The Louisiana Legislature is quickly heading toward its sixth special session in 29 months, and Jeremy Alford says you shouldn’t be surprised if the a seventh special session is called before the end of June.
“No one is actually talking about a seventh special session. Not yet,” Alford writes in his latest column. “Let’s just call that third sentence above what it is: speculation. But, look here, when the Legislature and administration started averaging two special sessions annually, they forfeit any protections from scheduling-related speculation.”
Borrowing an English idiom, Alford says we’re at sixes and sevens, a phrase that suggests a state of disorder or total confusion.
“Do you happen to know any states that fit that description?” he asks. “I thought you might.”
In fairness, Alford says, there are some states in worse shape than Louisiana when it comes to budget shortfalls and legislative stalemates.
“Illinois lawmakers, for example, left the Land of Lincoln budget-less during fiscal years 2016, 2017 and most of 2018,” he notes. “The gridlock there makes Louisiana’s inaction look like action.”
Since taking office in January 2016, Gov. John Bel Edwards has called lawmakers into special sessions twice a year with hopes they would create permanent sources of revenue via tax changes, Alford says.
“Democrats were largely on the same page in the beginning, but they’ve since splintered as Republican legislators have held strong to a vision of a smaller government,” he writes. “The problem for the GOP line-holders has been that no one can communicate a solution that includes a politically pragmatic path forward and some form of continuity for future terms.”
More importantly, Alford says both sides still seem to be searching for a magic-bullet plan—one with enough flexibility to provide cash to the state in the short-term, while gradually transitioning into structural revenue and spending reforms.
Jeremy Alford publishes LaPolitics Weekly, a newsletter on Louisiana politics, at LaPolitics.com. Follow him on Twitter, or on Facebook. He can be reached at JJA@LaPolitics.com.
