Left starts quest to delay defective map death

The legal gymnastics have begun for the political left to delay the inevitable long enough to seat an extra Democrat into Congress from Louisiana for 2024.

Just days after a number of Louisianans sued over the state’s new congressional map, arguing that it violated the 14^th and 15^th Amendments of the Constitution, the special interests behind the litigation that had encouraged the Legislature in special session to produce that map attempted a pair of legal maneuvers to slow the new case’s progress. One, filed in the Western District where the new case Callais v. Landry resides, alleges that the same deep-pocketed national interests that bankrolled and provided the primary legal assistance to the plaintiffs in the case against the old districts should be enrolled as defendants along with the state of Louisiana. The other, filed in the Middle District with the same judge Shelly Dick who has presided over the original consolidated Robinson v. Landry and Galmon v. Landry cases, tries to transfer the new case to her jurisdiction.

The reasons given are essentially the same. The motion to intervene comes under a claim that the issues argued in the new and the old cases are similar enough, but that the state, even as it has been defendant both times, is switching sides on arguments and so need involved the plaintiffs-now-defendants who have maintained the same argument. The motion to transfer asserts because of the supposed similarity the judge who handled the old case should try to new one.

Initial Landry budget must curb govt growth

Later this week, Republican Gov. Jeff Landry will present his first budget to the Legislature, in an environment of future looming deficits that needs to recognize that spending, not revenues, are the problem.

Earlier this month, the Joint Legislative Committee on the Budget received a forecast of revenues and expenditures for the current and next three budget years, assuming continued trends in revenue and spending, adjusted by known changes in each. It predicts this fiscal year will produce a $91 million surplus, but then next year will see a $64 million deficit, followed by much larger ones of $559 million, $614 million, and $773 million.

In response to this data, Landry issued an executive order to take immediate action to reduce spending where possible. It certainly was a refreshing change from his predecessor Democrat Gov. John Bel Edwards, who in similar circumstances would jawbone for more revenues.

Landry natural resources order beneficial

A little-noticed act from last year has helped to facilitate Republican Gov. Jeff Landry’s request to increase efficiency in how Louisiana handles its natural resources, including the possibility that tens of billions of dollars will be spent more wisely over the coming decades.

The new law changed, as of last month, the name of the Department of Energy and Natural Resources by adding the “Energy” designation. It also added some structure to it that will provide some guardrails for a request by executive order Landry made last week to reorganize natural resources functions from three separate affiliated agencies and over a dozen independent commissions into the defined functions of the department.

This law empowers Landry to solicit changes from the department, with the first report due at the end of the month and all wrapped up by the end of July. Likely some legislation will come forth concerning this for the year’s regular legislative session to begin Mar. 11 and to end Jun. 3. Likely many of the entities listed in the order will be folded into DENR management, the new law and text of the order suggests.

LA left flails in defending defective map

Louisiana’s political left finds itself in a pickle as it seeks to defend the indefensible new congressional map, with its members already signaling they have nothing up to snuff.

Within days of the special session last month to redraw the plan under the threat of a federal court potentially to do the same, voters across the state filed suit to invalidate it. The map substantially reorganizes boundaries of the northeast-to-central, northwest and western, and Baton Rouge-to-the-southern-coast districts, most prominently creating a district acting as a dagger into Shreveport with the handle slicing up Lafayette and Baton Rouge. In the process, the new map manages except for Bossier City to crack every major city in the state between various districts.

It was, in words repeated on the record often by its legislative supporters, designed deliberately with race in mind to create two majority-minority districts to avoid a court from doing that. They didn’t mention that it destroys communities of interest, violating one criterion of reapportionment accepted in statute and the courts, and that it measures out similarly to a district in a plan determined unconstitutional three decades ago for those reasons.

BC charter review initially seems unserious

Last week at the Bossier City Council meeting, the head of its and Republican Mayor Tommy Chandler’s appointed Charter Review Commission Preston Friedley reported on his panel’s activities and solicited input from councilors on changes. How – if – they respond to that will determine whether the constructed body actually carries out the task envisioned for it in the city charter or if it exists merely as a dog-and-pony show with ulterior political motives.

The Commission has met twice and addressed organizational considerations. It has set up an aggressive schedule of meetings throughout February and intends to toss in some public forums as well. That in and of itself indicates its use as a political tool to preserve the power of a small number of city insiders.

Its creation came in the context of a petition drive to put a three-term lifetime limit into the Charter. The drive succeeded, but has become hung up over legal minutiae initiated at the behest of the four graybeard councilors – Republicans David Montgomery and Jeff Free, Democrat Bubba Williams, and no party Jeff Darby – all of whom would be disbarred from running for reelection next year if the petitions (one covering councilor service, the other the mayor’s) make it onto the Nov. 5 or Dec. 7 ballots and receive majority voter approval – plus GOP rookie Councilor Vince Maggio. On at least three out of four occasions each of the five has refused – illegally, according to the Charter which states they must approve for the ballot a petition certified by the registrar of voters as the pair were – to do that.

