Lay the Blame Where It Belongs

Once again, the B.R/N.O. Advocate has written a bias editorial ignoring the facts, simply for sensationalism. The decision to dredge the Mississippi River did not occur in some vacuum, resulting in some whim by the Army Corps of Engineers. It was done with the full approval of the Feds, the Louisiana legislature and the port authority of New Orleans. It was NOT some unilateral decision by the Army Corps. It came down to making New Orleans a central hub for commercial shipping with the prospect of billions in shipping revenues, or the loss of these dollars based upon the odds of what might happen if the project went forward. The state of Louisiana decided to take the cash and needs to man up and live with its past decision.  Louisiana folks, who are suffering through this latest saltwater intrusion and want to lay the blame on someone, need to find another scapegoat because unlike what the Advocate editorial would have you believe, the Army Corps only did what Louisiana wanted them to do.  Please research the facts; something the Advocate chose not to do. 

Louisiana's Shameful Non-Voters

We as Louisianians should be so proud.  Eighteen percent (18%) of the registered voters in our state carried Jeff Landry into the governor's office for the next 4 years.  If ever I hear any complaints from individuals about his tenure, the first question I will ask is, "Did you even vote?"  We as a state should be ashamed of ourselves, and Jeff Landry really has little to be proud of.  However, he doesn't most likely really care, because he is now governor.  Pathetic

Louisiana Auto Insurance Rates Myth

Once again, the myth that Louisiana automobile insurance rates are high only because of its number of accident-related lawsuits has been echoed in recent media ads by some of our gubernatorial candidates.  And, as always, other contributing factors have been omitted. Forbes magazine recently published an article about high insurance rates across states.  Their conclusion was, and I quote, "Louisiana’s insurance rates jumped by 19% from last year, to an average annual premium of $2,839, about double the national average, partly because of its large number of uninsured and under-insured drivers – about 11.7% of drivers in the state are currently uninsured."

If Louisiana would get tough about enforcing the uninsured motorist laws, insurance rates would drop.  Instead, our legislators pass laws making it easier to avoid insuring a vehicle; like mandating that a vehicle only needs to be inspected every two years instead of yearly.  Consequently, you only have to show proof of insurance once every two years instead of yearly to get an inspection sticker. Also, our esteemed legislators passed a law limiting the rights of those who do use the courts to pursue accident-related costs under the guise that rates would decrease.  That did nothing to reduce the increases because amendments that would have required insurance companies to reduce rates a set amount yearly were removed from the law by pressure from the insurance companies.  Consequently, our legislators gave financial benefits to these companies with no guaranteed benefits for the policy holders. 

Additionally, the majority of the penalties issued by law enforce personnel in Louisiana is simply the placement of a green sticker on a vehicle's rear window when caught by police for not having automobile insurance; instead of immediately impounding the vehicle and taking away the driver's license. The required state minimum liability insurance rate coverage also needs to be raised to address the under-insured problem.  People sue because an at fault driver doesn't have enough insurance to cover the victim's expenses resulting from the accident.

 

Insurance companies by law notify the state when a vehicle is no longer insured, but no immediate action is taken.  State troopers need to proceed to the owner's residence and impound the vehicle. There are already some laws on the books to drive down auto insurance costs, just no desire to actually do it by enforcement, coupled with no desire to tackle the under-insured problem.  The number of auto accident lawsuits is only the tip of the iceberg for why auto insurance rates are high in Louisiana.

No Money for Bailouts for Catholic Church

New Orleans Archbishop Gregory Michael  Aymond’s revelation that local churches and schools will now have to help bail out the sexual abuse of children disgrace that occurred under his watch and that of his predecessors is just the beginning of the additional suffering that will now occur for the poor and elderly of New Orleans.

As the Archdiocese seeks to round up all the money it can to pay for the over 500 sexual abuse cases, it is only a matter of time before they raid the coffers of the Catholic Charities of New Orleans and shut it down to pay trial judgments for these atrocities.

And as is always the case, the poor and elderly of New Orleans will be the most impacted.  According to its website Catholic Charities of N.O. includes the following:  Children and Family Services, Health and Behavioral Services, Housing and Homelessness Services, Immigration and Refugee Services, Justice and Employment Services, Seniors Services, Disaster Response Services, Adoption Services, and Abuse and Violence Services.

