Intense rivalries mark NW LA legislative tilts

Reapportionment shook up Caddo and Bossier Parish representation in the Louisiana Legislature, setting up for some new faces, refugees from other local offices, and intense clashes on this fall’s ballot.

The area’s overall declining population rearranged things considerably. Which boundaries are coming and going will create some interesting dynamics.

In the House of Representatives, District 1 won last time for his first term by Republican Danny McCormick, retreated from Bossier Parish to become a completely Caddo-based entity. He will again face Republican Randall Liles in a race that could be closer than last time. Although McCormick eked out a general election win without runoff, he ran six percentage points better in Bossier than Caddo. Still, the foothold he has established over the past four years and votes reflecting the district’s ideological tilt should be enough to reelect him.

Blatant Democrat gerrymander dulls Caddo races

Because of a blatant partisan gerrymander, not much drama will come from Caddo Parish Commission elections this fall, with just a few internecine conflicts to stir up things.

Despite having a black/white population of about 49/45 percent as a result of the 2020 census, earlier this year the Commission reapportioned itself into seven strongly majority-black districts out of 12. In terms of registered voters (through August), no district’s majority race was less than 62 percent, District 10 being the lowest, which also underwent the most dramatic change from its previous incarnation where prior to February’s reapportionment its plurality was 49 percent white.

Commission Democrats managed this with an extreme power play. Disregarding its own rules that reapportionment should have occurred in 2022, they delayed the process until one commissioner, Republican Jim Taliaferro, resigned at the end of the year to take a seat on the Shreveport City Council and then appointed Democrat Ron Cothran to serve in the heavily-Republican district. That gave them seven sure votes by which to muscle through the current plan, disregarding an alternative that would have created six each black or white majority districts, leaving District 10 with a small white plurality.

BESE race outcomes expected to refresh reform

From the lineups of candidates for seats on the Board of Elementary and Secondary Education, its potential for policy change from its present course is incremental for the next four years after 2024.

Only District 3 Republican Sandy Holloway will return unopposed. Three other districts will send another Republican, while two will produce a Democrat. As a Republican seems likely to win the governorship and that officer appoints three members, that would indicate a Republican majority regardless of the outcome of the two races where major party candidates will clash.

Although in both cases, a Republican newcomer seems likely to win, with each having an existing connection to state government. Current District 4 Republican incumbent Michael Melerine will defer for a state House of Representative contest, but his wife Republican Stacey Melerine will run in his stead. They may become the new political power couple in north Louisiana, given that District 5 Republican Ashley Ellis also will retire, leaving her husband independent Friday Ellis as mayor of Monroe the only elected official in the household.

BC term limits still delayed, but likely coming

While the battle still rages over term limits hitting the ballot in Bossier City this fall, momentum appears headed in the direction that some form, if delayed and diluted, of these will come into being sooner rather than later.

Last month, the turmoil kicked off when a group of citizens had certified a petition, as authorized under the city charter, that invoked one of the two methods to amend the charter to include term limits. The petition process allows for the City Council to amend the charter directly through ordinance, using the exact language of the ballot propositions, within 30 days of receipt; if not done, then the Council is required to call an election within the next 90 days after with the exact proposition language put upon the ballot. The other process has the Council form a charter review commission whose members it and the mayor appoint, which then formulates amendments that the Council must put on the ballot.

Prior to the Aug. 8 deadline, at the last Council meeting prior to that Aug. 1 Republican Mayor Tommy Chandler tried to have the enabling ordinance introduced, but he missed the deadline which required unanimous Council approval for the addition. Instead, councilors Republicans David Montgomery, Jeff Free, and Vince Maggio, plus Democrat Bubba Williams and no party Jeff Darby, vetoed that – an atypical move, as the Council historically hardly ever has denied putting tardy submissions on the agenda.

LA lesser executive contests offer intrigue

Telegraphed for months in advance, qualifying for Louisiana executive office contests besides governor went largely to script and brought largely predictable clarity to races, if not intrigue.

Lieutenant governor looks like a walkover for Republican Lt. Gov. Billy Nungesser, drawing token opposition with the exception of GOP former state Sen. Elbert Guillory. This isn’t Guillory’ first statewide rodeo but he doesn’t have a great history in drawing votes statewide and hasn’t reported any consequential raising or spending of campaign funds.

By contrast. in terms of unpredictability, perhaps the most interesting is Secretary of State, where incumbent Republican Kyle Ardoin chose not to run for reelection. GOP Public Service Commissioner Mike Francis is the biggest spender and has a base to work from, while Republican businessman Brandon Trosclair who previously made a legislative run has waged an insurgent campaign based on election integrity. GOP House Speaker Clay Schexnayder is trying to rival Francis in spending, hoping to appeal to state government insiders and crossover Democrats, having had a relationship with them since his speakership election that relied heavily on their support and typically acting sympathetically to their spending agenda unless really pressured by his caucus.

Bossier jurors' acts spur flood of challengers

A review of races this fall in Bossier Parish government shows an expected electoral quietude among executives, but perhaps having the chickens coming home to roost for many of the incumbents on the Police Jury.