Imperfect but adequate I-10 bridge deal worthy

It’s not perfect, but the deal the state signed this week to construct a toll bridge where Interstate 10 crosses the Calcasieu River has more plusses than minuses.

After legislative and state approval, the final step in a couple of weeks is for the state to have the State Bond Commission approve nearly a billion dollars in financing from its end. Throw in $225 million in federal funds, and that leaves $900 million for the private consortium Calcasieu Bridge Partners to foot the rest in the building, maintenance, and operating of it for 50 years. That construction could begin within weeks and it is anticipated will last seven years.

Throughout this interval, CBP will collect tolls to pay it back: the initial capital outlay, operating costs, and maintenance. Beyond those, 15 percent goes to the state, with the intention of plowing some or all of that back into subsidizing the tolls, which are indexed to inflation from their initial negotiated levels, with any of that not going to that purpose used for Lake Charles-area transportation projects.

New map death watch starts, but when executed?

That didn’t take long. In fact, what took so long for a challenge to come to Louisiana’s recent reapportionment attempt that probably won’t do much in the short term but could have an enormous impact long term?

Wednesday, a suit was filed against the state for its new congressional map carved into existence at the legislative special session in January. That plan deliberately created two majority-minority districts, with residents who identify at least partially as black holding narrow majorities, out of the six. It replaced a map with a single M/M district in a state where just about a third of residents identified as at least partially black that was under litigation with Middle District of Louisiana judge Shelly Dick, a Democrat former Pres. Barack Obama appointee who showed little patience for the existing map with her threatening to impose her own two M/M map as a result of a rushed ruling in 2022.

That decision became bolstered by the U.S. Supreme Court’s Allen v. Milligan ruling last year, which consented to a special three-judge panel in Alabama, which had a black population of about a quarter, that determined a one-of-seven M/M plan by the state violated Section 2 of the Voting Rights Act. That ruling gave preference to race as a means of reapportionment over other principles such as compactness, contiguity, and community of interests preserved, by injecting race as something defining a community’s interest.

LA fights to expose possible Biden EPA collusion

Now we know more about why the Environmental Protection Agency last year suddenly punted on one Louisiana case trying to expand its powers beyond its legal authority, thanks to a similar case initiated by Republican Gov. Jeff Landry.

Last week, a federal district court blocked the EPA from creating rules that would allow use of disparate impact requirements in its decision-making process. This process utilizes a disparate impact study, which assesses whether proposed actions that may have differential impacts on protected classes under Title VI of the Civil Rights Act and assumes foundationally that significant differences must connote racist intentions deemed illegal.

Over two decades ago the U.S. Supreme Court instructed the EPA that it couldn’t impose this requirement, but only at the tail end of the Republican Pres. Donald Trump Administration did it issue a repeal. But before the rule became final, predictably the new Democrat Pres. Joe Biden EPA dropped it. Illegally imposing the rule threatens, in this instance, hundreds of millions of dollars in state grant money from the federal government because, as part of its role in approving these, EPA insists on including the language that the state must follow.

Done right, LA lowering age will reduce crime

Republican Gov. Jeff Landry’s transition team studying crime and public safety issues got it right on its recommendations for dealing with juvenile crime, especially in adjusting how and when juveniles should face adult sanctioning.

Statistics in Louisiana capturing juvenile criminal behavior are incomplete and difficult to corral, but it appears that this has increased in frequency over the past few years. In some other jurisdictions with similar treatment under the law and more complete data, such as New York City, confirm such an increase.

The report on this subject, released last week and which echoes without the detail of a previous one from the attorney general’s office when Landry headed that, concludes “Soft on crime philosophies have failed, allowing the juvenile crime crisis to spiral out of control.” It recommends various measures to compensate such as mandating certain minimum penalties, introducing probation and parole as options, and transparency in releasing juvenile correctional information that can lead to more appropriate reactions to change miscreant behavior.

Landry challenged again by climate craziness

Republican Gov. Jeff Landry scored a final success going out the door as Louisiana’s attorney general, but an even greater challenge from climate craziness has reared its ugly head.

Landry proved a reliable champion against climate alarmism in his two terms as attorney general, which mainly featured battles against the overreach of Democrat Pres. Joe Biden. Usually, these incidents affected the state as part of the broad collective of states and not directly targeted at Louisiana. Democrat former Gov. John Bel Edwards also is a climate alarmist, but he couldn’t do much to spread the infection into state government with little support from the Legislature and Public Service Commission, and what little he could do Landry already has started to reverse.

However, a recent Biden Administration action that ultimately could threaten national security delivered direct punch at Louisiana. Last week, the Department of Energy said it wouldn’t approve indefinitely permits for liquified natural gas exportation to countries not part of free trade agreements with the U.S., pending a review of factors that go into that decision-making. The guidance is five years old and, according to Biden, doesn’t take into account the alleged “climate crisis” built upon weak-to-nonexistent confirmatory data.