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Jindal needs to understand that Revelation is not always a Biblical term: Let my people know OGB financial status

April 15, 2013 by tomaswell

It was supposed to save the state some $40 million.

It cost more than 100 dedicated, efficient state employees their jobs.

It was supposed to be the best thing for the state even though studies commissioned by the Jindal administration said it was not a good deal.

It was such a great idea that the Office of Group Benefits (OGB) reduced its premium rates by 7 percent last July, six months before Blue Cross-Blue Shield of Louisiana (BCBS) was scheduled to take over as third party administrator for OGB’s Preferred Provider Organization (PPO). And if it was going to save $40 million, why not reduce rates?

Well, for one reason, since BCBS took over in January, that alluring $500 million reserve fund that former OGB Director Tommy Teague had helped the agency build up is now said to be less than half that amount because expenditures (claims payments) have been outpacing revenues (premiums).

Except no one really knows because the administration has not provided the monthly reports.

Our open, accountable and transparent administration has not been forthcoming with financial information on the agency.

We can’t seem to see any early evidence of that $40 million savings.

When revenues don’t keep up, BCBS has been forced to dip into the reserve fund to pay claims. Obviously, when the fund is depleted, there is just one way out for BCBS: increase premiums.

That’s not exactly an unexpected development. In fact, a retired OGB employee said last October the rate reduction was a formula for fiscal irresponsibility. “The program operated at a small deficit for the fiscal year ending June 30, 2010 (before the premium rate reduction), and is almost guaranteed a significant loss for Fiscal Year 2013 with the 7 percent reduction,” he said.

“The only reason that premiums could be reduced was the fact that the program had a significant surplus. For the current fiscal year, the program will be operating on its surplus for significant portion of the current year’s operating expenses…but this cannot go on forever,” he said.

“It is another example of using one-time funds to pay for continuing operations of the state. Once the reserve fund is exhausted, rates will need to be increased significantly to cover continuing operations.”

A member of the OGB board of directors requested copies of February’s monthly financial statement several weeks ago but has met only with frustration.

It can’t be that the report is not ready; word coming out of the agency is that not only is the February report complete, but the monthly report for March as well is complete.

Funny thing about this is that financials has always been provided to board members in the past. Suddenly things have changed.

With that in mind, we decided to submit our own request pursuant to the Louisiana public records laws.

In past requests for records from the Division of Administration, we have encountered delays and stonewalling that would test the patience of the Dalai Lama. DOA consistently offers the lame excuse that DOA personnel are “searching for records and reviewing them for exemptions and privileges.”

Anticipating the usual foot dragging, we submitted the following request:

From: Tom Aswell [mailto:azspeak@cox.net]
Sent: Monday, April 15, 2013 3:55 PM
To: doacommissioner@la.gov
Subject: PUBLIC RECORDS REQUEST

• Pursuant to the Public Records Act of Louisiana (R.S. 44:1 et seq.), I respectfully request the following information:

• Please allow me the opportunity to review the monthly financial statements for the Office of Group Benefits for February and March of 2013.

• And please do not insult my intelligence by giving me your B.S. stock response (below) that you are “searching for records and reviewing them for exemptions and privileges.” You and I both know this is not privileged information and it certainly is not exempt. I will call on you Tuesday to review the documents. Any delays on your part will be met with prompt legal action.

Our most recent public records request to DOA was on March 10. Here is DOA’s response:

From: Joshua Melder [mailto:Joshua.Melder@la.gov]
Sent: Thursday, March 28, 2013 4:53 PM
To: ‘azspeak@cox.net’
Cc: David Boggs (DOA)
Subject: RE: PRR BenefitFocus

Mr. Aswell,

We are still searching for records and reviewing them for exemptions and privileges. Once finished, we will contact you regarding delivery of the records. At that time, all non-exempt records will be made available to you. As of now, we will not be ready to produce records on Monday.

Regards,

Joshua Paul Melder
Attorney
Division of Administration
Office of General Counsel

Under Louisiana’s public records laws, public agencies, from town hall to the governor’s office, have three days in which to provide requested records or to respond in writing why the records are not available and when they will be available.

