Bossier City finds competitor to most apathetic electorate

As far as 2017 local elections go in Louisiana, it looks as if Bossier City may have to hand over its crown for king of apathy to a region just west of Lafayette.

The city that has grown up around Barksdale Air Force Base in the shadow of Shreveport, pockmarked with casinos, has become infamous over the decades for its sclerotic government. In the last four regular elections dating back to 2005, for a total of eight offices – seven on the city council and the mayoralty – these 32 positions have drawn precisely 42 candidates, an average of just over one contested election per cycle.

This year held to form. Republican Mayor Lo Walker, who will turn 84 this year, qualified unopposed for a fourth term, despite a flurry of indications he would not skate (with injudicious past behavior likely keeping out one potential contender). Six of the seven members of the City Council escaped challenge, with only one of its less useful members from a panel of mediocrities having to work for reelection, District 1’s Scott Irwin, who also faced a challenger in 2013.

Expulsion only punishment for LA Senate miscreant

Should Democrat state Sen. Troy Brown stay or should he go from the chamber, after another no contest pleading to a misdemeanor use of violence on a woman? Answering this requires thoughtful understanding of the purpose and role of a legislator.

Past policy-makers had written into law a value judgment about such matters: legislators convicted of a felony cannot continue to serve. The severity of felonious behavior, it would seem, presupposes that the official (this applies to all state government officeholders, elected or not, although not judicial or not civil service) in question does not have the sufficient trustworthiness to govern in the interest of the people. Suspension from office occurs until the conviction reaches finality, i.e. exhaustion of appeals through the judicial system.

None of this applies to Brown, but the Constitution provides for removal of a state official through impeachment for “gross misconduct” while in office. While some senators have raised this possibility, other seem hesitant, such as state Sen. Yvonne Dorsey Colomb, who wants to rewrite the law to allow for “suspension.”

Associations to play big role in HD 8 election

Associations past and present will play an important role determining the victor of the Louisiana House of Representatives District 8 contest this spring.

On Mar. 25, voters in northern Bossier Parish will head to the polls for the special election to replace Republican Rep. Mike Johnson after his recent win. With just a shade under half of the district’s registrants signed up as Republicans, this may be the most conservative House seat in the state. A Democrat has not even tried to run since 1995.

But that doesn’t mean fellow travelers of that party have not made an attempt in the past two decades. In 2003, lawyer Ryan Gatti came up way short against former Rep. Jane Smith. A dozen years later, Gatti narrowly won the state Senate post from the area, in the process openly aiding Democrat Gov. John Bel Edwards in his upset victory.

Mayoral politics intrudes on NO good govt measure

Defending a fast-and-easy system that permits transfer of taxpayer wealth to questionable organizations seems the first order of business in the nascent mayoral campaign of New Orleans City Councilor LaToya Cantrell.

At a recent City Council committee meeting, City Councilor Stacy Head made the reasonable suggestion that the city charge discounted rates to organizations claiming nonprofit status for city involvement with special events. Until now, the chronically cash-strapped city has waived all such fees, and still would waive it in some cases under the new fee structure.

That notion generated little controversy, but sparked heated argument when it came to what qualified groups as nonprofits. Head wanted to count groups only with Internal Revenue Service charitable status. Until recently, this procedure, which costs $400 to obtain, required a detailed application, typically dozens of pages long, spelling out clearly the governance structure, decision-making rules, and purposes to which donated funds would go.

The Advocate column, Jan. 15, 2017

Governor, state health department leader's obsession with Medicaid expansion distracts from budgetary problems
http://www.theadvocate.com/baton_rouge/opinion/jeff_sadow/article_d08a82dc-d8f7-11e6-a7ee-1fc60d589ad8.html

Links:
http://www.nola.com/politics/index.ssf/2017/01/obamacare_repeal_advocacy_aca.html
http://www.theadvocate.com/baton_rouge/news/politics/article_9c597028-d478-11e6-8928-173f02e9b646.html
http://www.legis.la.gov/legis/ViewDocument.aspx?d=915902
http://www.legis.la.gov/Legis/ViewDocument.aspx?d=911313
https://www.heartland.org/_template-assets/documents/publications/mdcdexpntnimpct_mrch13.pdf
https://thefga.org/download/ObamaCare-Expansion-is-Shattering-Projections.PDF
https://cei.org/blog/obamacare-shrinks-economy-through-medicaid-expansion-and-tax-credit-cliffs
http://www.cnsnews.com/news/article/medicaid-estimate-renews-cost-concerns-over-obamacare
http://www.nber.org/oregon/

Flawed LA Regents report needs serious adjusting

Well, it ended up as false advertisement, but with modifications the draft response of the Louisiana Board of Regents to a legislative study request can make the state’s higher education system significantly more effective and efficient.

