Posted in BESE, Education, Governor's Office, Notable Quotables, Transparency on December 1, 2011| 1 Comment »
“Article 8 Section 1 of the Louisiana Constitution gives the responsibility for public education to the Legislature not the Governor. His sole role is the appointment of his three members of the Board. BESE’s selection is subject to the approval by the Senate. Any interference with this process is abuse of power by the Governor. There are separation of power laws.”
–Contribution from anonymous reader.
Posted in BESE, Ethics, Governor's Office, Transparency on November 30, 2011| 1 Comment »
The Louisiana Ethics Board recently announced it was investigating Livingston Parish Tax Assessor Jeff Taylor for his involvement in the local race for Livingston Parish President. Taylor sent out letters to Livingston Parish voters endorsing challenger Layton Ricks over incumbent Mike Grimmer. Ricks won in a runoff with 56.8 percent of the vote.
The ethics board said it was investigating the propriety of Taylor’s involving himself in the election with his letter. The letter was sent out under his private letterhead but included the telephone number of the tax assessor’s office. Taylor said the inclusion of the telephone number was an oversight. Taylor also said he spent his own money on the mailout.
The Board is looking into whether the flier violated state law which says public servants can’t use their authority to coerce people to engage in political activity.
If the ethics board can somehow find wrongdoing in Taylor’s involvement in the race, it will be interesting to see how it treats the presence of Jindal’s heavy hand in the BESE elections. In those races, his campaign generated automated phone calls in which he used his voice, his name, his influence and the status of the governor’s office to urge voters to cast ballots for his favored candidates—including Chas Roemer and Jay Guillot, among others. Moreover, Jindal contributed thousands of dollars from his own campaign war chest to favored candidates. That would seem to qualify as a public servant using his authority to coerce people (voters) to engage in political activity.
Frankly, it’s quite a stretch to define the activities of either Taylor or Jindal as illegal or even unethical. A public servant’s use of his authority to coerce his employees to engage in political activity would be illegal but Taylor’s letter went to voters throughout Livingston Parish–not just to his employees. Jindal? His biggest sin was to become a nuisance during the campaign. It got a little tiresome to pick up the phone and hear a pre-recorded message from the governor. A live call from Jindal would at least afford the opportunity for a little voter feedback but it’s somewhat unfulfilling giving a Bronx cheer to a recording.
There are other matters that warrant the board’s consideration as well.
Jay Guillot, recently elected to the District 5 seat on the Louisiana Board of Elementary and Secondary Education (BESE), won’t have to bother getting an opinion from the ethics board on the propriety of his serving on a state board while holding a multi-million dollar state contract.
LouisianaVoice has saved him the trouble.
Guillot, for whatever reason, neglected to get an opinion from the ethics board prior to qualifying to run against incumbent Keith Guice. Guillot won the election with 54.6 percent of the vote, thanks in large part to the support of Gov. Bobby Jindal who, along with other key donors, poured tens of thousands of dollars into Guillot’s and other BESE candidates’ campaigns.
A sampling of contributions to Guillot included $5,000 from the Jindal campaign committee; $7,100 from the state Republican Party for television advertising; $10,000 from ABC Pelican Political Action Committee; $4,000 from Charter Schools USA of Ft. Lauderdale, Florida; $5,000 from the Louisiana Federation for Children; $5,000 from ISC Constructors, a contributor to ABC Pelican PAC; $5,000 from another ABC contributor, Cajun Industries; $5,000 from Todd Grigsby, an executive for ISC Constructors, and $10,000 from New York City Mayor Michael Bloomberg.
Guillot contacted Ruston’s Morning Paper on Sunday to say that his attorney, Jimmy Faircloth, Jr., would complete his request to the ethics board for an opinion on his legal status sometime this week but that the agency for the board is closed for December. That would mean that the board would not be able to consider a request from Fairchild until January—after Guillot is sworn in at BESE’s January meeting.
But not to worry; LouisianaVoice got its request in on November 2, one day before the cutoff for the December 15-16 agenda.
In fact, the request submitted by LouisianaVoice was two-pronged:
• Should Guillot be allowed to serve on a state board when he simultaneously holds nearly $17 million in contracts with the state—one contract alone is for $16 million?