Here is that March 10 request for which we still are waiting for the records:

From: Tom Aswell [mailto:azspeak@cox.net]
Sent: Sunday, March 10, 2013 9:19 PM
To: doacommissioner@la.gov
Subject: PUBLIC RECORDS REQUEST

Pursuant to the Public Records Act of Louisiana (R.S. 44:1 et seq.), I respectfully submit the following request:
Please provide me the opportunity to review the following information dating back to July 1, 2012:

• all written (email and traditional mail) correspondence between the Division of Administration (DOA) or any of its representatives, spokespersons and/or agents and BenefitFocus or any of its representatives, spokespersons and/or agents relative to any contract, Request for Proposal or any other contractual or business relationship between DOA and BenefitFocus or between the Office of Group Benefits (OGB) and BenefitFocus;

• all written (email and traditional mail) correspondence between the Office of Group Benefits (OGB) or any of its representatives, spokespersons and/or agents and BenefitFocus or any of its representatives, spokespersons and/or agents relative to any contract, Request for Proposal or any other contractual or business relationship between OGB and BenefitFocus or between DOA and BenefitFocus;

• all written (email and traditional mail) correspondence between the Division of Administration (DOA) or any of its representatives, spokespersons and/or agents and the Office of Group Benefits (OGB) or any of its representatives, spokespersons and/or agents relative to any contract, Request for Proposal or any other contractual or business relationship between DOA and BenefitFocus or between OGB and BenefitFocus.

We will keep you posted on how this silly, unnecessary drama plays out.

Posted in Governor's Office, Health Care, Layoffs, OGB, Office of Group Benefits, Privatization, Revenue, Transparency | 10 Comments »

DOE $148K Chief Information Officer issues orders for department staff not to attend March 8 BESE meeting

April 10, 2013 by tomaswell

James Bowman is officially listed as the Chief Information Officer for the Louisiana Department of Education (DOE).

At $148,000 a year, he ostensibly presides over information technology for DOE.

He may even be the one responsible for redesigning the department’s web page to make it all but impossible to navigate. So much the better to keep the public uninformed about the machinations of DOE.

LouisianaVoice made its initial public information request pursuant to a curious Bowman email way back on March 10 but DOE did not get around to responding until Wednesday of this week. Our request read, in part:

• Pursuant to the Public Records Act of Louisiana (R.S. 44:1 et seq.), I respectfully request the following information:

• Emails sent by James Bowman the week of March 4-7, 2013 relative to directing staff not to attend BESE meeting.

The email was sent by Bowman on March 7 to Dave Elder, Carol Mosley and James McMahon of DOE and read:

• If you have staff that normally attends these meetings, pls advise that they should not attend tomorrow.

Inquiring minds, of course, want to know. Accordingly, we fired off an email to James Bowman, Chief Information Officer for the Louisiana Department of Education, in which we sought…well, information. Our email read thusly:

• What was the reasoning behind your email of March 7 to Dave Elder, Carol Mosley and James McMahon in which you directed them to advise their staff members that “they should not attend” the March 8 BESE meeting?

Bowman opened our email at 6:12 p.m. Wednesday but by 10 p.m. had not responded.

…So much for the information part of his title. Apparently that does not extend to the great unwashed.

For what it’s worth, we were unable to ascertain the exact job titles and salaries of Mosley or McMahon, but Elder was a former information technology director for DOE who has since retired.

As for that mysterious March 8 meeting, the agenda appeared rather routine:

• Academic Goals and Instructional Improvement;

• Administration and finance;

• Educator Effectiveness;

• Policy Information.

We can’t help but wonder if that BESE meeting may have held a clue to DOE’s agreement to provide sensitive student information to a huge computer data base controlled by Fox News honcho Rupert Murdoch—thus the directive to bar certain DOE staff members from attending the meeting.

What might have been buried in that “policy information” item? Or “academic goals and instructional improvement?”

Paranoid? Hell yes.

Posted in BESE, Education, Public Records, Transparency | 12 Comments »

Jindal tax plan was like watching movie from back row of a drive-in theater on a foggy night…before he punted to Leg.

April 9, 2013 by tomaswell

It seems Gov. Bobby Jindal’s $500,000 advertising campaign was good money thrown after bad.

You’ve probably seen those ads paid for by Believe in Louisiana, the non-profit 527 political organization founded by Jindal supporter and Baton Rouge Business Report publisher Rolfe McCollister.

The advertising blitz was supposed to turn the tide in favor of Jindal’s proposal to abolish the state income tax in favor of a state sales tax increase that kept changing. The ads laid it out loud and clear: you either wanted to get rid of the state income tax or you preferred to “keep loopholes for lobbyists.” The ad concludes with the question, “Whose side are you on?”

Pretty simplistic. Very much like former President George W. Bush’s “If you’re not with us, you’re against us” in his dust-up to his Big Iraq Attack.

