GOP House error already haunting it politically

It didn’t take long for the Louisiana House’s petulance, and in particular that of self-styled Republican “fiscal conservatives,” to come back to haunt it. The possibility that the GOP would put itself into a political bind became reality when its own recent action stymied its ability to pass a budget to its liking.

Earlier this week, supported by House Republican leaders, the body made a rule change that would require two-thirds approval for any use of funds that were deemed “one-time” in nature – asset sales, privatization proceeds, and dipping into funds with dedicated sources of revenue – in a budget beyond what the forecasted increase in state general fund revenues would be for the next fiscal year. This meant that when the state’s operating budget came up for discussion, cuts of $93 million needed to happen.

So the chairman of the House Appropriations Committee, Democrat state Rep. Jim Fannin, proposed hacking $81 million of that out of money that would fund the transition of Louisiana’s Medicaid system from its present fee-for-service arrangement to a more efficient coordinated care network.

Diluted board merger better than nothing, but still may fail

If tying Southern University New Orleans a little closer to the University of New Orleans instead of a demonstrably better merger is an eighth of a loaf when bread symbolizes good public policy, then, as currently envisioned, the creation of one governing board for higher education to replace the current five is a sixteenth of a loaf. Whether this marriage can make it out the church, unlike the other, is another matter.

HB 391 (unamended text here; as is growing more common, legislative staff are getting lazier in posting current information) by Speaker Jim Tucker would accomplish this by consolidating all governance power of higher education into a board of 13 gubernatorial appointees and one student member – looking on the surface remarkably like the existing Board of Regents with its 15 gubernatorial-appointed members and a student. But a couple of other aspects smirch the laudatory aspects of the amendment almost to the point its success would become pyrrhic.

As amended in committee, it retains the Art. VIII Sec. 5 requirement that the Legislature may close or merge institutions only through a two-thirds vote, a stricture due more to politics than to philosophy.

Cowardly House GOP angles for assisted political suicide

One of the main reasons, in a moderately conservative country like the U.S. where Republicans do not consistently operate government, and in a conservative state like Louisiana where only recently Republicans have come to power, that the GOP does not run government as often as their numbers would suggest is the party’s propensity to have its elected officials form a circular firing squad and shoot. And when it’s done for reasons of political cowardice, it’s that much worse.

Louisiana Democrats must be guffawing at the latest incident, the House’s passage of Republican state Rep. Brett Geymann’s HCR 27 which requires, for use in a budget, a two-thirds vote of the House to allow in any funds “ available for appropriation from any special treasury fund excluding any monies forecast to be dedicated into such a fund by the Revenue Estimating Conference in the official forecast for that fiscal year [or m]oney available for appropriation from the state general fund from one time transactions, but not recognized as nonrecurring revenue by the Revenue Estimating Conference, including but not limited to court settlements, the sale of state facilities, and the privatization of state operations.”

As previously noted, the second part of this isn’t entirely reckless – asset sales and settlements are true windfalls of a kind, although there’s no logic including privatization efforts since they produce recurring savings. But it’s the asinine first part that demonstrates too many members of the House choose symbolism over substance, to the detriment of both the state and, in the case of Republicans, to GOP fortunes.

Strong governor possible only with Legislature's cooperation

It’s not that the governor of Louisiana is so powerful, it’s that the Louisiana Legislature, shaped by the personalistic political culture of the state, is so willing to abdicate its considerable power – especially when democratic checks and balances come into play.

Some observers had a chance to muse about the fate, the apparent death in the Legislature, of a proposed constitutional amendment this session, which would have tripled fees for private vehicle registrations and dedicated the additional money over the next six years to fund a potpourri of roads projects. Not that the legislation was good to begin with – it’s never a good idea to write such specific things in the Constitution leaving no room for changing needs and there have been suggested better plans to more flexibly get more money to roads construction that don’t require any fee increases – but regardless of its worth the episode serves as a example of how the personalistic political culture of the state continues to shape its policy outcomes.

This political culture emphasizes the role of the individual policy-maker in the aggregation, articulation, and pursuit of policy interests, as opposed to collective institutions such as political parties, interest groups, and social movements. This transforms the purpose of government from something that is to impartially manage social conflict to allow individuals the maximal opportunity to pursue their own ends in societal interactions, and instead makes it an active participant to be used by the strongest coalition to steer resources to its members from non-members.

Merger alternative risks making bad situation worse

As opponents of improved higher education breathe a sigh of relief over the shift in strategy concerning Southern University New Orleans and the University of New Orleans, that they scored a victory does not diminish the upheaval facing the entire system in the state and their culpability in potentially making matters worse..

The eighth-of-a-loaf denouement now pursued by merger backers of simply shifting UNO into the University of Louisiana system and forging agreements between UNO and SUNO for resource-sharing has drawn sharply diverging views on the potential outcome. Some see this as a destructive umbilical cord that will sap UNO to keep SUNO performing at its abysmally low level. Others think, in a neo-functionalist way, that this will create tighter binds between the two that will dissolve SUNO resistance and facilitate a merger in just a few years, especially when SUNO faces reality.

