Not worst, but bad news coming for LA Democrats

Early voting in Louisiana has commenced and data from the most recent poll of the Senate contest shows the biggest question about it is whether existing elite Democrats can hang onto power in their own party and whether the party stays relevant.

Public Policy Polling, aligned with leftist interests and somewhat notorious for its willingness to push voters but also much less expensive, conducted one in early October. To nobody’s surprise, incumbent Republican Sen. John Kennedy lapped the field, whose 53 percent indicates unsurprisingly he would win without a runoff.

That was the case even with the push question included, which asked about willingness to vote for him upon realizing he voted against the Democrats’ massive special interest-fueled spending bill from this summer. Rather embarrassingly for the pollster, respondents said overall they would become more likely to support Kennedy knowing that. (This can’t be good news for the state’s other GOP senator, Bill Cassidy, who voted for it.)

Perkins tax gambit fails to absolve his failure

Shreveport Democrat Mayor Adrian Perkins has been trying to post a lot of wins lately in his bid to retain his job, but his reading of tax accountability and roads responsibility won’t be one of these.

Over the past month, Perkins has trotted out a series of alleged policy-making victories as he makes the case to win reelection. He boasted about a drop in crime over the past several months, even as it remains higher than when he assumed office and won’t drop at all over his term unless the recent trend continues. He crowed about building a whole new ballpark at the Fairgrounds and bringing in a minor league baseball team, even as it remained entirely uncertain whether that ever could happen or what the city would pay and the city still must deal with a half-demolished hunk of an old stadium. He bragged that he launched, in conjunction with the library system, free wireless Internet provision in some parts of town although without a plan to continue funding its operation as its capital costs came from one-time money. Plus, the city filed suit against its former consent decree contractor, claiming improprieties to claw back hundreds of millions of dollars that it probably won’t see again even as three or four times that amount remains to be spent in meeting a timetable unlikely to be attained.

Of course, in that span he suffered some losses he rather would have avoided. Chiefly, a former employee filed a whistleblower lawsuit contending that he was fired, backed by Perkins, because he revealed financial irregularities with payroll and Perkins’ travel expenses. That came on the heels of a Louisiana Legislative Auditor’s report confirming the legal problems behind the travel expenses.

Sensible sales decision escapes BC on other items

The only thing worse than a governing authority making an unpopular decision is subsequently butchering its implementation, as Bossier City discovered with its new $12 parking fee at the city-owned, money-losing Brookshire Grocery Arena. Which should teach it a lesson in intruding into matters better handled by the private sector it finally tentatively seems ready to learn after decades.

With little publicity, at the beginning of the month the city revealed the new fee, to be collected in a cashless form using smartphone applications. It went into effect for an Oct. 7 concert, and social media lit up afterwards with horror stories about how the system didn’t work. Complaints about incredible lag times if being able to connect at all, double charging some, or not charging others filled posts and comments, which also extended to general justifiable griping such as poor air conditioning performance and restrooms barren of supplies. No doubt a portion of these filtered to city councilors.

Citizens justifiably were outraged, as not only do they own the building awash in red ink, but now they have to pay for parking next to their own white elephant. Since 2010, a budget year which ended with the Arena Special Revenue Fund that tracks the profitability of the arena having a balance of -$261,284, through last year the facility has lost $6,413,517, requiring $6,953,663 in transfers from other city revenues to leave a balance of $278,863. And, this doesn’t count the tens of millions of dollars spent since then for maintenance.

Edwards politicized kid jab flip-flop exposed

On the issue of Wuhan coronavirus vaccinations for students, Louisiana’s Democrat Gov. John Bel Edwards keeps finding his ideology putting him into politically embarrassing situations.

Last year, Edwards went gung ho on making Louisiana only one of two states that would force schoolchildren to receive such a vaccination, unless parents opted out. His Department of Health promulgated a rule to take effect this fall to do that, then after a House of Representatives panel vetoed that he overruled it. His action fit the politicized nature that marked his policy-making in this area that sought to leverage the issue as a method to increase command and control by government over the citizenry.

However, the evidence against such unwise policy, clear then, became even more so as the calendar changed to this year. The “vaccine” isn’t one but merely a prophylactic that more often than not prevents virus contraction or reduces its impact; it doesn’t prevent transmission, and as the virus involves increasingly doesn’t even work as a prophylactic. And, as almost no children of school age contracting it suffered more than minor symptoms, much less died from it, there was little reason to make vaccination a default condition for attending classes. Worse, there still is medical uncertainty about whether the vaccines, the first ever based upon messenger RNA, have serious long-term side effects, most specifically heart conditions concerning male youths, posing questions that may take decades to resolve that makes discretion the better part of valor.

Right call to bounce adviser willing to pursue ESG

There’s good reason for Louisiana Republican Treasurer John Schroder and the State Bond Commission he heads to have ended a dozen-year relationship with a firm that advises the SBC: because they found one more knowledgeable therefore likely to make better decisions.

Current adviser Lamont Financial Services found itself ousted last week when the SBC voted to award the contract to Public Resources Advisory Group (PRAG), which has similar deals with 18 other states. The adviser makes recommendations for financing deals looking for the lowest interest rates on state debt.

Although Lamont’s longtime liaison with the state plans to retire, what probably contributed more the switch was remarks made by its founder Bob Lamb about the role of “environmental/social/governance” criteria in making decisions. ESG is a somewhat nebulous concept but typically means making investing decisions on the basis of these nonpecuniary objectives. Increasingly a number of investment funds have included these criteria that brings up controversy because political viewpoints define these. This could mean, for example, a fund won’t invest in a certain industry because of its area of business, or a certain business because of labor practices, or a certain country because of its system of government over ideological displeasure with these.

