The Press-Herald column, Mar. 7, 2018

Medicaid reform missed in chaos of special session
http://press-herald.com/medicaid-reform-missed-in-chaos-of-special-session/

Links:
http://www.theadvocate.com/baton_rouge/news/politics/article_8e27dbae-2010-11e8-b502-e3c6be4b6df3.html
http://jeffsadow.blogspot.com/2018/02/done-right-medicaid-work-rules-will.html
http://jeffsadow.blogspot.com/2016/05/edwards-expansion-trick-invites-costly.html
http://www.legis.la.gov/legis/ViewDocument.aspx?d=1072767
http://www.legis.la.gov/legis/ViewDocument.aspx?d=1067232
http://www.legis.la.gov/legis/ViewDocument.aspx?d=1064009
https://www.cdc.gov/media/releases/2015/p1112-smoking-rates.html
http://www.nola.com/politics/index.ssf/2017/12/louisianas_medicaid_spending_o.html
http://www.dhh.louisiana.gov/assets/medicaid/forecast/01_Jan18ForecastReport-Final.pdf

Session conditions sabotaged real tax reform

Opining about attempted tax reform during the recently completed, underachieving 2018 First Extraordinary Session of the Louisiana Legislature, failed comedian and Republican state Rep. Kenny Havard lamented, “We didn’t even try.”

Of course not. If anything, the session’s design subverted that task.

Havard’s predilection for government spending more usually puts him in league with Democrats, and around the House of Representatives several from that party during the session complained that GOP plans to address a potential fiscal year 2019 shortfall rested on a partial, temporary extension of the 2016 sales tax hike. They said not to pursue a permanent tax increase did not achieve “tax reform.”

First governor's race poll warning to Edwards

The first significant independent poll has surfaced regarding the 2019 governor’s contest, and it brings bad news to incumbent Democrat Gov. John Bel Edwards.

For some months, Edwards has kept calm over challenges to his reelection, reassured by some good fundraising numbers (some $5 million in the bank at the end of 2017, plus an allied political action committee that separately has around $270,000 available) and approval numbers a bit above 50 percent. However, as elections contrast more than a single candidate, suspicions lingered that the popularity figure overestimated support at present in the voting booth.

A survey by Mason Dixon Polling and Research confirms this. The firm put up three hypothetical Republican candidates, two of them well-known, against Edwards. Facing Sen. John Kennedy, Edwards at 45 percent leads him by a single point; matched against Rep. Steve Scalise, the U.S. House of Representatives’ third-ranked official, he has a three-point advantage at 46 percent; and enjoys 51 percent support to only 28 percent for Rep. Ralph Abraham, who not many would know from outside the northern part of the state.

Ask right tax questions to find useful policy

My Advocate colleague Tyler Bridges wrote something last week that, while informative, entirely missed the point of the tax-raising animal spirits currently on display at the Louisiana Legislature’s lingering special session

Running some numbers from various sources, he argued that all the conflict over whether to increase taxes, how, and by how much actually didn’t amount to a whole lot for the typical households. Best he figured, whether on income or sales, it amounted to one percent of an individual’s income.

That implies that all of the conflict renting the session overdramatizes the situation. If just this amount, the tone of the article asks, why can’t some agreement to hike taxes be reached?

The Advocate column, Mar. 4, 2018

Pay now or later? Retirement board shows thoughtful debate
http://www.theadvocate.com/baton_rouge/opinion/jeff_sadow/article_2d9adc6e-1d77-11e8-b7a7-131105b2e8ef.html

Links:
http://www.theadvocate.com/baton_rouge/news/politics/legislature/article_afd5146c-1839-11e8-a61c-3fd01b164187.html
http://www.legis.la.gov/legis/law.aspx?d=206322
http://www.doa.la.gov/Pages/prsac/Retire_Systems.aspx
http://www.doa.la.gov/prsac/PRSAC%20Recommended%20Rates%20for%20FYE%202018-19_Updated%202.5.18.pdf
https://finance.yahoo.com/quote/%5EGSPC/history?period1=1183179600&period2=1501390800&interval=1mo&filter=history&frequency=1mo

