LSU Manship School Statehouse Bureau

Published: May 18, 2023

By: Allison Allsop, LSU Manship School News Service

BATON ROUGE, La. — A $483 million increase in revenue for the state’s general spending fund is now being estimated for 2024, adding to a giant pile of money that the state Legislature has at its disposal.

Under the new projections, the state’s general fund also will take in $323.4 million more than previously expected in the current fiscal year, bringing the total surplus from the last two years to over $2.1 billion.

The new projection was made Thursday by the state’s Revenue Estimating Conference. It updated revenue forecasts for both the current fiscal year, which ends June 30, and for next year.

The increased projections come as the House and the Senate are split over what to do with all the extra money.

Under a formula that places a cap on spending, the Legislature could only spend $500 million of the surplus funds in fiscal year 2024 on recurring budget items, and the additional revenue forecasted Thursday will not increase the cap.

Read more at WWL-TV

Published: May 18, 2023

By: Allison Allsop, LSU Manship School News Service

BATON ROUGE–The House passed a bill 79-17 Wednesday that would provide free menstrual products to students in public schools.

House Bill 117 would require public schools to provide free tampons and pads in easily accessible locations. Charter schools are exempt from the bill.

The Legislature would have to approve funding each year for the bill to be in effect that year.

The funding for the products would come from the state’s general fund. Schools may provide the products in bathrooms, offices or other locations.

Read more at The Houma Times

Published: May 17, 2023

By: Piper Naudin, LSU Manship School News Service

BATON ROUGE–The House Committee on Administration of Criminal Justice moved a bill
forward that would create a registry of people who commit battery against minors.

Rep. Troy D. Romero, R-Jennings, proposed House Bill 31 to protect children. Terry Mann
tearfully testified how he had discovered after two weeks of intensive medical care that his 7-year-old grandson had suffered from two skull fractures.

He said the bill was necessary to protect children from people who might harm them.

Sarah Whittington, an attorney for the Justice and Accountability Center of Louisiana, testified in opposition. She said the bill would be ineffective in protecting children because all the information that it attempts to publicize is already available to law enforcement officers.

Read more at Bossier Press-Tribune

Published: May 17, 2023

By: Claire Sullivan, LSU Manship School News Service

Louisiana’s most recent plan to restore and protect its coast at a cost of $50 billion advanced Wednesday through the House Committee on Natural Resources and Environment.

The coastal master plan is updated by the Coastal Protection and Restoration Authority every six years, as required by state law. It lays out the 50-year future for Louisiana’s coast in terms of coastal land loss and flood risk–with and without its implementation.

The plan represents a vital need in a state that has lost more than 2,000 square miles of land, an area the size of Delaware, since the 1930s, according to the U.S. Geological Survey. Louisiana’s problems are exacerbated by devastating hurricanes and rising seas from climate change.

Though the coastal plan rests on the latest science and engineering, it also emerges from a highly public process. The coastal authority received more than 200 public comments and held close to 100 public meetings in South Louisiana about the plan, the coastal protection board’s chairman, Kyle R. “Chip” Kline Jr., said.

Read more at Louisiana Illuminator

Published: May 17, 2023

By: Molly Ryan, LSU Manship School News Service

BATON ROUGE – A bill that would, in certain circumstances, require newborns to get tested
for cytomegalovirus, or CMV, cleared another hurdle Wednesday as it advanced out of the
Senate Health and Welfare Committee.

House Bill 643, also known as “Journie’s Law,” requires newborns in Louisiana who fail their
hearing tests to be screened for CMV, a common virus that can lie dormant and be passed from mother to child during pregnancy. It can have serious health implications for children if it goes undetected.

Rep. Dodie Horton, R-Bossier, the bill’s author, said a failed hearing test is an immediate sign an infant may have the virus. The bill is named after one of Horton’s constituents, Journie, who was not tested for the virus after failing her hearing test.

Journie is now blind, has cerebral palsy and needs to be fed with a feeding tube. Horton said
Journie could be walking and talking if the virus had been detected earlier.

Read more at Bossier Press-Tribune

Published: May 17, 2023

By: Jenna Bridges, LSU Manship School News Service

BATON ROUGE, La. — A House committee on crime advanced a bill 8-1 that would allow permitless concealed carry for individuals 18 and older.