Act 619 of 2016 set the state’s governance board for higher education on course to review comprehensively delivery of post-secondary education. When commencing this effort last fall, leaders said they would produce a document with “bold” recommendations.

Instead, the finished product unveiled this week comes off as mild as a church mouse, which undoubtedly will disappoint the bill’s author, Republican state Sen. Sharon Hewitt. Months ago, she asked for very specific items for the Legislature to tackle in the near future. She and other legislators widely expected the effort to include guidance on streamlining the governance system and establishing a lower number of senior institutions.

Loudmouth Landrieu needs to do his job on crime

It doesn’t have the flashiest name, nor can it contribute much to crime reduction. But as long as governance of New Orleans does not address seriously the causes and disincentives to committing crime in the city, the revamped and renamed Louisiana Bureau of Investigation under the jurisdiction of Republican Atty. Gen. Jeff Landry will prove helpful in keeping down the Crescent City’s rampant lawlessness – despite its political leadership.

Landry recently has expanded activity of the unit, which has in the past served as an investigative unit for his office, by sending it into New Orleans. There, in a few months it has racked up relatively small numbers of arrests and prompted complaints from the powers that be in the city, principally Democrat Mayor Mitch Landrieu and his police chief Michael Harrison.

Harrison actually wrote a note to Landry alleging that the state’s top justice official did not have the authority to conduct policing activities in New Orleans because of its special act home rule charter. Let’s hope Harrison knows law enforcement better than he knows his state’s Constitution, for while Art. VI Sec. 5 gives such governments powers not inconsistent with law and the Constitution, in Art. VI Sec. 6 it places the only limitation on the state’s powers relevant to a charter, that no law affect powers under the charter or functions and organization of government related to that. Landry’s office or any state agency with law enforcement power has the unfettered right to operate in New Orleans as it wishes.

Legislature must trump Edwards on deficit agenda

Even if Democrat Gov. John Bel Edwards uses his authority to force the Louisiana Legislature into special session, Republican legislative leaders still can force him to dance to their tune that emphasizes efficient government of appropriate size.

Next week the Revenue Estimating Conference will meet, potentially to change its forecast of fiscal year 2017 revenues. When it met late last year, mainly at the behest of House Speaker Taylor Barras, it did not alter the current forecast that already has come in around $300 million fewer than budgeted.

However, trends may not have reversed sufficiently so as not only to create a deficit on top of the one previously declared, but also a significant one. So large, in fact, that Edwards alleges nothing less than a special session can do to fix it, meaning broad tax and/or fee increases on the table. And while Edwards complained about the REC not declaring deficit conditions in December, which would have required a special session after 30 days if administrative actions still left a deficit, he did not issue a warning for executive branch agencies to clamp down on spending like he did earlier last year.

Flawed study misinforms on LA Obamcare impact

As midnight approaches for the Affordable Care and Patient Protection Act (“Obamacare”), its supporters summon any failed argument they can to try to stave off its inevitable demise. Thusly in Louisiana we hear a rehash of the widgets defense.

A report alleges that repeal of the wealth redistribution aspects of it and Medicaid expansion in Louisiana would cost $639.7 million loss in state and local taxes; $39.1 billion loss in business output and a $21.5 billion hit to the gross state product. Nationally, the presumed impact would mean a $2.6 billion loss in jobs in 2019 and a $1.5 trillion drop in gross state products between 2019 and 2023, according to the report.

But like all analyses supposedly touting the economics of Obamacare, it fails both in execution and conceptually. These always look only at the effect of adding money into the health care sector, not in the balancing of taking money out of the economy – with the latest Congressional Budget Office numbers forecasting at least $2 trillion removed by the federal government, some of which comes in direct taxation of individuals specifically to finance the scheme, plus over $600 billion more in fees and penalties over the 2016-25 period. That doesn’t even count the rapidly escalating cost of health insurance that shunts even more money from citizens who otherwise could have spent it on other economic sectors or have invested it – for 2017 an average annual increase of 25 percent for individual policies nationally and in Louisiana 17 percent.

The Advocate column, Jan. 8, 2017

Evangeline Parish officials playing dumb about arrest scandal, much like the 'Three Wise Monkeys'
http://www.theadvocate.com/baton_rouge/opinion/jeff_sadow/article_c917b838-d377-11e6-b5df-773e459f642d.html

Links:
http://www.theadvocate.com/acadiana/news/crime_police/article_6981deec-ceb5-11e6-bacf-63ebea1d8c26.html
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Three_wise_monkeys
https://www.justice.gov/opa/file/919436/download
http://www.lcle.la.gov/programs/postinservice.asp
http://jeffsadow.blogspot.com/2016/01/democrats-drawing-wrong-lessons-from.html