By Quint Forgey
BATON ROUGE — A measure aimed at streamlining the governance of Louisiana’s higher education by merging its four management boards and the overarching Board of Regents into one new governing body — the Louisiana Postsecondary Education Board of Trustees — was effectively killed by one vote in the House Education Committee on Wednesday.
By Justin DiCharia
BATON ROUGE — Former Attorney General Buddy Caldwell testified Wednesday against a bill prohibiting justices of the peace from issuing felony warrants unless all other judges within their district had been contacted first.
By Michael Tarver
BATON ROUGE – A bill that would triple the time a woman must wait before getting an abortion passed through the Senate Health and Welfare Committee, but not without heavy debate.
By Michael Tarver
BATON ROUGE — The Louisiana House Government Affairs Committee passed a bill Wednesday defining the restrictions of surrogate pregnancies and detailing the process by which a woman can legally carry a child for another couple.
House Bill 1102 by Rep. Stuart Bishop, R-Lafayette, coasted through the committee without opposition though not without public opposition and advances to the full House for debate.
By Noah Bryant Ballard
BATON ROUGE — Louisiana’s LGBT community will have to wait a little longer for the House of Representatives to consider legislation aiming to protect them from discrimination.
Scheduled Monday to consider two anti-discrimination bills, the House Civil Law Committee failed to hear bills by Rep. Pat Smith, D-Baton Rouge, and Rep. Joseph Bouie, D-New Orleans, who voluntarily pulled their respective bills, HB 501 and HB 925, after sensing they didn’t have sufficient committee support to get the measures to the House floor for debate.
By Michael Tarver
BATON ROUGE — A bill by Sen. Mack White, Jr., R-Baton Rouge, allowing K-12 employers to opt out of the Teachers’ Retirement System of Louisiana failed to gain Senate Retirement Committee approval Monday. It appears dead for the session.
By Justin DiCharia
BATON ROUGE — Republican lawmakers, eyeing spending cuts to shift money to fully fund TOPS, the state’s college scholarship program for in-state students, pushed through committee approval Monday to require the executive branch to cut $184 million from state contracts.
By Justin DiCharia
BATON ROUGE —In July, all able-bodied Louisianans between 18 and 49 years of age will be required to undergo workforce training before receiving government food stamps
Gov. John Bel Edwards announced the requirement Thursday in Hammond and signed an executive order to require state residents in the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program to personally attend training at one of the state’s 59 Louisiana workforce business and solution centers.
By Jack Richards
The Senate Education Committee Thursday unanimously passed a proposal that would require cursive writing exercises starting in the third grade and continuing through high school graduation.
By Michael Tarver
BATON ROUGE — The Louisiana Constitution may come under a legislative microscope this summer if a bill calling for a constitutional convention is approved by the House and Senate. It was off to a good start Wednesday, sailing through the Senate Governmental Affairs Committee and delivered to the full Senate for consideration next week.
LSU Manship School Statehouse Bureau 