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In a legislative session that should focus on the state’s most pressing problems, Louisiana lawmakers are pursuing a wide-ranging rewrite of the state’s ethics code that would whittle away at the minimal protections enacted to safeguard against conflicts of interest, backroom dealing and corruption.
The Louisiana House backed a nearly $43 billion state operating budget that keeps many agencies at a largely standstill level of financing, continues the stipend that public school teachers have received for the last two years and adds money for a new voucher program backed by the governor.
Nearing the midpoint of the Louisiana Legislature’s annual regular session, lawmakers are debating more than 900 bills, continuing the trend of fewer filed bills. The fiscal session that began April 14 is designed to focus most heavily on Louisiana’s finances.
The release of Gov. Jeff Landry’s budget proposal to lawmakers came with a cloud of uncertainty. A combination of unanswered questions about state and federal financing sources is driving unpredictability for piecing together the spending plans for the 2025-26 fiscal year that begins July 1.
Louisiana’s governor and lawmakers will get to sidestep debates over whether to make steep budget cuts next year thanks to the tax changes they adopted last month.
Voters have adopted 221 changes to the Louisiana Constitution since its ratification 50 years ago, a total that grew with the November and December elections. Nearly 69% of the 321 amendments posed to voters across those decades have won passage.
Louisiana lawmakers embraced much of the tax rewrite package sought by Gov. Jeff Landry in the just-ended special session, agreeing to lower and flatten income tax rates in exchange for new sales tax charges.
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