Parishes have four elective executive offices up for grabs, but there will be next to no drama in Bossier for these. The incumbent assessor, clerk of court, and coroner drew no challengers, letting all three cruise to reelection. Republican Sheriff Julian Whittington did receive a challenge from political unknown Republican Chris Green, a former deputy who would seem to have little chance for the upset.

The Jury contests are another matter. In 2019, eight incumbents walked back into office, with District 2 Republican Glenn Benton being the only incumbent to receive a challenge. This time he avoided one, along with Democrat Jimmy Cochran (unchallenged in District 7 since 1999) and Republicans Doug Rimmer (unchallenged since 2011 in District 8) and Tom Salzer (never challenged since being the only one to qualify for a special election for District 11 in 2017) while the other eight incumbents all filed for reelection against opposition.

Set LA gov field pushes Landry, Wilson to front

Qualifying for this fall’s Louisiana governor’s race went off as expected – predictably since to make a serious effort once must start campaigning months in advance of the due date. So, where do things stand?

Among the 16 candidates were a retread here and there among the several significant ones, the latter being Republicans state Sen. Sharon Hewitt, Atty. Gen. Jeff Landry, state Rep. Richard Nelson, Treasurer John Schroder, and past top gubernatorial appointee Stephen Waguespack; Democrat and recent cabinet member Shawn Wilson, and independent lawyer Hunter Lundy. They gained this distinction by having large enough campaign war chests – in Lundy’s case, mostly self-financed – with at least occasional media references to their candidacies.

Although clearly Landry by this metric is in a class of his own. Having spent millions already and with over $9 million available, that banked figure means Hewitt has in her account 3.8 percent of that total, Nelson has 3 percent, Schroder has 24 percent, Waguespack has 24.2 percent, Wilson has 6.5 percent, and Lundy has 23 percent. That is, all together the significant candidates have 84.5 percent of Landry’s total.

Against type, LA leads in one area of policy

It’s nice to see Louisiana out in front of state policy for once, courtesy of a legislator who has served less time than just about anybody else in Baton Rouge.

Fashionable, with good reason, is the listing of ways in which the state is behind the curve of many of its brethren. While its neighbors cut taxes in significant ways, put some brakes on spending growth prior to this year, and slap restraints on unaccountable bureaucracy in education and other areas, Louisiana made no progress in these areas, mainly because of an obstinate leftist throwback governor in Democrat John Bel Edwards and also weak-kneed so-called conservative leadership in the Legislature.

But the state has pioneered policy in restricting minors’ access to overly sexualized material. Act 436 by Republican state Sen. Heather Cloud, which received much attention and a begrudging assent from Edwards, has libraries create cataloguing and patron borrowing systems that give parents greater control over their children’s media consumption. While measures in several other states address operating funds for libraries as tools to gain compliance with procedures such as these, Louisiana’s is unique in as it leaves operating funds alone and instead would impair the borrowing ability of parish authorities if they don’t comply.

BC term limits resistance invites losing war

Amid the manufactured controversy over an expression of the people’s will in Bossier City to impose term limits on their elected officials, several of its city councilors are trying to win a battle that likely will cause them to lose a war where ultimately Republican Mayor Tommy Chandler picks up the win.

Trying to thwart the wishes of the citizens who organized and signed petitions are Republican Councilors Jeff Free, Vince Maggio, and David Montgomery, Democrat Bubba Williams, and no party Jeff Darby. All except Maggio never again could serve as councilors if the proposition installing a three-term limit succeeds. Along with that is a companion that limits the mayor to lifetime three terms as well.

These five voted down a request to add an agenda item to last week’s Council meeting that could have fulfilled one of the two compulsory Council actions in the wake of a successfully certified petition to amend the charter: a vote whether to make such amendments. Chandler sponsored that, but too late to make it on the agenda without a vote.

Strong LA gov canard distracts from real reforms

What a few candidates for Louisiana governor, as well as state politicians and the public must understand, is that any perception that the state’s chief executive has a lot of power that needs clipping really means curbing the formal powers of all of state government.

Because it is a stubborn fiction that Louisiana’s governor has a vast set of powers granted him by the Constitution. Instead, as the latest if a bit dated (2009) version of a long-running assessment of relative gubernatorial powers among the 50 states reveals, the Bayou State’s chief executive at best comes in among the middle of the pack. Among other things, term limits, widely dispersed executive powers with many out of his hands entirely, limited budgetary authority, and an elected judiciary circumscribe his ability to make policy in an extensive and unconstrained fashion.

Thus, when at a recent gubernatorial candidate forum Republicans state Rep. Richard Nelson, Treasurer John Schroder, and former gubernatorial chief of staff Stephen Waguespack all said they would try to circumscribe the power of the office, they traded on a canard. Nelson and Waguespack mentioned the state’s fiscal system that places too much emphasis on centralized revenue sources and redistribution to local governments, while Schroder targeted a related issue, the governor’s ability to veto state capital outlay funds to local governments as an enticement for legislator cooperation with his agenda.