Welcome to deja vu, Louisiana state government-style.
The latest meeting of Louisiana’s income forecasting panel signaled a guaranteed repeat of budget strife, with one of the conservative House Republican leaders who regularly clashed with Gov. John Bel Edwards during his first term again disrupting the Democratic governor’s plans as his second term is about to begin.
The returning feud over state revenue projections served as a reminder that while Edwards is celebrating a re-election victory, Republicans aren’t plotting endless ways to work in harmony with the Democrat in the state’s top job.
“We’ve seen this movie before. It’s Groundhog Day,” lamented Commissioner of Administration Jay Dardenne, the governor’s chief budget adviser, as the income forecast increase Edwards seeks, was blocked by House Appropriations Chairman Cameron Henry.
Edwards’ latest financial impasse isn’t only with Henry, a Republican moving to a state Senate seat when the new term starts in January. The governor is also at odds with Republican Treasurer John Schroder over a multimillion-dollar fund transfer that Schroder is blocking, a dispute that could end up in court.
Three members of the Revenue Estimating Conference—Dardenne, Senate President John Alario and independent economist Stephen Barnes—sought to increase this year’s and next year’s forecast, based on the advice of the state’s nonpartisan economists. Forecasting changes, however, requires a unanimous vote. Henry, sitting in for House Speaker Taylor Barras, stalled the increase.
Stalling the forecast changes creates procedural difficulties in the legislative budget process. In addition to being lower than economists’ recommendations, projections adopted in April also don’t contain billions that agencies expect to receive from fees, fines and other revenue sources. Read the full analysis of last week’s block from the Associated Press.