• Should Chas Roemer be allowed to continue to make motions and vote on matters coming before BESE pertaining to charter schools when his sister, Caroline Roemer Shirley, serves as executive director of the Louisiana Association of Public Charter Schools?
Normally, a candidate in Guillot’s position would have sought an ethics opinion long before qualifying for and spending tens of thousands of dollars on a bitter campaign for public office.
Guillot, in fact, showed no inclination to seek such an opinion until pressed by the Morning Paper and even then, his responses were vague and non-definitive.
With the latest revelation that he would seek an opinion after all, only caused further head-scratching at his choice of legal counsel for the request.
Faircloth is the one-time and once-again legal counsel for Jindal and was apparently retained by Guillot to make the inquiry of the ethics board. That, in itself, would seem to be a conflict of interest, given Jindal’s political and financial support for Guillot’s candidacy and the governor’s tacit yet unmistakable influence on the board.
But it’s not as if Faircloth, who worked from January 2008 until July 2009 as Jindal’s executive counsel and now is again employed by the governor’s office, is unfamiliar with the ethics board and breaches in ethics.
On March 18 of this year Faircloth signed a consent judgment in which he agreed to pay a $1,000 fine for accepting $7,000 in fees for representing the Louisiana Tax Commission, beginning on Jan. 12, 2010. State law requires a waiting period of one year before a former state employee may represent a state agency.
He did the work for the tax commission under a $20,000 contract approved by the Attorney General’s office and the Office of Risk Management. Faircloth’s entering into the contract was in violation of Section 1113D(3)(a) of the Code of Governmental Ethics, according to the ethics board.
So now it comes down to what the board will decide and what board attorney Tracy Barker will write regarding Docket No. 2011-1688 later this month.
Posted in Governor's Office, House, Senate, Legislature, Legislators, Transparency on November 17, 2011| 5 Comments »
Perhaps we were a bit hasty in our last blog in which we accused Gov. Bobby Jindal of finding a parade, jumping out in front and yelling, “Follow me!”
That was written after Jindal issued his executive order directing any employee of a public college or university who witnesses child abuse or neglect to report it to law enforcement within 24 hours.
In typical Jindal grandstanding, the governor was attempting to jump aboard the bandwagon of understandable public fury over the sex scandal swirling around former Penn State defensive coach Jerry Sandusky and young boys left in his care.
It must be pointed out, however, that the indignant outrage he apparently felt over the mess at Penn State University did not carry over to the abhorrent behavior of his fellow Republicans in the Michigan State Senate.
In Michigan, Matt Epling was a child who was subjected to constant bullying in middle school in East Lansing. His last day of eighth grade, he was given a “Welcome to high school” beating. When school officials did nothing, his parents went to police. Matt, fearful of retribution from the bullies, committed suicide.
Over the next nine years, another 10 students subjected to regular bullying killed themselves—all while the Michigan legislature did nothing because Republican lawmakers repeatedly blocked attempts to pass an anti-bullying law.
This year another attempt was made and Republican State Sen. Rick Jones tacked on an amendment that said torment is not bullying if “a sincerely held religious belief or moral conviction” is behind the bully’s actions.
That’s right, it’s not bullying if the bully says he has a moral or religious hatred of Jews, Muslims, gays or blacks.
The law as amended by Republicans also specifically addresses cyber bulling—but only if the bully uses “a device owned or under control of a school district”—not a student’s personal cell phone. Finally, Republicans withheld support of the bill until it was agreed that school officials would not be held accountable for failing to act.
Matt’s father, Kevin Epling described the bill as “government-sanctioned bigotry.”
The bill passed with 26 Republicans voting in favor and 11 Democrats voting no.
Democratic State Sen. Gretchen Whitmer called the amendment a “blueprint for bullying.” She told her fellow lawmakers, “Here today, you claim to be protecting kids, and you’re actually putting them in more danger.” Her speech on the senate floor went viral last week and the resulting pressure forced Smith to back off on his amendment, all while Jindal remained strangely quiet.
No bandwagon there.
Nor, apparently has the governor displayed any moral outrage over the failure of the Louisiana Legislature to pass HB 112 earlier this year.
