Support for Louisiana: The State We're In is provided by Enterg Louisiana is strengthening our power grid throughout the state.

We're reinforcing infrastructure to prepare for stronger storms, reduce outages and respond quicker when you do need us, because together we power life.

Additional support provided by the Fred B. and Ruth B. Zigler Foundation and the Zigler Art Museum located in Jennings City Hall.

The museum focuses on emerging Louisiana artists and is an historical and cultural center for Southwest Louisiana and the Foundation for Excellence in Louisiana Public Broadcasting.

With support from viewers like you.

The first regular session this year.

And what you need to know.

Meet homegrown companies with certifiable success thanks to a state program.

And could Louisiana's Constitution be rewritten?

Experts weigh in.

It's nesting season for the whooping crane.

We'll head into the marshlands to see efforts to save them from extinction.

That's coming up next.

On the state we're in.

You ready?

I'm ready.

Let's do this.

Hi, everyone.

I'm Kara St. Cyr.

And I'm Karen LeBlanc.

Much more on those top stories in a moment on this week's edition of Louisiana, the State we're in.

But first, Monday afternoon was the start of the 2024 regular legislative session, the third session this year.

Lawmakers have three months to pore over more than 1000 bills, ranging from additional crime bills to insurance reform, though no specifics were given.

Governor Jeff Landry implied support for insurance, education and conservative budgeting plans.

Here's a wrap up of the governor's address.

After two special sessions, the legislature returned to the capital once again, this time for the 2024 regular session, making it the third time lawmakers convened this year.

We won't fix crime if we don't fix our schools.

Louisiana is failing our students, and the statistics could not be more alarming.

70% of our fourth graders can't read.

At 80% of eighth graders can't do basic math.

We all know that the foundation of a good education comes down to teaching the basics reading, writing and math.

Governor Landrieu speech was quick and to the point the legislature would focus on three major issues insurance, the budget and education.

My main motivation, honestly, is when we collect tax dollars, a huge portion of that goes to educating our kids.

Representative Julie Emerson echoed the governor's call for education reform.

She is in the process of filing a bill that would launch an education savings account program, which would ultimately give families access to taxpayer dollars to cover some private school costs.

And we just want to empower parents to have more of a choice in how their children are educated.

But the governor didn't give many specifics about what bills he'd support or how he planned to tackle the issues.

Let's run a government that now works for not against the people of our great state.

God bless you.

Thank you.

God bless Louisiana and our great citizens.

Thank you.

Though the session isn't a fiscal one, lawmakers still have to prepare for what could be a fiscal cliff next year, caused in part by the roll off of a temporary sales tax.

The legislative auditor is projecting a $500 million shortfall in the budget that needs filling.

Otherwise, the deficit could spell disaster for the state.

I'm hoping that going into next year, that shortfall, we can lessen it by doing some things with the budget this year and addressing some of that shortfall.

Representative Jack McFarland is on the House Appropriations Committee.

He's tasked with finding solutions for the deficit.

Now, the legislature could swing in a few different directions to avoid a fiscal cliff.

They could extend the temporary sales tax, make cuts to the budget, or find alternative sources of revenue.

McFarland says the latter is the option the Republican dominated legislature will most likely go with.

And we want to look at all avenues possible.

Additionally, we see corporate income taxes up here.

For the last several years, we have collected above the $600 million that's necessary.

That money has been going into our surplus.

So with the additional increases in corporate income tax, the sales tax that we currently operate under, not just .45, but the other $0.04 is collecting more dollars than prior years as well.

McFarland says it's also possible the expected deficit could lower before next year.

But that all depends on what happens here during this session.

Out of the more than a thousand bills filed, insurance stands out as another major issue lawmakers have to tackle.

A series of insurance bills prioritizing businesses were filed.

Some are already receiving praise from Insurance Commissioner Tim Temple.

His goal is to limit hurdles for insurance companies who want to hike up rates or drop customers at will.

Temple maintains that this will create a competitive environment promoting fair prices.

But Democrats are raising concerns.

At the end of the day, I have a fear that we'll just be adding more policies to citizens, which is the exact thing that we do not want.

So I look forward to working with the commissioner on that proposal.

I think there's some compromise that we can come to to where it would prioritize our homeowners and our small businesses, but at the same time lead to increased competition in the state.

Aside from the more typical list of agenda items, the governor also hopes to hold a constitutional convention, according to the Council of State Governments.

