Settling up: Individuals and businesses who have fallen behind on their taxes have five days remaining to take advantage of the state’s tax amnesty program. The 30-day amnesty program, which ends at 11:59 p.m. on Friday, gives delinquent taxpayers and non-filers the opportunity to pay off their delinquent balances with penalties waived, along with 50% of accrued interest. Though the department has said its goal for this amnesty period is to collect just $100 million of the potential $1.9 billion in outstanding taxes owed, last year it collected more than $450 million during a similar program. The department says amnesty applications take about five minutes to complete. Get complete program details.
Party time: As the party makes a final push to unseat incumbent Democratic Sen. Mary Landrieu, the Republican Party of Louisiana is holding a rally this afternoon in downtown Baton Rouge featuring Kentucky Sen. Rand Paul, Gov. Bobby Jindal and Sen. David Vitter. They’ll be stumping for Rep. Bill Cassidy, who is on the December runoff ballot with Landrieu. The rally, which begins at 12:30 p.m. at Huey’s Bar, 350 3rd St., will also feature Cassidy and his former opponent, Rob Maness, who finished third in the Louisiana Senate primary and is now backing Cassidy, state Sen. Elbert Guillory, state Rep. Paul Hollis, LAGOP Chairman Roger Villere, and Garret Graves, who is in a runoff with former Gov. Edwin Edwards for the 6th District Congressional seat.
Stand up and roar: You have two weeks to come up with the best names for the Baton Rouge Zoo’s two new Malayan tiger cubs, which were born in late July and have just been allowed out of their dens for public view. Name suggestions are being taken at the zoo’s Facebook, Twitter and Instagram pages now through Friday, Nov. 21. The submissions will then be narrowed to a list of four finalists and the community will have an opportunity to vote for their favorite. Although there are no official rules regarding the suggested names, Malaysian names have a better chance of being selected, in respect of the origin of the species, zoo officials say.