HB 112, by Rep. Austin Badon (D-New Orleans), would have prohibited “harassment, intimidation, and bullying of students by students” and further defined such terms as including “intimidating, threatening, or abusive gestures or written, verbal or physical acts motivated by actual or perceived characteristics including race, color, religion, ancestry, national origin, sexual orientation, gender, gender identity or expression, physical characteristic, political persuasion, mental disability, and physical disability, as well as attire or association with others identified by such categories.”
Actually, such a law is already on the books in Louisiana. The law, R.S. 17:416.13(B), for some inexplicable reason, however, exempts six parishes: East and West Feliciana, East Baton Rouge, St. Helena, Tangipahoa and Livingston. Badon’s bill would have removed those exemptions.
HB 112 also would have further defined the terms “harassment,” “intimidation,” and “bullying” to include “any intimidating, threatening, or abusive gesture or written, verbal, or physical act by a student directed at another student occurring on school property, on a school bus, or at a school-sponsored event.”
So, how did the vote come down on HB 112?
It failed by a vote of 43-54—even after the bill was watered down with amendments that deleted references to “race, color, religion, ancestry, national origin, sexual orientation, gender, gender identity, or physical disability.” In other words, even after the bill was rendered toothless, it still couldn’t pass the smell test of the Louisiana Legislature.
More importantly, how did the vote fall in the six affected parishes, which are still exempted from R.S. 17:416.13(B)?
As might be expected, the vote was split right down party lines with six Democrats voting in favor of bringing their parishes into compliance and seven Republicans voting against the measure.
The Democrats voting in favor of HB 112 included Reps. Regina Barrow, Stephen Carter, Dalton Honore, Michael Jackson and Patricia Smith, all of Baton Rouge, and John Bel Edwards of Amite.
Republicans voting against the bill were Reps. Franklin Foil, Hunter Greene, Erich Ponti and Clifton Richardson of Baton Rouge, Mack “Bodi” White and Rogers Pope of Denham Springs, and Tom McVea of Jackson.
Rep. Alan Seabaugh (R-Shreveport) said, “This bill was intended to promote an agenda and force teaching alternative lifestyles to our children.”
Excuse me? At precisely what point did protecting children become a teaching tool for alternative lifestyles? How did someone this delusional ever get elected?
Incredibly, Seabaugh didn’t know when to shut up. He continued: “Every person who testified (on behalf of the bill) was either gay or testifying on behalf of someone who is gay, so let’s not delude ourselves about the intent of this bill. This language (in the bill) is straight out of the lesbian, gay, transgender playbook.” So just how was it that he came to be such an authority on that particular playbook?
And is this really where the governor wishes to align himself politically? Where was Bobby Jindal’s outrage, his moral indignation, his concern for the “health, safety and best interests of our children” that he trumpeted in issuing his executive order in reaction to the higher-profile Penn State scandal when this bill came up for consideration?
You would find those emotions hiding behind the Louisiana Family Forum, which called HB 112 part of the “homosexual agenda.”
Where was Jindal’s apprehension for the children of Michigan?
Apparently it could be found cowering in the same dark shadows as those 26 Michigan Republicans.
No parade for Piyush to lead there.
Posted in Broadband, Internet, Campaign Contributions, Charters, Contract, Contracts, Education, Governor's Office, Grant, Grants, Privatization, Transparency on November 16, 2011| 1 Comment »
U.S. Sen. Mary Landrieu says Gov. Jindal “fumbled” on two grants that cost the state $140 million but in fairness to Jindal, he now has a chance to dwarf those losses by blowing an additional $390 million in FEMA money to mitigate damage caused by two major hurricanes in 2005.
The word out of Baton Rouge this week is that the state will receive an additional $389.6 million from FEMA for flood prevention of homes, levees and public buildings.
But don’t hold your breath.
The state has received $1.4 billion in hazard mitigation money already after FEMA assessed damages from hurricanes Katrina and Rita.
The state might yet receive the money, however, despite the loss of two earlier federal grants of $60 million and $80 million. That’s because this money was secured through the efforts of the state’s congressional delegation and was not hampered by the Jindal administration.
The additional hazard mitigation money can be used by property owners to elevate or retrofit homes with additions such as hurricane-proof windows and storm shutters and local governments may use the money to repair levees, improve drainage and strengthen school buildings and other public facilities.
Most of that money is expected to be used in the parishes of Cameron, St. Bernard and Orleans, areas especially hard-hit by Katrina and Rita in 2005.