Louisiana ranks among the longest of all state constitution, having 72,000 words in it in less than 50 years, the legislature has proposed over 300 amendments, of which 210 have been incorporated into the 1974 constitution.

Our state constitution hasn't been updated since 1974.

Though some Democrats and Republicans agree that the document needs an edit.

There wasn't a clear consensus on what needs to be changed.

I think everybody would agree that the Constitution does need to be revised to some aspect, but given what I've seen so far from Governor Landry's administration, I'm really terrified of them leading the effort to rewrite our state's constitution.

I am actually really excited about that opportunity.

I can't tell you exactly what's going to come out of it, but I'm excited about the opportunity to maybe go back to the drawing board.

The bill for the convention has not been filed just yet, but it's expected to be formally added to the list of bills next week.

From hashtag to headlines, here's what's trending this week.

All right.

Lawmakers are wanting to ban Tik Tok on Capitol Hill.

Now, this is not exactly new news, but it seems like there's a revitalized effort to do this.

I've been talking about it, but now they're kind of taking action here.

Yeah, And I mean, of course, Tik Tok has been on the chopping block for a while.

Like you said, it's already banned partially in some states, including here in Louisiana.

It's not supposed to be used in state agencies, especially not on the Wi-Fi.

So this is definitely something that's been in the works for a long time.

You know, and I pity all those social media influencers to rely on Tik Tok for their income.

Tik Tok has really become a bonafide business for a lot of people here in the state, So there are actually asking the owner of Tik Tok to relinquish their ownership rights.

Sell it.

Yeah.

So that way we have a better understanding of what actually this app is being used for.

Right.

Okay.

So we have apparently some high rents in New Orleans.

That's a statement I never expected to say on the news.

But yes, there are some rats, apparently that got into some marijuana and they've been acting pretty wonky ever since.

And the city, So let's just clarify what is happening here.

This is the New Orleans police Department had in their, I guess, evidence room marijuana.

And the rats, apparently they're infested with rats at the police headquarters broke into the marijuana.

They've been nibbling on it, getting high.

But it's kind of interesting that the pothead rats are now what's prompting the police department to say, hey, it is time for a new police facility?

know, we should give him a name.

Potty, potty, rat.

All right, maybe not.

All right, So we are going to shift gears here.

If you've been following sports news and social media, the two collided LSU's basketball women's basketball coach Kim Mulkey says she's being unfairly targeted.

There was a bench brawl fight that broke out courtside recently and she's catching some heat for it.

And the problem is they're saying that Coach Kim she didn't really have a problem with the fight.

She just felt like the players were not equally matched to the other.

Yes.

Six, seven and five.

Ten is a very big discrepancy.

Yes.

So it'll be interesting to see how much more backlash comes out of that.

But definitely buzzing with social media there.

So Taylor Swift concert ticket.

Okay.

This is like on the wish list of every tween and teen American Girl, the Children's Hospital of New Orleans is raffling off a 28 suite, 28 suite level tickets for the October concert.

And get this, a raffle ticket cost 200 bucks with a maximum of 5000 chance of being sold.

So, hey, I would take my chances.

I mean, $200 for a Taylor Swift ticket as opposed to 2000 plus dollars.

$1,000 for a concert is crazy.

But I guess people save up for this the entire year.

Yeah, and here's another little good piece of that is that all proceeds will go to help fund a new pediatric stem cell transplant unit at the Children's Hospital of New Orleans.

So get your tickets before they are gone.

And it's for a good cause.

For a good cause and so good cause and good news to report.

And this week's good news, Louisiana.

More than 600 homegrown companies carry the certified Louisiana seal.

It's a mark of quality and authenticity that amplifies their marketing efforts and brand visibility.

The Louisiana Department of Agriculture created the certified Louisiana program to call attention to our world famous cuisine and cultural products while assuring consumers they are the real deal.

I am introducing you to two certifiable success stories.

The Cajun spice package at this Lafayette facility is the real deal.

The goat cheese and yogurt from this goat dairy in Franklinton also the real deal.

These products are certified as home grown, locally sourced and produced by the Louisiana Department of Agriculture through a program called Certified Louisiana.

Each participating product carries a logo of authenticity.

It's all in a part of our heart and our soul in our culture.

You think about certified Creole, what it means certified Cajun, but you know, it's fresh that it's local.