But just as Bush’s “Mission accomplished,” and his “You’re doing a heckuva job, Brownie” were a bit premature, so was the ad campaign.

And they were still running on Tuesday, a day after Jindal suddenly folded like a cheap suit on his tax proposal. That’s what happens when you make a large media buy. Just like furniture store and automotive ads that often continue to run a couple of days after a special promotional ad, the tax ads continue to implore viewers to tell their legislators to support the tax plan.

Jindal unexpectedly pulled the rug from under legislators who first heard that he was pulling the tax proposal bills when the governor announced it during his uncharacteristically brief 13-minute address to open the 2013 legislative session on Monday.

His decision, besides catching legislators short, also disappointed many who have grown to detest everything about this governor.

“I was almost sorry Jindal folded,” one Baton Rouge resident said. “I was hoping for a well-deserved humiliating defeat, which would have been good for the state, if not for him. He’s got about three more years to keep wrecking Louisiana. I’d rather have Edwards or Uncle Earl (Long) when he was in Mandeville,” he said in reference to Long’s commitment to East Louisiana Hospital in Mandeville in 1959 during the waning days of his last administration.

“Jindal is wrong about the GOP being the stupid party,” he said. “It’s the crazy party now and for the immediate future.”

Another longtime political observer said, “I wasn’t surprised that he capitulated. That was going to happen sooner or later. But I really was surprised that he had no Plan B,” he said. “How could they not have a fallback plan?”

The sudden retreat should not have caught anyone by surprise. Trying to decipher the governor’s tax plan was closely akin to trying to watch a black and white movie from the back row of an old drive-in theater in a thick fog.

But then, anyone parking on the back row of a drive-in theater on a foggy night probably had no intention of watching a movie in the first place, so perhaps that’s a bad analogy.

The lack of an alternative plan prompted retired Louisiana State Budget Director Stephen Winham to say that Jindal “never had a plan beyond elimination of income taxes and franchise taxes as an ancillary.”

But then Winham perhaps captured the quintessential Jindal when he predicted that Jindal would turn lemons into lemonade. “I think he can possibly salvage his national reputation, again based on my original premise that he can claim he tried to lead us to the Promised Land, but we just didn’t have sense enough to go.”

Winham said in a guest LouisianaVoice column way back on Jan. 25 that Jindal had “already achieved a major goal of this proposal—getting extensive national media coverage for making a bold proposal to fix Louisiana’s budget and economic development problems.”

A somewhat jaded Baton Rouge political junkie said Jindal realized his ambitious tax plan was stalled and would never get out of the House Ways and Means Committee. “No governor could have his plan die in committee, so he got in front of it and pulled it,” he said.

“I also think he did the smart thing by throwing it to the legislature. Now it’s on their backs. If they don’t come up with a plan (and they won’t) Jindal can blame the legislature,” he said, echoing Winham in predicting Jindal will play the blame game on his renewed national speaking tour.

Moving forward at the end of the day (as Jindal is fond of saying), the blame game is about all that is left for him in his efforts to save face in the coming weeks.

With the tax issue all but dead now, we can all turn our attention to the legislative debate on Jindal’s patchwork budget proposal.

That should be every bit as interesting as the highly anticipated tax debate that went out with a whimper after a lot of bravado, buildup and B.S.

Posted in Budget, Governor's Office, House, Senate, Legislature, Legislators, Taxes | 19 Comments »

BESE apparently watches ‘Bachelorette’; White continues to ignore legitimate media requests for DEO public records

April 9, 2013 by tomaswell

Call this the John White Special.

Let’s start with BESE’s March meeting at which the calculation of Minimum Foundation Program (MFP) funding was discussed in a 26-page report which at one point appeared to veer off into reality television. The MFP was approved by BESE on March 8.

One of the criteria outlined at that meeting was the High Standards Weight.

“This weight is provided to recognize the cost of providing advanced coursework,” the BESE report said. “A 30 percent weight is provided for students in grades 8 through 11 that (sic) meet the certain criteria on exams. Students must meet the following criteria in order to be considered eligible (one would think that education administrators would know to use the word “who” instead of “that.”):

• Students in 8th grade that (there’s “that” again, instead of “who”) score excellent on Algebra I End of Course (EOC) tests;

• Students in 9th grade who (ah!) score excellent on Geometry EOC tests or score in a 3 or higher on an Advance Placement (AP) exam;

• Students in 10th grade who score 3 or higher on an AP exam;

• Students in 11th grade who score a 3 or higher on an AP exam or a 4+ on an International Bachelorette (IB) course.