“As we did after Hurricane Gustav and Hurricane Ike, we are sending these dollars directly to parishes because local leaders know how to best protect our communities from future losses in the event of another natural disaster,” Jindal said.
That would represent something of a departure for the Jindal administration which has thus far fought, at least publicly, to resist federal funding but has never shied away from taking credit when he passes out checks during Sunday morning visits to north Louisiana protestant churches.
Jindal no doubt hopes the $390 million bonus will help him save face after his rumblin’, bumblin’, stumblin’ performances with two other grants.
The first, $60 million in early childhood education funding was lost when the administration simply decided not to apply for the money.
The second was an $80 million grant from the U.S. Department of Commerce to fund a project to install 900 miles of cable to bring broadband internet connection to 21 rural parishes.
The $60 million grant would have been the third round of Race to the Top dollars and was to have been used to improve the quality of early learning and closing the achievement gap for children with high needs resulting largely from poverty.
Commissioner of Administration Paul Rainwater called U.S. Sen. Mary Landrieu’s criticism of Jindal “disappointing.” Rainwater once worked with Landrieu but now is the mouthpiece of the administration. He said the state punted on the $60 million because the state studied the grant and decided that it would not have expanded early childhood education but rather would have targeted programs the state has already been addressing. He neglected to say what those programs were.
Rainwater also said the money would have had strings attached that would have meant more federal control over the education system.
The state, of course, is far above that. No control over local school systems by the state with this administration. Just pull funding from the public school systems and divert it into charter schools. No control there. All the local systems have to do to compensate for the lost funds is layoff teachers. What control?
Landrieu disagreed. “All the federal government is doing is offering them money with virtually no strings attached except for basic accountability,” she said.
The truth probably lies somewhere in between the two positions, but so what? If you borrow money from the bank, there are usually strings attached, such as for what purpose the money will be used and how it will be repaid. That’s life.
Basic accountability is something the state has found lacking in some areas, most notably with payment for the $239 million Jindal sand berms built at the governor’s insistence as an effort to stem the flow of oil from the April 2010 BP Deepwater Horizon explosion and subsequent blowout. That failed effort was monumental in scope. Not only did the berms wash away but so too did the heavy dredging equipment brought in to construct the berms—all swallowed up in the Gulf waters.
That was bad enough but then along came the Legislative Auditor’s office that issued a report earlier this month that the state overpaid Shaw Environmental and Infrastructure, Inc. by nearly $495,000 to build the oh-so-temporary and oh-so-useless berms.
It’s not the first time Shaw’s name has surfaced in questionable costs.
Immediately after Katrina devastated New Orleans, Shaw was awarded a no-bid contract to cover storm-damaged roofs across New Orleans with those familiar blue tarps. Each tarp covered 100 square feet, meaning the average home would require 15 tarps to fully protect its roof. There were literally tens of thousands of those homes in and around New Orleans.
Shaw’s contract called for it to receive $175 per square (one tarp, or 100 square feet). That did not include the cost of the tarps because they were provided by FEMA. The $175 was just for labor. (That, by the way, comes to about $2,600 per house—not much below what it would cost to simply re-roof the home.)
Shaw promptly hired a subcontractor to install the tarps at $75 per square. That meant Shaw would net $100 per square for doing absolutely nothing. Multiply that by 15 per house ($1,500 net per house) times the thousands of houses getting the tarps and well, you get the picture.
The subcontractor then found his own subcontractor and paid him $35 per square, leaving the first subcontractor with a neat profit of $40 per square, or roughly $600 per house for doing zilch.
The second subcontractor then found laborers who actually installed the tarps—at $2 per square. Is this what they meant by trickle-down economics?
But back to the grants.
When the Public Service Commission demanded answers it got the typical bureaucratic shuffle from Rainwater and Board of Regents President Jim Purcell.
The blame, they said, lay alternatively with the legislature which took too long to approve spending, a contractor whom they said was late with his work (the contractor denies that) and the Obama administration, which Rainwater said “wants to run the car companies, the banks, our entire health care system, and now they want to take over the broadband business.
“We won’t stand for that in Louisiana,” he sniffed.
That little bit of defiance resurrected echoes of Leander Perez in his efforts to defy the federal government’s insistence on school desegregation more than a half-century ago. At the time, Gov. Earl K. Long reminded Perez in not-so-gentle terms of the realities of the day when he bellowed to the arch-segregationist, “What you gonna do now, Leander? The feds have the A-bomb!”