You know, it's manufacturers process.

Most of it's grown here and it goes through this whole process.

Certified Louisiana started in the 1990s with legislation that established a logo as a registered trademark with the United States Patent and Trademark Office and the Louisiana Secretary of state's office.

Eligible products must be made, grown, manufactured, processed, produced or substantially transformed in the state of Louisiana.

Companies that carry the certified Louisiana SEAL undergo an approval process by the Louisiana Department of Agriculture Ragin Cajun products carry the Cajun Certified logo that just shows that it's authentic.

Authentic Cajun Creole food comes from Louisiana.

And if you don't have that certified logo or sort of, you know, certification, you can't really justify this true Cajun food.

Raging Cajun started in the 1980s and over the years expanded its product line.

Since joining the certified Louisiana program three years ago, the company has quadrupled its sales and moved into a much larger production facility.

We've got room to grow and so we're looking forward to that as it has progressed so that you can see here, these are all of our ingredients we bring in.

We've got over 100 different ingredients that we're going to bring in here, and this is our production room.

This is where we're going to take bulk ingredients and put them in packaging, the final packaging you see on the store shelf.

So we have our seating line, we have bag lines, we make our bag products, we make roux.

And so all the good packaging, they're very things packaging labeled and packed and ready to go to the grocery stores.

We're producing boxing, packaging and shipping all across the country.

Certified Louisiana products have entrepreneurship and marketing resources, including grant opportunities.

Which brings us back to that goat dairy in Franklinton.

So we started about about eight or nine years ago.

I bought four goats for my wife for an anniversary gift.

As we were getting ready to have children quickly thereafter, we started growing, increasing our goatherd playing around with making cheeses and yogurt, and to the point where we are now a little over 250 animals, we're going to be milking about 130 this year.

Twice a day.

And you are the largest goat dairy in the state of Louisiana.

That is correct.

Southern Maids dairy sells goat milk, yogurt and cheese to restaurants and retailers.

Each product carries the certified Louisiana logo here.

And this is our cheese processing room where we process all of our goat milk products from milk, all of our cheeses and yogurt.

The company has applied for a grant with guidance from the Certified Louisiana program to help fund its cheese production expansion.

For us being certified, Louisiana really pushes that and brings that to home.

And people can be can can have that understanding that their stuff is local and that there's been some process behind getting certified.

And so when you look at this marketing is that that's something that for many entrepreneurs that don't have a degree in marketing, you know, that's a that's a whole different world and we help you with that.

And to that effect, then we can get you if you want to market internationally through the southern United States Trade Association.

We are members of that and that's all part of the Foreign AG Service and we can help you market your products worldwide.

Southern Maids is milking its certified Louisiana logo to success, while Raging Cajun says its Cajun seal of approval has spiced up sales nationwide to home grown companies, creating jobs and products only made in Louisiana.

While previous legislative sessions focused primarily on social issues and financial woes, this session is focused on a desire for structural change in Louisiana's executive and judicial branches.

Governor Jeff Landry said he wants a possible constitutional convention to revamp our state document, which hasn't been touched since 1974.

Weighing in on this topic this week is Council for a better Louisiana's Barry Erwin Well, first off, I just want to say thank you so much for joining us.

Glad to be here.

All right.

So we just started our third session of the year, but this one is the regular session.

It's different from a special session.

What are some of the biggest agenda items that you're expecting to see this go round?

Well, you know, we already had, as you mentioned, two special sessions.

So we got a couple of big things off the plate right there.

So I think the big thing that you're going to see very soon is talk about insurance.

I mean, we've been talking about that for a while.

Finally, we have a legislative session where some of those things can be addressed by the legislature.

And, you know, a bunch of bills have been filed.

I think there's a handful of them, broadly speaking, that kind of deal with the regulation of the insurance industry.

That's kind of what we're going to see out the chute, The argument being that we don't have a lot of insurance companies in our state, not only because we're vulnerable to disasters, but also because we overregulated to some degree compared to other states.

So I think what you'll see is a variety of bills that tend to try and ease some of the regulations on insurance companies with the hope that is that will attract more of them into the state, increase competition and then lower the rates outside of insurance.

Of course, education is going to be big in any regular session that you have.

The governor also mentioned our constitution in Louisiana, which has not really been changed since 1974.

What are the goals with restructuring it and why bring this up now?

Well, there's been a lot of talk, you know, you hear over the years about, we need to change our Constitution.

