Rather than clarify, sweeps decision confuses

Confusion is as confusion does, which sums up perfectly an incomprehensible ruling on an important question in Louisiana governance.

Yesterday, state District Judge Don Johnson issued a ruling declaring a case of a fund sweep unconstitutional. In this instance, the Legislature lifted from Public Service Commission revenues collected by fees on regulated carriers, appropriating some of that amount to pay for other operations of government.

Interestingly, Johnson last week appeared to have delivered two versions, taking different sides. For whatever reason, it all got sorted out yesterday in favor of a dramatic substitution of judicial opinion for the actual wording of the Constitution.

Big-govt senators ask Edwards to help them

Memo to a bunch of Louisiana state senators: Read the Louisiana Constitution.

Earlier this week, 11 of the majority Republicans joined by three Democrats sent a note to Democrat Gov. John Bel Edwards, urging him to call a special session prior to the start of the regular session Mar. 12. This being an even-numbered year, legislators can’t deal with tax bills in a regular session. With a nearly billion-dollar deficit staring lawmakers in their faces for fiscal year 2019, it seems likely that, at the least, the Legislature will have to tackle renewing temporary taxes.

Most prominently signed by the GOP Sen. Pres. John Alario, the authors point out that the sooner, the better for such a session, in terms of options available. Edwards has said he won’t call the session, a power granted to him under Art. III Sec. 2 which also allows him to set the agenda, unless he has a commitment from the leadership of both chambers to raise specific taxes on a permanent basis. So far, particularly the House leadership, like the Senate’s composed of Republicans, has not assented to any permanent tax increases.

Political intrigue swirls around casino move threat

Whether it’s a power play to extract concessions, DiamondJacks Casino’s possible move to Tangipahoa Parish carries plenty of political intrigue.

Peninsula Pacific, the parent company of the facility which bought it about a year-and-half ago, has said it has $100 million to invest in the laggard of Bossier City’s four boats. However, that might not happen in Bossier Parish. That company has floated the idea to move the boat to the Amite River in Tangipahoa Parish in a bid to improve its fortunes.

By most measures, DiamondJacks performs worse than any of the 15 non-land casinos in Louisiana. For fiscal year 2016, it registered the second-smallest take, behind only the Amelia Belle located in an area relatively far from state borders with a far smaller population base than Shreveport/Bossier. Its admissions were among the lowest; together, these statistics translated into the smallest take per admission of all state boats.

Change LA law to bolster govt accountability

Atty. Gen. Jeff Landry may feel pressured into pursuing legal action against opioid manufacturers. But he has no reason to continue defending an unconstitutional law, nor should Louisiana legislators keep it as is on the books.

Recent federal court decisions have taken a dim view of the state’s R.S. 14:122, which begins “Public intimidation is the use of violence, force, or threats upon any of the following persons, with the intent to influence his conduct in relation to his position, employment, or duty …  Public officer or public employee.” It has good intentions, to prevent discouraging such officials from carrying out their duties.

However, it goes overboard as its language can apply to citizens expressing their rights to hold public servants accountable for their actions. In two recent cases, federal courts have registered strong reservations about overbroad application regarding police behavior, refusing to side with government when it has issued citations utilizing this law.

The Advocate column, Feb. 4, 2018

Louisiana lawmakers keep writing wrong cure for opioid abuse
http://www.theadvocate.com/baton_rouge/opinion/jeff_sadow/article_619b44b4-0796-11e8-ba46-6bf98cb386a1.html

Links:
http://www.theadvocate.com/baton_rouge/news/crime_police/article_7c667572-02f8-11e8-ba90-53c92cef1f7c.html
https://www.cdc.gov/drugoverdose/data/statedeaths.html
http://www.theadvocate.com/baton_rouge/news/politics/article_f1d40e70-a3bf-11e7-83c6-d7000d29e1bd.html
http://www.theadvocate.com/baton_rouge/news/article_e31cac4c-0063-11e8-8e32-2f32dd4b5e65.html
http://reason.com/blog/2017/11/02/opioid-commission-mistakenly-blames-pain
https://www.investors.com/politics/editorials/opioid-epidemic-obamacare-medicaid-expansion/
http://ww.theadvocate.com/baton_rouge/opinion/article_0be7c756-020d-11e8-a174-ab3d65d2ee34.html
https://www.cdc.gov/drugoverdose/maps/rxstate2016.html

GOP must keep free-spending Edwards boxed in

Louisiana’s House of Representatives Republican leadership put the budget ball in Democrat Gov. John Bel Edwards’ court this week – a playing surface Edwards finds contracting in size.

Speaker Taylor Barras transmitted a letter to Edwards outlining GOP caucus demands attached to any revenue-raising package. They include enhanced spending transparency, a change in the expenditure limit calculations, and patient responsibility and work or other requirements for able-bodied adult Medicaid recipients not pregnant, exempting parents of newborns or children with disabilities and people in drug or alcohol rehabilitation programs.