Probably Jindal’s frittering away the $80 million has more to do with campaign contributors than any philosophical differences over federal influence.
The broadband project would have connected to the Louisiana Optical Network Initiative (LONI), a 1,600-mile fiber-optic network that connects Louisiana and Mississippi research universities to National LambdaRail and Internet2, which would connect 100,00 households, 15,000 businesses and 150 schools, libraries and hospitals.
A Jindal campaign contributor whom the governor appointed to the Board of Regents, Ed Antie of Carencro, was forced to resign earlier this year amid revelations during Senate confirmation hearings that he had a $531,000 contract with the Regents through one of his companies to provide fiber-optic cables to LONI, which is overseen by the Regents.
“Straight baloney,” said Public Service Commissioner Foster Campbell of Rainwater’s contention that the broadband internet project would result in unfair competition with private providers.
“We’ve been begging the private providers to build broadband infrastructure in the rural areas of the Delta and they won’t do it,” Campbell said. “I don’t give a damn if the companies object. If they won’t do it on their own, then does that mean we should just sacrifice these poor parishes’ and people’s chance to be connected?”
Campbell said he wants the state’s major telecoms, Rainwater and Purcell to attend the next PSC meeting. “I want to know the providers who objected,” he said.
At one point in the hearings, Campbell, whose position is not appointive but elective, found it necessary to remind Rainwater, “I don’t work for you.”
That must have come as quite a shock to both Jindal and Rainwater who, without Timmy Teepell to hold their hand, were probably unable to locate a copy of the State Constitution that would verify Campbell’s unexpected revelation.
Posted in ALEC, American Legislative Exchange Council, Campaign Contributions, Education, Governor's Office, House, Senate, Legislature, Legislators, Prison, Privatization, Transparency on November 9, 2011| 2 Comments »
Follow the money.
It’s an axiom as old as politics itself and it is clearly evident in the examination of efforts to privatize various segments of state government in Louisiana.
Take state prisons and public education as two cases in point. The Jindal administration is pushing for both against stiff opposition. But outside influence is being brought to bear that would seem to tilt the scales heavily in the favor of the administration.
Take the organization once known as All Children Matter, headed up by one Elizabeth DeVos. The organization changed its name to the American Federation for Children after All Children Matter was fined $5.2 million for campaign money violations in 2006.
All Children Matter made 56 campaign contributions totaling more than $67,000 between November 2003 and January 2010. Those 56 contributions ranged from as little as $500 to as much as $2,000 to a host of Louisiana candidates, including $1,000 in 2007 to Lt. Gov. Jay Darden, then running for secretary of state; five donations totaling $6,500 to State Sen. Ann Duplessis. Duplessis was rejected in June of this year by the Louisiana Senate as Jindal’s nominee to serve on the LSU System Board of Supervisors.
While All Children Matter did not contribute directly to Jindal’s three gubernatorial campaigns, Elizabeth DeVos and husband Richard made six individual contributions to Jindal totaling $16,000 between June of 2003 and August of 2008.
Elizabeth DeVos’s brother Erik Prince heads up Xe Corp., formerly Blackwater, a firm that gained considerable notoriety for privatizing warfare as the largest supplier of mercenary soldiers in the world.
The Walton family, long a proponent of charter schools, also contributed $13,500 to Jindal from June of 2003 to September of 2007.
K12 contributed $5,000 to the Jindal campaign in September of 2007 and in October of 2011, gave $1,000 to the campaign of State Sen. Jean-Paul Morrell (D-New Orleans) and $500 to Board of Elementary and Secondary Education (BESE) candidate Holly Boffy (R-Lafayette).
K12, Inc., based in Reston, VA., is funded by the Milken Family Foundation and is run by Lowell Milken. It is the brainchild of Lowell Milken’s brother Michael Milken, the Wall Street “junk bond king,” who was jailed for violation of U.S. securities laws.
Students First of Baton Rouge contributed $5,000 to the campaign of BESE member Chas Roemer in September of this year. The founder and national CEO of Students First is Michelle Rhee, better known as the former chancellor of the Washington, D.C. public school system where suspiciously high test-score gains in 41 Washington schools while she was chancellor led to revelations of a high rate of erasures by teachers. In one class, 97 percent of erasures were from wrong answers to correct ones.