The Press-Herald column, Feb. 28, 2018

Bossier City’s downtown project is mired in lack of planning, follow-through
http://press-herald.com/bossier-citys-downtown-project-is-mired-in-lack-of-planning-follow-through/

Sources:
http://bossierpress.com/city-council-consider-special-permit-open-containers-festival-plaza/
https://www.shreveporttimes.com/story/news/2018/02/21/bossier-citys-alcohol-downtown-plans-hit-snags/359710002/
http://bossierpress.com/city-council-adopts-festival-plaza-region-open-container-provisions/

Fracking leading LA, US to reap energy benefits

How do an autocratic Russian ruler, some misinformed European governments, and fear-mongering environmentalists together make life better for Louisianans?

The state ‘s economy got a lift when last year Poland’s state-owned gas company agreed for the next five years to buy liquified natural gas shipped out of Cameron Parish. Tired of having Vladimir Putin use its gas supply to their country as a foreign policy cudgel, last summer the Poles began importing LNG from Louisiana. From its facility Cheniere Energy began exporting to 18 countries last year that could bring into the state hundreds of millions of dollars annually.

This bonanza comes courtesy of greater domestic gas supply derived from hydraulic fracturing. Most of Poland’s nearby neighbors with gas deposits have outlawed this process that pries open subterranean gas seams, as have two states with ocean-going ports, New York and Maryland, and several counties in California. Removal of these potentially lower-cost suppliers from the marketplace allowed Louisiana to scoop up Poland’s business.

Edwards inaction surely would scuttle reelection

Louisiana’s House of Representatives Republicans seem to have gotten it together, to the point that Democrat Gov. John Bel Edwards may allow sabotage of the entire special session devoted to revenue issues.

Entering this potential two-week convocation, called as temporary taxes rolling off at the fiscal year’s conclusion would leave a deficit of nearly $1 billion at current spending trends, the GOP knew that Edwards would attempt to use this as an opportunity to increase taxes permanently. With his unwillingness to deviate from this conflation of tax reform and hikes, and with reform parameters ill-defined and incompletely confected into his call that triggered the convening, legislators could do nothing lasting and would have to leave genuine reform for the future.

Last week, at first some Republicans didn’t get it. State Rep. Stephen Dwight offered up his HB 23 that would have enacted a permanent tax increase of a half cent of sales tax. This would admit that government needed permanent expansion, ratifying state-sourced spending that rose at twice the rate of inflation during the first two years of Edwards’ term. Democrats sought to pile on with a pair of bills raising telephone taxes advancing out of committee.

Troubling claims also expose Democrat hypocrisy

Regardless of the merits of the allegations, a sexual harassment complaint against Republican Louisiana Sec. of State Tom Schedler raises questions about his fitness to serve, and on the side exposes the hypocrisy of state Democrats.

Last week, a departmental employee filed suit against Schedler for illegal discrimination, harassment, and reprisals. She alleges a decade-long pattern of behavior, stemming from the time he first became employed in the office, where she had taken a job three years earlier, through his appointment, election, and subsequent reelection to the post to the present. He maintains they once had a consensual sexual relationship, which the woman denies, and admitted he has remained separated from his wife for an extended period of time.

The suit broadly references episodes of Schedler’s reportedly intrusive behavior that occasionally resulted in personnel actions the plaintiff believed retaliatory in nature. While the document gives a few details here and there that in isolation could be interpreted as supporting the woman’s contentions, only a full trial can produce convincing evidence.

The Advocate column, Feb. 25, 2018

Louisiana property tax policy needs bigger reforms
http://www.theadvocate.com/baton_rouge/opinion/jeff_sadow/article_27a4affa-1747-11e8-b96b-176b18f98f5b.html

Links:
http://www.theadvocate.com/baton_rouge/news/politics/article_7dd6c9ae-11ba-11e8-b1b1-13ec256edc13.html
http://gov.louisiana.gov/assets/ExecutiveOrders/JBE16-73.pdf
http://www.lpb.org/index.php/publicsquare/topic/07_09_property_taxes/
https://files.taxfoundation.org/20171016171625/SBTCI_2018.pdf
https://files.taxfoundation.org/20170816154839/LA_Reform_Final_8-17.pdf