Never got very far.

I think the governor is coming in on kind of a wave of support and kind of momentum and feels like this is the time to do it.

I think the argument has been that our Constitution, which was approved in 1974, has kind of ballooned over the years.

Everybody knows we pass or vote on constitutional amendments year after year after year.

We put a lot of things in our Constitution that probably should just be in the law, not in the Constitution.

We do things that kind of tie the hands of lawmakers when we get into budgets, situations.

Well, I want to stop you there, but can you give me an example?

Yeah.

Well, for instance, the property taxes, if you think about it, when we vote on amendments many times, most of the time we're voting on something to deal with with property taxes or local taxes.

We basically put our tax code, our property tax code in the Constitution as opposed into the state law.

And so every time a local government or somebody else wants to make some change in property taxes, which are local taxes, and we have 64 parishes, you have to go to the Constitution to do that.

The other thing is we dedicate a lot of dollars in the in the Constitution.

So when you get into a budget situation, you don't have the flexibility to kind of deal with those things when the money gets really tight.

And so in addition to talking about our Constitution, there's also something he talked about whenever it came to Louisiana Supreme Court and that is, you know, appointing judges, how Louisiana selects them.

What is Governor Landry's goal with bringing this up and talking about this now?

You know, it's hard to say what the governor's goal is, because on the one hand, we're dealing with a lawsuit similar to what we saw in the congressional district, being about whether we should add another minority, you know, seat into the Supreme Court.

That's something that's come up a couple of times that hadn't passed but will likely come up again.

Then you have this other whole thing going on where legislators are putting in these bills to to actually make Supreme Court justices appointed by the governor as opposed to elected by the people or elected in different ways or the chief justice of the Supreme Court selected in different ways.

So there's a lot going on with the Supreme Court, which probably has to do, you know, along, you know, to some degree along Partizan lines, because parties feel differently, feel like the courts are acting one way or the other, really trying to assert, I think, more of I won't say political control, but maybe more conservative control or bent on the Supreme Court.

And it seems like there's kind of a theme to the session in the past.

You know, you either focus on solely the budget or you focus on other things like cultural issues.

But it seems like for this particular session, that's not really the goal.

Instead, you're focusing more on policy whenever it comes to insurance, education and the topics that we just talked about.

He didn't really get into any of those things dealing with some of the social issues that we've seen the last few years.

But that said, those same bills have been filed again.

And so I think we'll still have that same discussion that we had before.

But the difference being a lot of those either didn't pass or they got vetoed by the governor because he was a Democrat and he had signaled he wasn't for those things.

This time you don't have that same obstacle.

And I do feel like we're going to see a lot of those same issues come up again.

I think they're probably have a better chance of passing this time.

And you have a governor that would probably sign those into law.

All right.

So we've kind of done a final round of questions about this regular session.

We've talked about insurance.

We've talked about our Constitution, Louisiana Supreme Court, the budget, and also social issues.

Is there anything that you think our viewers specifically should know about?

Well, I do think there is going to be a big discussion about education in particularly ways the governor mentioned, talking about parental choice.

It's basically a program called Education Savings Accounts.

We're seeing them pop up in a number of red states around the country.

We've debated a couple times here in Louisiana, but I think this time we've got the governor making a priority and it's sort of like a voucher program that would allow state dollars that are now going through the MFP, the funding formula to go to public schools, really to go into an account that a parent might set up for their child and then could use those dollars for private school or for some specialized tutoring or something like that.

That's going to be a little controversial, as you might imagine.

School districts are worried about it.

There are questions about the cost.

There's questions about accountability.

But that's going to be a very big issue.

And I think people will be hearing about it for sure over the next weeks ahead on that one.

All right.

Well, thank you so much.

We are out of time.

Well, good to see you again.

Of course.

In 1958, Louisiana's whooping crane population dwindled to one, prompting the state to act.

The Louisiana Whooping Crane reintroduction program launched in 2011 to bring the bird back into Louisiana's habitat.

To date, a whooping cranes are living in Louisiana's marshlands, a slow and small victory in an ongoing effort to save the whooping crane.

It's nesting season and the program hopes to see more whopping crane offsprings.

I'm taking you into the marshlands of Jefferson Davis Parish for a behind the scenes look at saving a species from extinction.

Hey, Sara Hi, Karen.

How are you?

I'm great.