With prison privatization, things are pretty much the same.
A private operation of prisons is a high-dollar enterprise worth millions to the private owners. States and the federal government each pay private operators to house prisoners and private prison owners are clamoring for the business, thanks to legislation successfully pushed by the conservative American Legislative Exchange Council (ALEC).
In addition to charging the state and federal governments on a per diem basis, private-run prisons also make money in other ways.
In Florida, minimum security inmates produce tons of beef, chicken and pork for Prison Rehabilitative Industries and Diversified Enterprises (PRIDE) at 20 cents per hour for re-sale to schools to feed students–at considerable mark-ups.
ALEC has worked diligently to pass state laws to benefit two of its major corporate sponsors, Corrections Corporation of America (CCA) and the GEO Group. One of those laws was SB 1070, Arizona’s notorious immigration law that helps keep CCA prisons filled to capacity with immigrant detainees.
The Prison Industries Enhancement (PIE) Certification Program has allowed the State of Florida to pay minimum wage to prisoners for PIE-certified work. But 40 percent is taken out of their accounts for room and board—the rent of cell space to offset the costs of incarceration, a requirement not too many would object to. They are, after, all prisoners serving time for crimes.
But the regulations specifically forbade the shipment of prisoner-made goods such as furniture, solar panels, and even guided missile parts across state lines.
The Prison Industries Act changed that by allowing a third-party company to set up a local address in a state that makes prison goods, buy the products from a prison factor, sell them locally or surreptitiously ship them across state lines.
Texas State Rep. and ALEC member Ray Allen drafted the Prison Industries Act in that state. Soon after, the PIE program was transferred from the Department of Justice’s Bureau of Justice Assistance to the National Correctional Industries Association (NICA).
NICA is a private trade organization that just happened to be represented by Ray Allen’s lobbying firm, Service House, Inc. In 2003, Allen was appointed Chairman of the Texas House Corrections Committee and began pushing the Prison Industries Act and other legislation beneficial to CCA and GEO Group, such as the Private Correctional Facilities Act, nationally. Soon after that, Allen became Chairman of ALEC’s Criminal Justice Task Force (now ALEC’s Public Safety and Elections Task Force). In 2006, Allen resigned from the state legislature while still under investigation for unethical lobbying practices.
He was hired soon after that as a lobbyist for the GEO Group.
Jindal tried this year and will likely repeat efforts to privatize at least three state prisons to placate campaign contributors.
Two of those prisons, in Allen and Winn parishes are already leased to private operations—GEO Group of Boca Raton, Florida (Allen) and Corrections Corporation of America (CCA) of Nashville, Tennessee (Winn).
Another local company, LaSalle Southwest Corrections of Ruston, would like a piece of that action. LaSalle already operates 12 facilities in Louisiana and Texas.
LaSalle contributed $12,000 to Jindal in four separate transactions between December of 2005 and November of 2008 and also contributed $1,500 to former Gov. Kathleen Blanco in November of 2004. LaSalle also contributed $500 to state senate candidate Rep. Richard Gallot of Ruston in July of this year.
In all, LaSalle gave $20,500 in 11 separate campaign contributions between December of 2006 and July of 2011. Others included:
• State Rep. Charles Chaney (R-Rayville), $1,000 in July of 2011;
• Jason Bullock (R-Ruston), who is in a runoff in House District 12;
• Ken Bailey, a Democrat who won the race for Claiborne Parish sheriff;
• James Paxton, district attorney for the Sixth Judicial District, $1,000 in June of 2008;
• Leah Sumrall, candidate for Ouachita Parish Clerk of Court who finished fourth, $2,500 in July of 2011.
Those contributions were dwarfed, however, by the political contributions of GEO and CCA.
CCA gave $5,000 in two separate contributions to Jindal in November of 2008 and in November of 2009. CCA also contributed $1,000 to Blanco in November of 2003.
