday’s joint meeting of the House Appropriations Committee and the Senate Finance Committee which was supposed to take up that very issue.

As both sides were still jockeying to line up votes Wednesday afternoon, word came down that the administration had pulled the item from joint committee agenda. The reasons for the deletion varied, depending upon who did the explaining.

Jackson said the delay was simply a matter of the administration’s failure to muster enough votes for approval of the contract.

House Appropriations Chairman Jim Fannin (D-Jonesboro) said the committee members did not receive the 80-page BCBS contract until Tuesday and had not had an opportunity to review it.

The governor’s office, however, said that several key members of the committee were scheduled to be out of town, so the decision was made to postpone the vote.

The reasons given by Fannin and the administration do not mesh but then legislators have been complaining for some time about a lack of communication between lawmakers and the governor’s office.

The civil service rules and the failure of the joint committee to take up the BCBS contract could present a classic Catch-22 scenario if the administration does follow through as planned.

What initially was touted by the administration as an efficiency move designed to save the state millions of dollars seems to have become a secondary issue to one of Jindal’s obsession of having his way, of winning at all costs.

The latest decision to try and push through a layoff plan appears to be an indication that he is determined to prevail in a game in which he is on one side of a metaphoric chess board and legislators on the other. In the middle are the pawns that he appears all too willing to sacrifice in order to gain an advantage.

Those pawns are state employees.

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Notable Quotables (in their own words)

Posted in Civil Service, Governor's Office, Health Care, House, Senate, Legislature, Legislators, Notable Quotables, OGB, Office of Group Benefits, Privatization on October 17, 2012| 1 Comment »

“We just got the contract yesterday and we need to give people an opportunity to look at it,” said Fannin, who added that the contract was nearly 80 pages.”

—House Appropriations Committee Chairman Jim Fannin, explaining the reason for cancelling Thursday’s joint meeting of the Appropriations Committee and the Senate Finance Committee to consider approving the contract for Blue Cross/Blue Shield of Louisiana (BCBS) to take over operations of the Office of Group Benefits. The governor’s office, however, said the reason for the cancellation was that key committee members were scheduled to be out of town.

That would be an oops moment…

…and another good argument for better communications between legislators and Piyush.

“Although we can be somewhat sure that the administration will continue in its attempt to gain committee votes for approval of this effort, it is our hope that the legislature will continue to stand strong and operate as a separate, co-equal branch of government.”

—State Rep. Katrina Jackson (D-Monroe), in a more plausible prepared statement following cancellation of Thursday’s joint meeting of the House Appropriations and Senate Finance committees to consider approval of the BCBS contract to take over as third party administrator (TPA) of the Office of Group Benefits (OGB). In reality, the meeting was most likely cancelled after Gov. Piyush Jindal’s office realized it did not have the votes for approval of the contract. Jackson is a member of the House Appropriations Committee.

“Legislators’ votes just went up in price.”

—C.B. Forgotson.

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