And that reality is, pending the introduction of higher admission standards through 2012-14, that almost all freshmen who now qualified for admittance to and attend SUNO would be unable to do so.

Budget reality check needed for Jindal, Legislature

A bad week on budgetary matters for Gov. Bobby Jindal got worse when the Revenue Estimating Conference unexpectedly found itself approving a forecast that was not more but less, by $77 million, than those previously approved. This news, contrary to expectations voiced at the last REC meeting a couple of months ago, now means the Jindal Administration and the Legislature will have to grapple with a hole nearly $300 million greater than envisioned in the Administration’s initial budget.

Only Tuesday did the dominoes began falling and quickly. Then, the House Appropriations Committee decided to remove two contingent sources of funds, $86 million from the sales of prisons and $92 million by channeling money from the Millennium Trust Fund to fund Taylor Opportunity Program for Scholars grants. The former would require legislation that the administration has ceased to back actively, while the latter depends on an affirmative legislative vote and one from the people no earlier than October, months after the new fiscal year’s start.

In part, this budgetary strategy was somewhat reckless by the Jindal Administration because its appropriations language did not really address from where monies to make up for the lack of funds if the contingencies didn’t come through. For example, on p. 166 of HB 1 (as originally):

Crybaby Gallot puts campaign interests over people's

And so, as a budget deficit needs final resolution, flood waters run rampant, and the wisdom of extensive tax cuts emerges as an issue, the great debate heats up over that burning issue of the day on which the fate of the state hangs, whether Republican Gov. Bobby Jindal, of south Asian origins, appoints enough non-whites to spots in state government.

Statistics show that 10.6 percent of all appointees by the Republican have been blacks, while 32 percent statewide identified black as a single race for the 2010 Census. Other non-whites he appointed to the tune of 2.4 percent when other single-race identifiers, including Hispanics, totaled 6.4 percent statewide. Thus, whites got 87 percent of appointments in a state where identifying as single-race whites were 62.6 percent of the population.

Releasing this information prompted the Democrat chairman of the House Governmental and Affairs Committee, state Rep. Rick Gallot, to take the pacifier out of his mouth

LA income tax repeals practical, desirable in near term

While some can’t move beyond simplistic bromides concerning the issue, whether to eliminate over time personal and corporate income taxes in Louisiana deserves a serious, analytical response – conclusions showing that given other changes the former is a reasonable goal in the near future, and the latter can be realized in the present.

For fiscal year 2009-10, the state reported $2.24 billion in collections for the individual income tax, and $435 million for the corporate income tax. Note that the former in just two years fell about a billion dollars, and the other over a quarter billion. State government did not bolt and padlock its doors in the interim, thereby demonstrating that large cuts can be made without any significant reductions in the level and quality of service. As such, “replacing” revenues “lost” by termination of these taxes need not be a policy outcome of the change, but let’s assume this in the analysis going forward.

The corporate tax figure certainly is in reach almost immediately, although structural changes needed would have to happen over the next year so this could go into effect starting Jul. 1, 2012.

Another disaster brings new set of political questions

Time to get out of the way of rising water headed into the area roughly between the Atchafalaya and Mississippi Rivers, and whatever flooding occurs in the next couple of weeks raises three political questions for Louisiana state politics going forward.

First, how much relative blame will state government get for the fact that as many as 25,000 people may get washed out of house and home and perhaps thousands of businesses ranging from farms to highly technology-dependent firms could find themselves under water? Technically, there should be none because the state has nothing to do with the decision that was controlled by the federal government, and the Army Corps of Engineers in particular (which may help redeem the ACE in the eyes of those around New Orleans but create an entire new set of complainers in the Atchafalaya Basin).

But, a lot of people won’t realize this so the logical lightning rod would be Gov. Bobby Jindal.

Electoral bills redundant, subvert majority will

While talk about changing the way America elects its president waxes and wanes, in a policy sense in Louisiana this year a serious effort has been launched to do this courtesy of HB 388 by state Rep. Nickie Monica and SB 126 by state Sen. Joe McPherson. As it is, these efforts turn out to be a case of not needing new laws to effect desired change.

These bills would make the state a party to a compact among states that pledge their electoral votes would go to the winner of the national popular vote, which would go into effect whenever states with enough electoral votes ratified the measure, regardless of how the vote turned out in their respective states. This would create an end run around the U.S. Constitution, as Art. II Sec. 1, modified by the  12^th and 23^rd Amendments, sets up the procedure where, as known today, the Electoral College selects (except in cases of lack of majority vote) the president and vice president.

Proponents of the idea argue that the present system of people voting for other people who vote officially for these officers confuses the electorate, subverts the will the majority in the historically rare instances (two) where the national popular vote winner does not win a majority in the College, and leads to candidates concentrating campaigning on only a handful of states of assumed competitive states. Opponents who support the current system argue neglect of many states, especially rural ones, would increase even more as candidates would concentrate their efforts of urban areas and the largest states where the biggest vote hauls exist.