Other CCA contributions included:
• Sen. Robert Kostelka (R-Monroe) in December 2009;
• State Sen. Lydia Jackson (D-Shreveport), $500 in November of 2010;
• State Sen. Robert Adley (R-Benton), $500 in January of 2010;
• State Rep. James Armes, III (D-Leesville), two contributions of $500 each in September 2010;
• State Rep. Billy R. Chandler (R-Dry Prong), three contributions of $500 each in January and September of 2010 and October of 2011;
• State Sen. Jack Donahue (R-Mandeville), $500 in January 2010;
• State Rep. Eddie Lambert (R-Gonzales), two contributions of $500 each in December 2009 and September 2010;
• Former State Sen. Kenneth M. (Mike) Smith (D-Winnfield), three separate contributions of $500 each in October of 2003, November of 2004, and April of 2005);
• House Speaker James W. “Jim” Tucker (R-Terrytown), $500 in December 2010.
GEO gave $10,000 in two separate $5,000 contributions to Jindal in June of 2007 and August of 2008 and $5,000 in September of 2004 and $1,000 in February 2007 to Blanco.
GEO, looking further into the political structure, also gave $1,000 to State Treasurer John Kennedy in November of 2005. Kennedy, as state treasurer, oversees the State Bond Commission which approves bonds to finance state construction projects, including prisons. The bond commission also could issue bonds to finance private construction as well.
GEO also made the following contributions:
• House Appropriations Committee Chairman James Fannin (D-Jonesboro), two separate contributions of $500 each in March of 2010 and March of 2011;
• Former Sen. James David Cain (R-Dry Creek), three separate contributions of $2,500 each in June of 2006 and November of 2007 (Cain was a candidate to return to his Senate seat this year and is in a runoff);
• Rep. Patrick Cortez (R-Lafayette), $500 in March of 2008;
• Sen. A.G. Crowe (R-Slidell), two contributions of $1,000 each, both in October of 2007;
• Former Sen. Ann D. Duplessis (D-New Orleans), $1,000 in October 2007;
• State Rep. and ALEC President Noble Ellington (R-Winnsboro), $500 in March of 2010;
• Sen Francis Heitmeier (D-New Orleans), $1,000 in August 2006;
• Rep. Dorothy Sue Hill (D-Dry Creek), four separate contributions of $1,000, all on October 21, 2011, and two separate contributions of $500, both on Feb. 16, 2009;
• Sen. Eric LaFleur (D-Ville Platte), $1,000 in April of 2009;
• Sen. Gerald Long (R-Winnfield), two contributions of $1,000 each, both in October 2007;
• Sen. Daniel Martiny (R-Metairie), five contributions of $1,000 each, two on Oct. 19, 2007 and one each in April 2008, April 2009, and February of 2011, and one $500 contribution in March 2010;
• Sen. Mike Michot (R-Lafayette), $1,000 in November of 2007;
• Sen. Ed Murray (D-New Orleans), nine separate contributions, including two of $1,000 each on Oct. 20, 2007, and seven of $1,000 each on Nov. 5, 2007. (The cumulative $9,000 contributed to Murray over a 16-day period would appear to violate the $5,000 contribution limitation.);
• Rep. Joel Robideaux (R-Lafayette), $500 in March 2008;
• Rep. Ernest Wooton (I-Belle Chase), two contributions of $500 in March 2008 and March 2010;
• Congressman Steve Scalise (R-Jefferson Parish), two $1,000 contributions, both on Oct. 18, 2007;
• V.J. St. Pierre, parish present of St. Charles Parish, $500 in March 2010.
GEO hedged its bets by two contributions of $5,000 each to the Republican Party of Louisiana in March and May of 2009, another $1,000 in September 2009 and $2,500 in December 2010 ($13,500 total), and then had one contribution of $2,500 in May 2006 to the Senate Democratic Campaign Committee of Louisiana and three more of $3,000 each in May 2009, June 2010, and May 2011. In addition, Geo contributed $3,000 in June 2011 to the House Democratic Campaign Committee of Louisiana, bringing the total contributed to the Democratic Party to $14,500.
Interestingly, 13 of the legislators receiving contributions from LaSalle, GEO and CCA are members of the Joint Legislative Committee on the Budget–the body which must approve any contracts between the Department of Corrections and these companies.
Those committee members include Chairman Fannin, Vice Chairman Michot, Chaney, Lydia Jackson, Armes, Donahue, Lambert, Tucker, Cortez, Ellington, LaFleur, Long and Murray.
Follow the money.
$2.50 each or three for $6.00
Louisiana Voice 