Shreveport mayor forums do little to move needle

While largely low key, the Triple Crown of Shreveport mayoral forums this week couldn’t provide much in the way of information for voters, but it did give the candidates a chance to test out and shoot down some of each other’s main talking points.

Over three straight nights, local television stations presented topical forums, covering policies dealing with crime, economic development, and infrastructure. The format of answers less than a minute gave little opportunity for the candidates selected to participate – Republican former City Councilor Tom Arceneaux, no party Caddo Parish Commissioner Mario Chavez, Democrat Councilor LeVette Fuller, Democrat Mayor Adrian Perkins, and Democrat state Sen. Greg Tarver who opted out of the final one on infrastructure – to speak in more than broad platitudes, but, even so, on occasion succeeded in drawing contrasts to each other.

The embattled incumbent Perkins expectedly aggrandized his record, alleging that under his watch crime was down and the city’s fiscal health improved, pointing to most recent statistics that indicated increased city revenues and lower crime rates. He also took credit for some individual successes, such as pay raises for city employees, the expected buildout of an Amazon fulfillment center, and a supposedly incoming new baseball field with team to go with it in place of the half-demolished Fairgrounds Field, currently still standing only because of a court order halting any further destruction over health concerns.

Bossier jurors indifferent to following law

It seems Bossier Parish can’t stay away from controversy regarding the qualifications of its parish administrator – and its Police Jury apparently doesn’t care whether it follows the law.

Earlier this year, longtime parish engineer Joe Edward “Butch” Ford, Jr. was named to replace retiring longtime parish administrator Bill Altimus. However, earlier this week during their weekly Internet narrowcast Bossier Watch hosts Rex Moncrief and Duke Lowrie, in response to an anonymized e-mail message, brought up that Ford apparently isn’t a registered voter in the parish and therefore wouldn’t be eligible to serve in that position.

The parish doesn’t have a home rule charter and thus state statute defines its government. R.S. 33:1236.1 empowers parishes to appoint a “manager” – which would equate to a parish administrator – and assistant, but both must be registered voters in the parish.

LA should resist wasteful carbon capture aid

Climate alarmists have become so panicky that they’ve started to sabotage their own efforts in Louisiana – and if they were intellectually honest, they would have started a lot earlier to put more extensively the brakes on the extremely high cost, low return, government-directed move away from fossil fuel usage

Their house organ Louisiana Illuminator recently ran a piece about the drawbacks of carbon capture and sequestration, at least in terms of its use of other resources, specifically water used by utilities. It points out the huge volume necessary that would severely strain, if not overwhelm, available water sources across the state in a quest to suck out carbon from energy producers largely using fossil fuels.

Naturally enough, the article doesn’t delve into the cost issue, which would be catastrophically high: CCS technology in a standalone air capture situation such as described costs up to $120 a ton, many times the cost of producing the electricity. This then, if the entire state Public Service Commission followed the lead of its more scientifically-ignorant members, ordinarily would come out of ratepayers’ pockets.

Another wake-up call to fix scoring jolts BESE

Louisiana graduating high school students’ miserable performance on the ACT college readiness test not only throws a crimp into the state’s higher education master plan, it also screams even more loudly to reform a school accountability picture that at present deceives.

Last week, the ACT organization released last year’s results. As does five other states, Louisiana requires all high school students to take the exam, while another eight states have regulations that lead to over 90 percent of such students to do the same. Theoretically, the fewer students that take it, the higher the average of those who do, because lower achievers are disproportionately disinterested in pursuing post-secondary education and don’t sit for the test.

The state finished fifth-worst overall, the same within the cohort of 14 of 90 percent-plus takers. This was the fifth yearly decline in a row, so, even if the Wuhan coronavirus pandemic likely had a negative impact exogenous to typical educating, the erosion began well before that and demonstrates a genuine trend, although that fall has been seen at the national level as well. Louisiana’s 18.1 composite score was 1.7 below the national average and 0.55 below its cohort.

Lax rules nets BC councilor big taxpayer bucks

If you live in Bossier Parish, make yourself at home at Republican Bossier City Councilor David Montgomery’s residence, his office building very near where the Walter O. Bigby Carriageway will terminate, or at his four acres off Swan Lake Road. After all, you and your fellow citizens paid for them by putting nearly $2.8 million in his pocket since 2008.

Montgomery by far has received more money for doing business – selling insurance – with political subdivisions than any other current member of the City Council, personal disclosure forms filed with the state reveal. New members Republicans Chris Smith and Brian Hammons from 2020 haven’t received a cent, nor have the grayer beards of Democrat Bubba Williams since 2008 and Republican Jeff Free from 2012. Williams, like Montgomery and no party Jeff Darby, all of whom had served on the Council prior to 2008, has no public information about his finances reported before then because that was when the state instituted new ethics laws mandating this recording.

Only newcomer Republican Vince Maggio, who since 2020 has made through his grocery store about $12,000 in lottery sales commissions, and Darby, whose total received through contracts by his counseling firm over the years (last in 2018) with state corrections comes up just over a half million dollars, have any income from political subdivisions other that salaries and per diem payments for their public service. Notably, these came from the state, with Maggio’s an automatic byproduct and Darby’s competing with other providers statewide. (For his part, GOP Mayor Tommy Chandler reported no income from other political subdivisions in 2020-21.)