Wait. What? Bachelorette? Yep, that’s what it said.

Like we said, reality television rules at BESE.

Maybe someone should have whispered to BESE/DOE that it should be International Baccalaureate before it’s approved for an official state document. And perhaps motivational speaker David “Lefty” Lefkowith could take time to show up for work one day and give proofreading lessons.

The biggest sticking point with White, insofar as LouisianaVoice is concerned, is the difficulty (make that impossibility) of squeezing what are clearly public records out of DOE.

R.S. 44:32(D) provides: “In any case in which a record is requested and a question is raised by the custodian of the record as to whether it is a public record, such custodian shall within three days, exclusive of Saturdays, Sundays, and legal public holidays, of the receipt of the request, in writing for such record, notify in writing the person making such request of his determination and the reasons therefor. Such written notification shall contain a reference to the basis under law which the custodian has determined exempts a record, or any part thereof, from inspection, copying, or reproduction.”

Three days.

If Jesus could escape from his tomb in three days, the Department of Education certainly should be able to lay its hands on and produce requested public records within that prescribed time.

Yet, LouisianaVoice has outstanding records requests dating back to March 6 without so much as an acknowledgement from DOE. We know Superintendent John White received the requests because our email alerts us whenever a recipient has opened one of our emails. There’s a reason for that.

Following are some of our outstanding public records requests:

Sent: Wednesday, March 06, 2013 8:58 PM
To: john.white@la.gov
Subject: PUBLIC RECORDS REQUEST

Pursuant to the Public Records Act of Louisiana (R.S. 44:1 et seq.), I respectfully request the following information:

I would like a list of and a CV for the following:

All personnel who now work or who have worked in the Louisiana Department of Education since January of 2007 who worked for or otherwise were associated, affiliated with or employed by Teach for America, the New Teacher Project, and/or the Eli Broad Foundation;

In providing this information, please provide the following information:

Dates of employment for each;

Job title for each;

Salary for each.

(Nothing.)

Sent: Sunday, March 10, 2013 8:29 PM
To: john.white@la.gov
Cc: J Arthur Smith
Subject: PUBLIC RECORDS REQUEST

Pursuant to the Public Records Act of Louisiana (R.S. 44:1 et seq.), I respectfully request the following information:

emails sent by James Bowman the week of March 4-7, 2013 relative to directing staff not to attend BESE meeting.
Emails sent by Nick Bolt since Feb. 1, 2013 pertaining to Shared Learning Collaborative, including any and all communications relative to off-line discussions of SLC or Shared Learning Collaborative.

(Nothing.)

Sent: Tuesday, April 02, 2013 10:04 AM
To: john.white@la.gov; troy.humphrey@la.gov
Cc: J Arthur Smith
Subject: PUBLIC RECORDS REQUEST

Pursuant to the Public Records Act of Louisiana (R.S. 44:1 et seq.), I respectfully request the following information:

Please allow me to review all contracts, purchase orders and authorizations to hire, executed and/or signed by Kunjan Narechania from January 1, 2012 through April 1, 2013. In providing these documents, please do not omit the signature page(s).

Please allow me to review all forms, including literacy, high school redesign and accountability authorized and/or signed by Kunjan Narechania from January 1, 2012 through April 1, 2013. Please include all signature page(s).

Please allow me to review all contracts, purchase orders and authorizations to hire executed and/or signed by Michael Rounds since his employment with DOE. Please include all signature page(s).

Please allow me to review all contracts, purchase orders and authorizations to hire executed and/or signed by David “Lefty” Lefkowith since his employment with DOE. Please include all signature page(s).

Please provide copies of all travel records/travel documents/travel reimbursements for David “Lefty” Lefkowith since his employment with DOE.

(Nothing.)

Sent: Sunday, April 07, 2013 9:00 p.m.
To: john.white@la.gov; troy.humphrey@la.gov
Cc: J Arthur Smith
Subject: PUBLIC RECORDS REQUEST

Pursuant to the Public Records Act of Louisiana (R.S. 44:1 et seq.), I respectfully request the following information:

Please provide signed time sheets verifying David Lefkowith’s presence in the DOE offices since his employment with DOE.

(Nothing yet, though the three-day deadline was not expired as of this writing.)

Even more serious is White’s dangerous little game of telling outright lies about the existence of public records and of playing favorites with the media.

The Independent of Lafayette attempted to obtain public records from DOE way back in April 2011 asking the department for correspondence DOE had received from the U.S. Department of Education relative to Louisiana’s No Child Left Behind waiver application.

