BATON ROUGE — Louisiana citizens should be outraged at some of the ways legislators are spending millions of their tax dollars. Over $25 million in local projects, a number of them for unknown causes, are included in the state’s proposed budget. Look through one section of House Bill 1, the legislation that outlines how state government will be financed in 2007-08, and you can’t help but do a double-take. The section in question is titled, “State Aid to Local Governments.” Many of the projects are selfexplanatory. Like $75,000 each for a number of economic development agencies. Or, for example, the $100,000 to the Avoyelles Parish Police Jury for the Spring Bayou ecosystem restoration and hydrilla control project in the parish master plan. The Vernon Parish Police Jury would get $150,000 for a recreational park in the Rosepine area. Cameron Parish is pegged for $100,000 for public improvements. Jennings would receive $150,000 for a water line, and Jeff Davis Parish could get $250,000 for bridges. Officials accountable These are just a sample of local government projects in the bill. And while you might wonder why local governments aren’t paying their own way, you can at least accept the fact that these and many other projects getting help are sponsored by a government agency. The local officials who handle that money are accountable at election time. Unfortunately, there is no accountability for a considerable portion of that $25 million. What, pray tell, is Rho Omega and Friends Inc., which is scheduled for $50,000? Why is the state giving the Jefferson Performing Arts Society $300,000 for operating expenses? You have to ask what the Volunteers for Youth Justice in Shreveport is going to do with $100,000. Look at the following organizations and the money they are supposed to get. Who are they and how will they spend the money? The Neighborhood Development Foundation Inc., $150,000; North St. Antoine Service Inc., $300,000; Uptown Community Redevelopment Inc., $125,000; Daughters of Promise, $25,000; the Goodwill Charity Association, $50,000; the Purple Circle Social Club, $50,000. Progress 63 Inc., $300,000; Rebuilding Our Community, $350,000; Just Willing Foundation, $75,000; Dryades YMCA, $300,000; the Colomb Foundation, $300,000; Westwego for the Sala Avenue Performing Arts Center, $250,000; Men of Vision and Enlightenment, $50,000. Also puzzling are the thousands of dollars being given to churches. Here are some of those expenditures: Greater Antioch Full Gospel Baptist Church, $10,000; St. Peter Claver Church in New Orleans, $130,000; Abundant Life Baptist Church, $20,000; Stonewall Baptist Church of Bossier City, $100,000; Shreveport Christian Church, $20,000; Fifth African Baptist Church, $10,000; Israelite Baptist Church in Crowley, $100,000. Is the state supposed to be in the business of subsidizing church operations? Rounding out the questionable spending is $75,000 going to the McKinley Alumni Association for operational expenses. However, the ridiculous spending isn’t over. The Senate will get its opportunity to add to the list when HB1 gets to the upper chamber. Spending millions on questionable causes is bad enough in itself. However, compounding the poor judgment of legislators is the deception with which they try to make us believe all we have to is ask and we can find out anything we want to know about these organizations. The House Appropriations Committee is where these questionable outlays got into House Bill 1. And the committee recently adopted a rule saying organizations applying for state assistance had to disclose who they are and what they do. After thumbing through House Bill 1 Wednesday and locating these and other expenditures, I asked Rep. Dan “Blade” Morrish, R-Jennings, our area’s representative on that committee, for background information on some of the organizations. No problem, Morrish said, and he went to work trying to get the information. He came back emptyhanded after learning the information on those organizations is privileged to the legislators who asked for the appropriations. Morrish can get the information, but he would have to go to each legislator involved and get his or her permission to make it public. While that isn’t a brick wall, it’s a major undertaking that shouldn’t be necessary. The people of this state deserve to know where every penny of taxpayer money is spent, and they shouldn’t have to jump through hoops to get it. Louisiana has some of the best open records and public meetings laws in the country. Unfortunately, the Legislature often isn’t restricted by those very laws it enacted. There’s no accountability This isn’t the first time lawmakers have provided for their favorite causes back home. It happens year in and year out, and we still don’t know much about most of the organizations involved. Some of them got money in the past, and we still don’t know how it was spent. Morrish has tried for some time now to pass legislation setting up an accountability system for every nongovernment agency that gets a state handout. He wants them to list their purposes, and officers, explain what they are going to do with the money and what they did with funds they may have already received. The requirement makes sense, and Morrish said he is going to keep trying to put it into law. However, he knows it’s going to be an uphill fight all the way. Legislators involved in this questionable spending don’t want you to know how your money is being spent. That’s because a big chunk of the spending can’t be justified. • Jim Beam, the retired editor of the American Press, has covered people and politics for more than four decades. Contact him at 494-4025 or jbeam@americanpress.com. For an autographed copy of “Positively Beaming,” a hard-bound copy of favorite Jim Beam columns, call 494-4051.
