“It doesn’t raise taxes on businesses and families. It’s a strong reform budget. We’re going to continue to reduce the size of state government.”
–Commissioner of Administration Paul Rainwater, on the executive budget to be presented to the Joint Legislative Committee on the Budget on Thursday.
Posted in Budget, Governor's Office, Notable Quotables, Taxes, Transparency | 4 Comments »
Is Gov. Bobby Jindal now trying to pit university and college presidents/faculty against state workers?
That certainly seemed to be the case on Wednesday when he dangled a $100 million carrot in front of state college system presidents (and certain legislators) in the form of a promise that state colleges would share an extra $100 million on the condition that lawmakers pass his radical state retirement system package during the upcoming legislative session.
The tactic represents a new low for the governor as he attempts to play on the fears of colleges and university presidents that their institutions would take large hits as the result of yet another anticipated budgetary shortfall of $900 million in what is becoming a somewhat tiring annual soap opera.
Jindal Chief of Staff Stephen Waguespack said the governor’s executive budget unveiled to lawmakers on Thursday would keep higher education funding at its present level in the 2012-13 fiscal year beginning July 1.
In a brazen attempt at outright bribery, Waguespack told the higher education officials that if the legislature approves Jindal’s proposal to overhaul the retirement system for thousands of state employees, the $100 million saved through cheaper retirement costs at universities would stay with the campuses and would not be used to stop cuts elsewhere in state government.
To that, we would add these words of caution to the university presidents: be careful, it’s a political promise and political promises have a habit of evaporating like yesterday’s cheap aftershave.
Jindal’s suggestion is calculated to build support for his proposed retirement changes among legislators with colleges in their districts. Those changes would, if approved, increase rank-and-file state employee contributions by 3 percent, shrink benefits and push back the age for collecting retirement payments. New state employees would be shifted from defined benefits to defined contributions similar to cheaper 401(k) type accounts.
Such an obvious ploy should be beneath a governor who purports to eschew politics as usual. And make no mistake, this is politics as usual: pure extortion of targeted legislators through anxious college presidents to garner votes necessary to pass a controversial legislative package.
It’s enough to make one sit back and ask, “What’s next?”
What tactic will the most ethical, most transparent, most accountable governor employ next to get his way in his efforts to push through an agenda aimed at destroying public education, slashing state employee retirement and health care benefits, privatizing state agencies and services and shoving thousands of dedicated state employees onto the unemployment rolls.
There may not be a lot of public sympathy out there for state employees, but these people are our neighbors, our relatives, our children’s teachers, and others who provide services across the civilian spectrum on a daily basis.
You may not care for the plight of state workers but they touch our lives each and every day, whether you know it or not.
Rest assured, Jindal has a much larger agenda than what is best for the State of Louisiana. His every move, every action, is carefully calculated to benefit businessmen and corporations who have a vested interest in privatization, who see profit in school vouchers and charter schools, who stand to gain financially by a relaxation of regulations special tax breaks, and who have invested in this governor’s political career.
It’s no accident that he has steadfastly, in the face of one fiscal crisis after another, year after year, refused to consider any increase in corporate taxes.
Jindal hopes those corporations have bigger plans for him.
And there’s your real carrot.
Posted in Budget, Governor's Office, Higher Education, House, Senate, Legislature, Legislators | 5 Comments »
“The report is privileged as part of the deliberative process and is exempt from disclosure.”
–Division of Administration attorney Paul Holmes, in his May 27 reponse to a public records request by LouisianaVoice in which he invoked the administration’s catch-all shield behind which it conceals information from the public.
Posted in Governor's Office, Notable Quotables, Retirement, Transparency | Leave a Comment »
The long-awaited report by Morgan Keegan on the proposed fate of the Louisiana Office of Group Benefits (OGB) has been turned over to the Division of Administration, LouisianaVoice has learned.
LouisianaVoice has made a formal request under the Louisiana Public Records Laws for a copy of the Morgan Keegan report. That request was directed on Wednesday to Commissioner of Administration Paul Rainwater.
But don’t expect the report to be released willingly. Rainwater, in all probablity will fall back on the erroneous claim that, like the notorious Chaffe & Associates report of last year, it is exempt from the public records law “as part of the deliberative process.” Even that claim was made only after Rainwater’s first attempting to deny the existence of the Chaffe report. To say this administration is willing to bend the rules in order to protect its backside is being charitable.
The Morgan Keegan report is said to have included several options, two of which included the outright sale of OGB or turning the administration of the preferred provider organization (PPO) over to a third party administrator (TPA)—a move that would be accompanied by a massive layoff of OGB employees who presently process claims by state employees, retirees and dependents.
An earlier report, and the number cited by Rainwater last spring in testimony before the Louisiana Legislature, said that 149 OGB employees would be laid off.
That number now sits at 177.
The word of the layoffs comes only days after word of Jindal’s hiring of several former legislators and relatives of former chief of staff Timmy Teepell to high-level positions in his administration.
It was earlier reported by LouisianaVoice that the executive budget to be delivered to the Joint Legislative Committee on the Budget on Thursday would include a line item to sell OGB outright for $189 million but the Jindal administration later backed off on that option and chose the third party administrator instead.
Jindal was reported to have been only lukewarm to either proposal because, in his words, the state would still be “in the insurance business.”
Sources close to the administration said that Jindal has added yet another option: to do nothing in case of another widespread protest as was experienced when the administration first floated the idea of privatization the agency that has accrued a $500 million surplus while administering health care claims for state employees, retirees and dependents.
Rainwater fired former OGB director Tommy Teague last April after Teague did not fall in line quickly enough over the proposal to sell the agency. Afterwards, a firestorm of protests erupted across the state from state employees and retirees that resulted in Rainwater’s vacillating between selling OGB or contracting with a TPA.
Posted in Governor's Office, Layoffs, Legislature, Legislators, OGB, Office of Group Benefits, Privatization, Transparency | 1 Comment »
“The bottom line is the governor appoints people who support his agenda for moving the state forward, not the other way around.”
–Jindal spokesman Frank Collins, explaining why Gov. Bobby Jindal chooses political loyalty over qualifications in making political appointments.
Posted in Governor's Office, Jobs, Notable Quotables, Politicians, Transparency | Leave a Comment »
