Two men in Caddo Parish have died as a result of this winter storm. Louisiana Department of Health says the deaths are a result of hypothermia. With this bitter cold, almost 125,000 Louisiana homes and businesses remain without this morning – over 48,000 in Ouachita Parish alone. SWEPCO who had around 70 thousand outages still has almost 30 thousand in the dark Michael Corbin with SWEPCO says they’re working quickly to restore service.
Cut 13 (11) “…people so quickly.”
Entergy and Panola Harrison Electric Coop are also working to restore power.
The winter precipitation has moved out of north Louisiana, the heavy rainfall out of south Louisiana but the bitter cold is here. Wind chill readings are below zero in north Louisiana and in the single digits for south Louisiana. LSU Health Climatologist Barry Keim says high temperatures will not get above freezing until Tuesday for north Louisiana. We’ll see a slight warm-up as the week goes on.
According to a conservative columnist, it’s not a slam dunk that Julia Letlow will win the Republican U.S. Senate primary just because she has the backing of President Trump. Jeff Palermo has the story.
Cut 1 (31) “…I’m Jeff Palermo.”
Meanwhile Cassidy is not joining the Republicans who are defending recent actions by Immigration and Customs Enforcement Agents. After agents killed U.S. Citizen, Alex Pretti in Minnesota, Cassidy is calling for a full joint federal and state investigation and expressed concern over the credibility of ICE and DHS.
Louisiana has the highest average combined state and local sales tax rate in the country, says the Tax Foundation. Policy Analyst Janelle Fritts says Tennessee has the second highest, but Tennessee has a taxpayer advantage over Louisiana
Cut 8 (12) “…the major taxes.”
She says Louisiana’ s recent change to a flat 3 percent and other tax cuts have improved the state’s taxpayers’ overall tax burden.