After first denying the existence of the requested correspondence, DOE finally acquiesced on Friday, May 4, and told the paper the documents would be provided on Monday, May 7.

Instead, White, spoon fed the information, including extensive details and comments from White himself to a reporter for the New Orleans Times-Picayune so that his favored reporter could have the story first.

Mr. White should know that is not the way you try to manipulate the media in Louisiana or anywhere else. Any newspaper worth its salt will do what it must do to protect its interest from such shabby behavior—and the Independent did.

You do not play favorites and you certainly do not ignore legitimate requests from the media—most media. Some take umbrage at such efforts to control information that rightfully is the domain of the public.

It will end ugly.

LouisianaVoice has retained legal counsel and as this is being written is preparing to initiate legal action against White, DOE, BESE and its president, Chas Roemer. It is BESE, after all, that hired White and it is BESE to whom he answers so BESE is legally liable for the behavior of its upstart superintendent who apparently feels the laws to not apply to him.

But apply to him they do. It will cost us money, but in the end, we will be upheld in our efforts and when that happens, the court not only may assess legal fines against the department and BESE, but it can also order DOE and BESE to pay our legal fees and our court costs.

And then there’s the negative publicity that would go with yet another embarrassing court decision against DOE.

Strother Martin (the warden in Cool Hand Luke) notwithstanding, there is no failure to communicate here.

NOTE: (J Arthur Smith copied in several of our public records requests to White is our legal counsel.)

Posted in BESE, Education, Public Records, Transparency | 15 Comments »

Barfield reportedly removed from Jindal tax swap team; administration insiders confide he was ‘in over his head’

April 5, 2013 by tomaswell

Administration insiders confide that Tim Barfield, executive counsel and Revenue secretary-designate Tim Barfield is “in over his head” and has been removed from Gov. Jindal’s struggling tax swap team.

That might seem like a demotion for a man who has been on the job for only six months. But considering the fact that the waters of Jindal’s state tax structure overhaul have been circling the drain for weeks and are now starting to make that familiar gurgling sound, even an involuntary separation from the Jindal tax team could be looked upon as a blessing.

The governor has seen one political ally after another break with him on his ever-changing tax plan, including the heretofore compliant House Speaker Chuck Kleckley, R-Lake Charles who put the Ways and Means Committee hearing on the tax plan on hold until House staffers complete an analysis that would give legislators a better handle on how much money the Jindal plan would raise.

The once friendly Louisiana Association of Business and Industry (LABI) also walked away from Jindal, whom the organization has traditionally supported.

Ernst & Young, the consulting firm hired by Jindal to perform an economic analysis of his tax plan even said the proposed tax swap, which would abolish the state income tax in favor of increased sales taxes, was a bad idea.

Making matters worse, Jindal recently upped the ante from the previous 5.88 percent sales tax to 6.25 percent, leaving observers scratching their heads over the administration’s inability to articulate any real plan.

On Wednesday, April 3, an emissary from the governor’s office showed up at the Department of Revenue (LDR) to demand new reports and numbers on revenue collections, saying the information was needed by the start of the session.

LDR staffers have been grinding away at the database in an attempt to comply with the governor’s ultimatum to somehow manufacture the numbers necessary to placate the legislature.

Meanwhile, Team Jindal, through Believe in Louisiana, the 527 non-profit organization founded by Baton Rouge Business Report Publisher Rolfe McCollister to solicit funds to advance the Jindal agenda, has made a half-million dollar media buy to initiate a slick TV ad campaign in support of the tax plan.

Many of the names of the big money men behind Jindal show up as Believe in Louisiana donors and the organization, unfettered by campaign donation limits, has pulled in individual contributions as large as $225,000, swelling its coffers to well over a million dollars.

“I don’t know why they’re throwing good money after that dog,” said one Democratic leader of the ad campaign.

Barfield, who previously served as labor secretary and as Jindal’s executive Counsel before leaving to work for home health provider Amedisys.

In order to lure Barfield away from Amedisys, Jindal added the title of executive counsel and gave him a combined salary of $250,000, more than double the $124,000 paid his predecessor, Cynthia Bridges.

Until Friday, he had been Jindal’s point man on the tax proposal, but Jindal could not have been happy two weeks ago when Barfield testified before the House Ways and Means Committee that the proposed tax swap would shift about $500 million in taxes to businesses, a statement that helped galvanize the business community against the tax swap.

At that time, he was still talking about a 5.88 percent state sales tax. Jindal has since bumped that up to 6.25 percent.

Posted in Politics | 32 Comments »

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