So as the rich folks and business owners continue to make large donations to the Catholic Church of New Orleans which it intends to use to help pay for these court cases, it should now become these folks’ responsibility to ensure that their money will instead only be used to continue to fund the charitable services of the church and not steered to bailouts and the continued salaries of those higher ups responsible for these acts of barbarity.  Just remember, all these guilty New Orleans priests reported to supervisors and none of these have ever been charged, let alone convicted, of any complicity in the actions of their subordinates.

A Pathetic Bunch

The front page story “State of Alarm” was not only a tragic example of the present pain and suffering of women in our state from inadequate prenatal care, but serves as yet another example of the failures of our esteemed Republican state legislators to improve the quality of life for the citizens of this state.

Sadly, instead they focus on whatever ‘hot topic’ is promoted nationally by extremists.  In the last legislative session, their main concerns were “protecting our children” from what they deemed unfit books in our public libraries, from unfair advantages in sports, and from transgender care for a minute population of our state.  They were in fact so obsessed with the last protection that they even called a special session to deal with it even though data shows that it is an inconsequential problem in this state.

And when it comes to “protecting the unborn,” they’re all about making sure none are aborted, but apparently couldn’t care less about how healthy that unborn child is.

In their decisions on how to spend all that extra money in the state’s coffer this year, our legislators chose allocating 30% of the state budget to 197 personal ‘pet projects’ for the particular parishes they represented.   Nearly a third of the total cash, 13.2 million, is going to the home parishes of House Speaker Clay Schexnayder, House Speaker Pro Tempore, Tanner Magee, House Appropriation Committee Chair, Jerome “Zee” Zeringue, and House Ways and Means Committee Chair, Stuart Bishop.

Meanwhile newborns continue to die at a rate “higher than the developed world,“ with no end in sight.

This trend could be stopped, but not with this pathetic bunch of legislators more interested in hot topic headlines rather than real improvement in the quality of life in our state. and let's not even talk about our esteemed A.G., Jeff Landry.

When is enough, enough?

 

With the exception of Mardi  Gras and the Essence festival which are actually run by private entities, what city services does  N.O. presently successfully offer?   Police response times for serious crimes such as rape, car jackings, theft, and shootings are still not even close to acceptable limits, and EMI response times also pale.  The sewerage and water board services and billing are still deplorable.  And let’s not even talk about the ongoing sanitation services debacles, coupled with failures to repair streets in a timely fashion.  Blight continues unchecked along with increases in the homeless populating its streets.

Now we discover that kids that worked this summer for various city projects still haven’t been paid, coupled with the tragedy of a child being injured by a fallen tree limb that could have been prevented by addressing the early warning signs of an unsafe tree in the highly trafficked Jackson Square.

The city of New Orleans continues to drift more and more into a reactive mode rather than a proactive one.  Sadly, I suspect that many have become so accustomed to the present environment in the Big Easy that they don’t realize that there are places where things are extremely better.

The excuse that the city’s problems are no different than any other big cities continues to lull its residents further and further into passivity and acceptance of the present city management.

One has to wonder when its citizens will realize that enough is enough, for they still continue to talk about how much, “they love the city.”  They need to stop living in the past.  New Orleans ain't what it use to be.

Greed Kills Bar Protection

When it comes to protecting the unborn our state’s Republican legislators have no problems enacting laws. When it comes to protecting our youth from transgender sports participants, and the discussion of sexuality in our schools, our Republican legislators have no problems with restrictive legislation. When it comes to regulating which books are available in our libraries and checked out by our kids, once again our esteemed legislators rise to the occasion and have no problems enacting regulatory laws at the state and local levels about a non-issue.

However, when it comes to protecting our youth from underage drinking, our Baton Rouge Republican legislators balk and claim any changes in raising the legal age to 21 for entering bars would, “not be in the best interest of our young people and, frankly this is not in the best interest of the state.”  At least this is what Sen Beth Mizell was told by the Senate Judiciary B Committee when they killed her bill aimed at protecting our youth from unscrupulous bars engaging in underage serving of alcohol. Presently in Louisiana you can enter a bar at 18 but must be 21 to purchase alcohol in a bar.

Am I missing something?  Maybe too much illegal money would be lost if the bar entry age was aligned with the alcohol purchase law, for it seems that such a change would be embraced by bar owners because enforcement of underage drinking would be a great deal easier. But they vehemently opposed the change which makes them all suspects in the illegal monetary benefits that presently exist.  Additionally, one has to wonder how many legislators own bars or have relatives or friends who own bars, or better yet, receive large campaign donations from alcohol lobby groups or owners of such establishments.

The hypocrisy in Baton Rouge never ceases to amaze me when the ‘almighty dollar’ is involved even when it may lead to harm.