A bill by Rep. Rickey Hardy to impose term limits on judges, district attorneys and sheriffs was beaten back Wednesday in the House & Governmental Affairs Committee. The Lafayette Democrat’s House Bill 101 failed on a 15-3 vote that included a nay by fellow Lafayette Rep. Nancy Landry, a Republican.
“Elected public office is a privilege, it’s not an entitlement,” Hardy told the committee in introducing the legislation. Appearing at the hearing in opposition to the bill were representatives of the state associations for judges, clerks of court, state troopers, assessors and district attorneys.
Landry was one of many at the hearing expressing particular concern over term limits for judges, questioning whether term limits for the judicial branch could lead to judges favoring litigants who might help them secure employment upon being term limited out of office. “How would we make sure we have a qualified pool of judges if we implement term limits?” Landry also asked. “And don’t you think the longer a judge serves the more experience he gets and the more removed he is from the political process, the better of a judge he is?”
It was an almost unified assault on the bill, although Hardy did manage to deliver a few of his customarily colorful quotes. “If it’s good for the bull it should be good for the cow,” he offered early. Later, in acknowledging that he was unsure whether the bill had the backing of groups like the Council for a Better Louisiana, Hardy suggested his bill had more a prestigious endorsement: “I have the most important person supporting it, which is God.”
Composed but clearly stung by the 15-3 rebuke, Hardy voluntarily deferred another of his bills before the committee — HB 470, which would prohibit persons 70 years old and older from holding public office.
Wednesday's meeting can be viewed by accessing the House of Representatives video archive.
MAY 17 Here's a column from James Gill, this time in the Advocate. Gill, who has jumped ship from the Picayune, writes about the absurdity of dueling polls in this post. The numbers are so wildly different, it is obvious that both sides are "cooking the books," he writes. In particular, he looks at Sen. Mary Landrieu, and how her recent actions in DC have been received by those polled. Gill's acerbic, amusing prose is a welcome addition to a paper so conservative as to be occasionally lacking in personality.
MAY 17 Blogger Tom Aswell continues delivering bombshells about the state education department and Gov. Jindal's education "reform" efforts. In this post, he reports that students in the Shreveport area have been signed up for a charter school without their knowledge or consent. Most interesting to Aswell is how this Texas-based charter (with ties to GOP types) got the personal student information it has, if the students didn't give it.
MAY 17 This post by JR Ball in the Baton Rouge Business Report is an interesting tongue-in-cheek look at recent Baton Rouge economic development efforts. Among the items he examines is the idea that gaining a Costco makes BR a "world-class city." (Really? All you need is a different brand of Sam's? MK!) This effort, and other recent ones, are all built on the taxpayer's back, with tax zones, tax incentives and tax rebates, Ball writes.
MAY 17 Blogger CB Forgotston is critical of the legislature's reliance on a revenue-estimating committee's decision to include projected tax amnesty income in this year's forecast. That's a problem, CB posts, because the deadline for these people to pay their taxes is June 30, 2014. So when do you think these people who haven't paid taxes in years are going to pay their taxes? Surely not before June 30, and that means the money won't be there for this year's budget, he argues.
MAY 17 Here's an interesting blog out of California by a Hollywood writer, attorney and academic named Brian Alan Lane. He blogs about higher ed, and was a whistle-blower in a scandal over false credentials. In this post, he takes aim at LSU's new top dog, King Alexander. It's convoluted and a little confusing, but it sure makes Alexander a lot more interesting than he was yesterday.
MAY 17 Blogger Robert Mann writes about the LSU Board's refusal to allow Dr. Fred Cerise to testify before the legislature about Gov. Jindal's plan to close down all the state's charity hospitals and dump the poor on the private system. It's hard to imagine anyone more qualified than Cerise to testify about that, so why would anyone try to prevent him doing so? Mann thinks it is because the powers that be aren't interested in hearing any truth about the plan.
MAY 17 This post on the Louisiana Sinkhole Bugle, a blog that notes developments in the Bayou Corne and Jefferson Island salt domes, talks about a proposed expansion of the salt dome storage under Lake Peigneur in Iberia Parish. Residents are working against it for several reasons, including two biggies: the sinkhole disaster in Bayou Corne and the continuing, unexplained bubbling on the surface of the Lake.
MAY 17 NOLA police arrested more people Thursday accused of either being involved in the Mother's Day shooting or hiding the suspect afterward, this Gambit story reports. The NOLA police chief said he suspects the whole thing was gang-related and throws out a challenge to the gangs: he's got informants now, he says, and he knows a lot more than the gangs want him to know. The people who live in the neighborhoods terrorized by gangs are ready to talk, he says.
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