Rep. Danny McCormick, R-Oil City, brought what he said was a “constitutional carry” bill before the committee Tuesday. McCormick’s bill would amend present law that only allows concealed carry for 21 or older who undergo the proper training to receive a permit.

Rep. McCormick told the House Committee on Administration of Criminal Justice that his bill, House Bill 131, would mimic current rules that allows individuals 18 and over to openly carry a firearm. His bill would allow individuals to carry a concealed weapon at the same age.

“So basically, what you’re doing with this bill is that you’re trying to get every law-abiding citizen in the state of Louisiana the same ability that every criminal does,” Rep. Raymond E. Garofalo Jr. R-Chalmette, said. “Every criminal right now can carry a concealed weapon with no permit, no training, no nothing.”

Read more at WWL-TV

Published: May 17, 2023

By: Allison Allsop, LSU Manship School News Service

BATON ROUGE–A House committee killed two bills Tuesday that were meant to clarify the language of abortion laws to protect physicians making difficult choices.

House Bill 598, written by Rep. Candace Newell, D-New Orleans, was blocked in the House Committee on the Administration of Criminal Justice in a 7-5 vote.

The committee rejected a similar measure, House Bill 461, by Rep. Mary DuBuisson, R-Slidell, in an 8-5 vote.

All the votes to kill both bills came from Republicans. Four Democrats and the committee’s chairman, Rep. Joseph Marino III, a political independent from Gretna, supported both bills.

Read more at BIZ Magazine

Published: May 16, 2023

By: Claire Sullivan, LSU Manship School News Service

BATON ROUGE, La. — A bill that would allow mothers to recover half of out-of-pocket, pregnancy-related medical expenses from the father of their child cleared another hurdle Tuesday.

House Bill 5, by Rep. Lawrence “Larry” Frieman, R-Abita Springs, moved forward from the Senate Judiciary A Committee. It is one of several bills filed this session to address the realities of post-Roe v. Wade in Louisiana.

Mark Mansfield, who has practiced family law in St. Tammany Parish for more than 20 years, said he began talking about legislation like this with fellow lawyers around the time of the Supreme Court decision that triggered a near-total abortion ban in the state last summer.

“For those of those that are pregnant, we want to give them a chance to recover the expenses the same way they can do when the child is alive,” Mansfield said.

Read more at WWL-TV

Published: May 16, 2023
By: Claire Sullivan – LSU Manship School News Service

BATON ROUGE, La. – High schoolers often worry about prom and exams. But a growing number fear being shot in school, students testified at the Capitol.

A bill aiming to address those concerns, called the School Safety Act of 2023, advanced Monday through the Senate Committee on Finance.

The proposal would establish the Center for Safe Schools within the Governor’s Office of Homeland Security and Emergency Preparedness. It would provide panic emergency notification and anonymous reporting systems for schools.

The bill also would require schools to hold shooting drills during high traffic or passing times in the hallways, have blood control kits and training to use them in school and create district threat assessment teams.

Sen. Barry S. Milligan, R-Shreveport, brought the legislation after consulting with the Legislative Youth Advisory Council, made up of high school students from around the state who engage with the legislative process.

The proposal addresses a growing American problem and fears felt by students nationwide.

Read more at KTBS

Published: May 15, 2023

By: Allison Allsop, LSU Manship School New Service

The House Appropriations Committee voted 16-5 Monday to kill a bill that would have increased the salary for legislators.

House Bill 149 had proposed increasing their pay to roughly $39,000 a year from $16,800, not including the daily stipend for lawmakers who live outside the Baton Rouge area. The committee rejected the bill after much discussion about service, privilege and ability.

Many legislators voiced their concern for supporting a raise in their own salaries when many residents of Louisiana deserve pay raises even more. Some members also worried about how it would look to vote to increase lawmaker pay after the same committee removed direct state funding for up to $3,000 in pay raises for K-12 teachers from the governor’s proposed budget.

After several members of the committee voiced their disapproval, Rep. Joseph Marino, a Gretna Independent who sponsored the pay raise proposal, said many lawmakers refused to pass the bill because they are running for reelection and worry it will harm them.

Read more at Louisiana Illuminator