The easier dissemination of expenditures would build upon efforts begun under former Gov. Bobby Jindal, something Edwards should not contest. As for the other issues, expect obfuscation and counterattacks because the realization of Republicans’ goals would separate Edwards too much from his desire to lock in inflated state government.

Diversity unnecessary for an impartial judiciary

So, are we to assume that Louisiana’s electoral system suppresses an inherent goodness of racial and gender diversity on the bench, utilized by males in a white majority electorate indifferent to the place of racial minorities and women in the courtroom?

That’s the implication from a report issued by Tulane University researchers, who compiled a profile of the racial and sexual characteristics of Louisiana’s judges the municipal level all the way to the Supreme Court. Unfortunately, the authors have not released it online where the public could judge the comprehensiveness and quality of their efforts.

They note that, in demographic terms, minorities and women remain underrepresented in robes, at both the state level and typically at the parish level, with one major exception. They do not ascribe causes for this, but assert that benefits would accrue from ameliorating this condition, saying that efforts to “demystify” the judiciary would produce greater proportions of minorities and women wielding the gavel to bring more “credibility.”

Medicaid expansion defenses again mislead

You always can tell when a response to an opinion column comes from Louisiana’s Health Secretary Rebekah Gee, for these ignore the points made by the authors and distract from the validity of these through dubious and non sequitur assertions.

Readers of the Baton Rouge Advocate received two doses of that last week in separate letters published. The first came after a column by state Sen. Sharon Hewitt. In that, Hewitt made the points that the state pays $500 per person enrolled in Medicaid every month and a third of those able-bodied Louisianans enrolled reported earning no income. Further, fewer than 17 percent of those enrolled are actually using the physician services provided through expansion. These numbers buttressed her larger point that the state could use work requirements or substitutes for able-bodied adults to receive Medicaid, as other states are pursuing.

A week later, in a letter Gee belittled that view, even though she tangentially at best addressed the twin issue of non-working able-bodied adults getting free Medicaid and large-scale underuse of Medicaid. She claimed work criteria should not apply to the majority of Medicaid recipients who are children or disabled – but Hewitt never proposed they should be.

LA Democrats sinking further their fortunes

The point isn’t so much that Democrats’ positions continue to deteriorate in Louisiana, or even why, but why Democrats continue to let it happen.

My Advocate colleague Tyler Bridges wrote a piece on how, despite enthusiasm stemming from Democrat Gov. John Bel Edwards’ 2015 upset win, indicators keep showing the party’s fortunes declining. Updating statistics that have appeared in this space on several occasions, it shows the sea change as the state hurtles towards a Republican registration plurality for the first time in recorded history.

It repeats that Republicans, through a series of special elections and party switches, gained a majority in the state House in 2010 and in the state Senate in 2011, for the first time since the post-Civil War Reconstruction era. Those majorities increased in 2011 and stayed essentially locked in as a result of the 2015 elections.

The Advocate column, Jan. 28, 2018

Instead of blasting Rick Scott's visit to Louisiana, Gov. Edwards should take notes
http://www.theadvocate.com/baton_rouge/opinion/jeff_sadow/article_62bbce9c-0208-11e8-a05a-9b6e31b42bf0.html

Links:
http://www.theadvocate.com/baton_rouge/news/politics/article_7d1703de-fb9f-11e7-9a39-27fc53ad24e8.html
https://www.flgov.com/2018/01/16/gov-rick-scott-two-years-of-louisiana-tax-increases-makes-florida-better-destination-for-business/
https://www.jec.senate.gov/public/_cache/files/c31c3a7b-34c9-47a4-8499-4995a6731d29/louisiana-employment-update.pdf
https://www.jec.senate.gov/public/_cache/files/7816b6f0-1bb6-462f-8cb8-e18b41296693/florida-employment-update.pdf
https://www.bea.gov/newsreleases/regional/gdp_state/qgsp_newsrelease.htm
https://www.bea.gov/newsreleases/national/gdp/gdpnewsrelease.htm
https://www.bls.gov/web/laus/laumstrk.htm
https://data.bls.gov/timeseries/CUUR0000SA0L1E?output_view=pct_12mths
https://data.bls.gov/cew/apps/table_maker/v4/table_maker.htm#type=17&from=2015&to=2017&qtr=1&own=0&ind=10&area=22000&supp=1
https://data.bls.gov/cew/apps/table_maker/v4/table_maker.htm#type=17&from=2015&to=2017&qtr=1&own=0&ind=10&area=12000&supp=1
https://data.bls.gov/cew/apps/table_maker/v4/table_maker.htm#type=17&from=2015&to=2017&qtr=1&own=0&ind=10&area=US000&supp=1
http://lfo.louisiana.gov/files/revenue/1_RelUnempRates_09_17.pdf
https://data.bls.gov/timeseries/LASST220000000000006?amp%253bdata_tool=XGtable&output_view=data&include_graphs=true
https://www.weforum.org/agenda/2016/03/what-s-behind-the-drop-in-oil-prices/
http://www.doa.la.gov/opb/pub/FY16/StateBudget_FY16.pdf
http://www.doa.la.gov/opb/pub/FY18/StateBudgetFY18.pdf