Recent editorials from Louisiana newspapers:
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Feb. 20
The Houma Courier on a recent pipeline explosion:
The deadly pipeline explosion Feb. 9 in Paradis should remind local people about the extreme conditions and dangers that can face our hard-working oilfield professionals when they go to work.
The blast, which set off a fire that burned for days, also killed a local worker, 36-year-old Josh Helms, of Choctaw.
So far, officials have not uncovered what caused the St. Charles Parish incident, which also left two contract workers injured.
“Looking at procedures, training, qualifications, is kind of where it gets started,” said Patrick Courreges, a spokesman for the state Department of Natural Resources. “Broadly speaking, we’re trying to determine who was there, what they were doing, was there a procedure on what they were trying to do, were they following the procedure, was the equipment up to speed, things like that.”
In the meantime, officials with Phillips 66, which owns the facility, asked people to keep Helms and his family in their thoughts and prayers.
It is also important that we - in the heart of the south Louisiana oilfield - recognize that the horrifically tragic incident is an unwelcome reminder that our oilfield workers sometimes face life-threatening situations.
That is not to say that their jobs are any more dangerous than they ever were, just a recognition of how brave these men and women are.
Everyone knows that they are hard-working.
They do difficult work, and they are glad to do it.
In fact, in the past several years, as the oilfield slowdown has continued to take hold of south Louisiana, they have clung to those jobs when they could. When layoffs forced them to look elsewhere, they have done that too - but always with the knowledge that they will return to the oilfield once it returns to its former vibrant health.
We have many reasons to be thankful for the oilfield. Through the decades, it has provided a stable job market for our local workforce and has done so many other things to keep our economy running as well as it does.
We will all celebrate when it returns, and the people who have been laid off will gladly return to their good jobs in the oilfield or in any of the industries that support it.
But when a deadly incident occurs, we have to stop and think of the man and his family. We have to once again realize what a dangerous place the oilfield can be. We have to remember that our workers brave that danger for their families - and in so doing, they help keep our nation supplied with energy.
Online: https://www.houmatoday.com/
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Feb. 22
The Advocate of New Orleans on Louisiana State Police:
As with a fraternity road trip, the details are not edifying if looked into too closely. But somebody should have shown better judgment at Louisiana State Police.
A delegation of more than a dozen LSP personnel attended an International Association of Chiefs of Police conference in San Diego. Some members of the group drove a circuitous route to get there, stopping at the Grand Canyon and a Las Vegas casino, then giving taxpayers the bill, which also included questionable charges for dozens of hours of overtime.
Records show that the agency spent more than $33,000 for airfare, lodging, meals and other expenses for the conference.
After the trip attracted media attention, State Police Superintendent Mike Edmonson reassigned the head of LSP’s internal affairs division, pledged to investigate the matter, and says he’s cracking down on the agency’s spending policies. He also said that troopers will be required to repay “all hotel fees and per diem claimed in Las Vegas.” Gov. John Bel Edwards ordered his own probe of LSP’s travel spending.
Coming as it does during a time of new state budget crises, the lavish spending on a winding travel itinerary seems especially off-key.
And while we support police training, one must wonder, in an age of teleconferencing, why LSP opted to send such a large delegation out West on the taxpayer dime.
If troopers want to see a canyon, they need look no farther than the miles-deep chasm of confidence dividing taxpayers and government. Escapades like the LSP’s Western adventure can only make that divide even deeper.
Online: https://www.theadvocate.com/
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Feb. 22
The Times-Picayune of Baton Rouge on why Louisiana makes it too hard to recall a politician:
Louisiana makes it harder for residents to recall an elected official than virtually any other state. At least one-third of registered voters have to sign a petition to get a recall election on the ballot here.
The list of failed efforts is long. An effort to force a recall election for Jefferson Parish President Aaron Broussard got 49,000 signatures, but ultimately failed in 2006. Voters didn’t meet the signature requirement in 2009 for then-Mandeville Mayor Eddie Price, either. Both men eventually went to prison on corruption charges.
Voters also launched a recall effort against St. Tammany Parish Coroner Peter Galvan in May 2013 after revelations that he had spent tens of thousands of taxpayer dollars on items that had no public purpose. But the threshold was high: more than 53,000 signatures in 180 days.
Mr. Galvan resigned in October 2013 as a condition of his guilty plea in federal court on a corruption charge, and the recall effort was suspended. But some tainted politicians refuse to leave, and Louisiana voters essentially have no way to force them to go until the next election cycle.
There were two different recall efforts in 2014 against former St. Bernard Parish President Dave Peralta, who was accused of an array of offenses in three different parishes. He lost re-election in 2015 and then pleaded no contest in June 2016 to three counts of malfeasance in office, abuse of office and stalking.
There have been some successful recalls in election districts with fewer than 1,000 voters because it is easier to reach the 40 percent of voter signatures required for those recalls. But the process is almost impossible in larger jurisdictions, where 30 percent of registered voters can add up to tens of thousands of people.
State Rep. Paul Hollis, a Covington Republican, wants to make the recall process less onerous he told the House Governmental Affairs Committee Monday, according to the LSU Manship School News Service. There has never been a recall in a Louisiana district with more than 25,000 voters, he said.
The difficulty voters had with the Galvan recall inspired him to change the process, Rep. Hollis said. It was galling to watch Mr. Galvan cling to office as charges of misspending mounted against him. He took more than $111,000 in payments he wasn’t entitled to and sent a coroner’s office employee to do medical work he contracted to do for the Slidell jail. The public paid $50,000 for that work, which was supposed to be done by Mr. Galvan on his own time.
Rep. Hollis said he doesn’t have a bill drafted yet and is asking for input from his colleagues on two approaches, according to the LSU Manship report.
Louisiana could either base the signature requirement on the number of voters who participated in the election of the official targeted for recall, as many states do. Or, the Legislature could reduce the percentage of total registered voters, possibly to 15 percent, in more populated areas. Georgia and Montana use similar thresholds, according to the National Conference of State Legislatures.
Either approach would make state law more “user friendly,” Joshua Spivak, a lawyer and expert on recalls, said in an email. The states where recall is more common use a percentage of the votes cast, not the total registered, he said.
This is how out of kilter Louisiana is. A proposed recall against former Gov. Bobby Jindal would have required more signatures than the one against former California Gov. Gray Davis, even though California is more than eight times bigger, he said.
Some Louisiana legislators expressed concern Monday about making the recall process too easy and allowing frivolous challenges. The details of Rep. Hollis’ bill can take care of that.
Even cutting the percentage of signatures in half in the Galvan recall would have required roughly 26,500 people to sign the petition. That is not easy.
Organizers pushing for a recall election against Jefferson Parish President Mike Yenni, who is entangled in a sexting scandal, have until April 6 to get more than 90,000 signatures. They said in late January that they had “40,000 to 50,000.”
If the Yenni recall petition is successful, Rep. Hollis said he would drop his legislation. That is unlikely, though. It’s just too high a bar to meet. The number of petition signatures required by law is larger than the 87,724 total votes cast in the 2015 election for Jefferson Parish President, and double the 45,823 votes it took to put Yenni in office in the first place.
Rep. Hollis needs to get his legislation ready.
Online: https://www.nola.com/
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