COVID billions pose a challenge for state government

FRANKLIN — The infusion of federal dollars from President Joe Biden’s American Rescue Plan Act of 2021 will offer Louisiana benefits, but it also presents challenges, too, St. Mary lawmakers said Wednesday.
The state will receive $3.2 billion, which they will utilize to plug a budget shortfall and replenish their unemployment trust fund. Prior to the pandemic, the unemployment fund totaled $1 billion and was “very sound,” state Sen. Bret Allain, R-Franklin, told the St. Mary Chamber of Commerce during its legislative breakfast Wednesday.
However, the fund’s balance is around minus $200 million at the moment, Allain said.
With the remaining funds, legislators think it has to be appropriated through a “direct appropriation” this year or in capital outlay, Allain said.
“I’m going to get very popular real quick,” quipped Allain, chairman of the Senate Revenue and Fiscal Affairs Committee. The committee oversees capital outlay and taxes.
“That being said, we’re going to work with the local governments to maybe even enhance what you’ve gotten to get some real things done here,” he added.
The leftover state money, tax reform Allain is pushing and the money parishes are receiving in the American Rescue Plan Act presents what Allain said is a “once in a lifetime chance to set the state of Louisiana and St. Mary Parish up for prosperity in the future.”
But not all of the news with the federal money is good.
The state’s projected deficit can be attributed somewhat to this federal money, which is a one-time payment, state Rep. Beryl Amedée told the audience. The money has to be used in the year it is allocated, rather than in future years.
While Amedée said the state also will enter the legislative session with an excess as well as a surplus, she said spending for that surplus is constrained by the state constitution.
“We have to be very specific with what we can do with the surplus,” she said. “With an excess, that’s what we’ll be arguing over when we come to the capitol because everybody’s already got plans of what they’re going to do with the excess.”
As for individual bills, Amedée’s main bill she wants to see passed is one addressing nursing home visitation.
“I believe in future years, when we are beyond the COVID pandemic and people actually look back and calculate some real numbers for us, we are going to find that we have probably lost more of our nursing home assisted living residents to the effects of long-term isolation than we have to the actual virus,” she said.
According to the Louisiana Office of Public Health, about 8,800 of Louisiana’s more than 10,000 COVID-related fatalities have been among people over 60, and about 6,900 have been among people over 70.
She said it is “completely appalling” that while human rights and dignity are so highly regarded, it appears residents of nursing homes were forgotten “with the ability to visit” with outsiders.
She also is reintroducing the Save Women’s Sports Act bill, which she pulled last year due to the pandemic. Other bills she is working on include one to safeguard free speech on social media platforms “that operate as a town square” and one in which “bodily integrity” is protected in the medical arena.
“It seems that we’re at a place and time right now where the government, in many cases, in certain states and at certain levels, would like to dictate certain medical procedures for us,” she said.
The bill would leave these decisions in the patients’ hands.
“That you cannot be forced to comply with a medical procedure, and that would include immunization mandates,” Amedée said. “There should always be an exception. Anytime there is risk, there needs to be a choice, and that’s what this bill will be about.”
Among bills to be brought to the table this session by Vincent St. Blanc, R-Franklin, are one for the Morgan City Harbor and Terminal District and one each for the cities of Patterson and Franklin.
The port bill proposes terms being extended from two four-year terms to two seven-year terms, according to the proposed legislation.
The Patterson bill will benefit the city’s water plant.
The plant is “the best water plant and the newest plant in Louisiana,” St. Blanc said.
With the bill, the city would not be required to have a certified operator continuously present while the plant is running because of the way it was built, St. Blanc said.
St. Blanc also is putting up a bill for the city of Franklin that addresses abandoned cars in yards.