Well, thank you for taking this along with the check on the nest of the whooping cranes today.

Of course.

Happy to have you.

Well, fingers crossed that we'll see some hatched eggs.

It's nesting season for the whooping crane, and we are in search of a pair that is laid.

Two eggs on this private property of crawfish and rice fields.

Sara Zimorski is a biologist with the Louisiana Department of Wildlife and Fisheries.

It's her full time job to track the population and the release of whopping cranes into Louisiana habitat.

Part of the reason why the reintroduction program requires so much time and attention is the bird itself is slow to mature and slow to reproduce, right?

Yep.

Correct.

They do live a long time, which helps offset that.

So they can live 25 to 30 years in the wild.

So we typically think don't think of them as being sexually mature until they're 3 to 5.

So that's a bird who might have to live for five years before it finds a mate or attempts to nest for the first time.

And then they're not always going to be successful the first time.

On top of that, they typically only lay two eggs.

Sometimes first time nesters or young birds will lay a single egg, even if they lay two eggs and hatch two chicks.

They're typically only successful raising one a year.

Whooping cranes are territorial, which is why we only find one pair in this habitat.

The Louisiana Whooping Crane reintroduction program began in 2011 after the state saved the last remaining whooping crane in 1950.

The whole reason we're doing this is that there needs to be multiple, self-sustaining populations to secure the whooping crane.

The whooping crane is the single most endangered bird in North America.

It has been critically imperiled for over 100 years.

We released ten Birds starting this effort in in 2011.

It wasn't until 2014 that we got eggs laid.

The Louisiana flock is protected under state law, the Endangered Species Act and the Migratory Bird Treaty Act.

As their numbers dwindled, then people actually wanted to shoot a crane so they could have one in their collection or have an egg in their collection.

And so that just compounded an already bad situation.

So sort of habitat loss and unregulated shooting before there were any hunting laws and regulations were sort of the two main causes for their decline.

Standing five feet tall with a wingspan of seven feet, the whooping crane with its red and black mask and black tipped wings, is both a muse and a model for an art contest, an exhibit to raise funds for the whooping crane reintroduction program.

So all those funds and then the proceeds from, you know, the artwork that was purchased, those will go to the program, which will pay for the transmitters and pay for different supplies that the biologists need to continue that program.

The Louisiana Department of Wildlife and Fisheries headquarters in Baton Rouge hosted the exhibit and featured more than 130 pieces, inviting students and adults to participate.

That was really intrigued by, do you know, painting the bird?

And then it also helping to keep these birds.

My piece is called Whopping Goldberg My husband named it.

I did not.

And it's kind of like a circle of life.

Like here we are, where whooping cranes at work stinks in Louisiana.

And now they're back, rendering whooping cranes on canvas to help them persevere in the wild under the watchful eye of biologist.

Each egg that hatches holds promise of achieving a self-sustaining population in the future.

There is a baby.

Yeah.

Okay.

Yeah.

This is going to be okay.

So right now it is.

It's still hard to see, but it's in between the two adults.

It's just a little orangey brown, so just look right sort of in the middle of the two adults.

It's very little.

So just it's just in the vegetation and.

Louisiana lost a whopping crane in January, Shot dead in Mamou, which is a criminal offense.

State and federal Wildlife and Fisheries together are offering a $12,500 reward to anyone with information about the case.

You can call 985-882-3756 or call 337-491-2588.

Callers can remain anonymous if they choose.

Well, that's our show for this week.

Remember, you can watch anything, LPB, any time, wherever you are with our LPB app, you can catch LPB news and public affairs shows as well as other Louisiana programs you've come to enjoy over the years.

And please like us on Facebook X and Instagram for everyone at Louisiana Public Broadcasting, I'm Karen LeBlanc, and I'm Kara St Cyr until next time.

That's the state we're in.

Support for Louisiana.

The state we're in is provided by Entergy.

Louisiana is strengthening our power grid throughout the state.

We're reinforcing infrastructure to prepare for stronger storms, reduce outages and respond quicker when you do need us, because together we power life.

Additional support provided by the Fred and Ruth Zigler Foundation and the Zigler Art Museum located in Jennings City Hall.

The museum focuses on emerging Louisiana artists and is an historical and cultural center for Southwest Louisiana.

And by visit Baton Rouge and the Foundation for Excellence in Louisiana Public Broadcasting and viewers like you.

Thank you.