Governor John Bel Edwards’ two terms in office ends Monday. ULM political science professor Pearson Cross says the Democrat from Tangipahoa Parish constantly battled with a Republican-controlled Legislature. He says the battle started on his first day in office when the House rejected the governor’s choice for House Speaker.
Cut 4 (11) “…predecessor.”
Edwards and the Legislature had to address a two-billion dollar budget deficit in his first year in office. It took a sales tax increase and other budgetary moves to get the state out of the red.

Edwards first executive order was expanding Medicaid coverage to some 400,000 Louisianans. In 2017 Edwards pushed criminal justice reform measures aimed at reducing the state’s prison population, some of those initiatives could be rolled back in an anticipated special session on crime next month.

The state’s longest-serving Insurance Commissioner, Jim Donelon, will leave office on Monday. The 79-year-old from New Orleans has been the state’s insurance commissioner since 2006. Donelon says one of his greatest achievements was an incentive program that resulted in more insurance companies providing homeowners coverage after Hurricanes Katrina and Rita…
Cut 10 (10) “…five years running.”
But property insurance rates began to escalate again after Hurricane Laura in 2020 and Ida in 2021.

As we start a new year, labor quality is the top concern among small businesses. Forty percent of National Federation of Independent Business members say they were unable to fill positions in the last two months of 2023. Regional NFIB Director Dawn McVea…
Cut 14 (05) “…want to do.”