Streamlining panel rejects Kennedy's plan

BATON ROUGE -- A panel looking for ways to cut costs in state government defeated a proposal Tuesday by state Treasurer John Kennedy to end financing of nongovernment agencies with taxpayer dollars.

The Commission on Streamlining Government instead went along with an amended recommendation by Rep. Brett Geymann, R-Lake Charles, to require nonprofit groups seeking state aid to be accredited by a national organization or the Louisiana Association of Non-Profit Organizations to ensure their legitimacy.

The amended recommendation, which passed 8-2, also gives the legislative auditor and the inspector general more authority to monitor spending by the nonprofits that provide services ranging from after-school education programs to obesity control.

Geymann's measure also would require that an executive order issued by Gov. Bobby Jindal to curtail state spending on nongovernmental organizations be placed into law. An executive order goes out of existence when the governor who issues it leaves office.

The guidelines that Jindal has used -- and Geymann wants to preserve in state law -- include that financing for the entities be openly discussed by lawmakers; that they must have a statewide or regional impact; they must be priority programs; and the groups must file an application and disclosure documents online.

"I have concerns with getting rid of NGOs across the board," Geymann said of nongovernmental organizations, pointing out that some of the organizations financed in the state budget that Kennedy would cut include volunteer fire departments, food banks and the Special Olympics.

"The earmark addiction (in the budget) started under (former) Gov. (Edwin) Edwards ... and each year it has grown and grown and grown," Kennedy said, conceding that Jindal has placed some restrictions on the spending.

"Gov. Jindal is not going to be governor forever," Kennedy said. "I am not saying these are bad projects; the issue is whether they are priorities."

He said the state has spent about $100 million in the past five years on the special projects, many sponsored by social groups and churches that might not be monitored very well.

Kennedy called the spending "an insult to every taxpayer in this state" By adopting Geymann's changes, he said, "You are putting lipstick on a pig, but it is still a pig."

Barry Erwin, president of the Council for a Better Louisiana, a government watchdog-advocacy group, said Kennedy's original recommendation also would have sliced money for groups in New Orleans that help sponsor the Sugar Bowl or try to secure Super Bowls or NCAA playoffs. "This will hurt economic development efforts," he said.

The panel also recommended about $10 million in cuts or merged services among state agencies in a series of proposals sponsored by commission Vice Chairman Roy Martin of Alexandria.

Most of the recommendations came from the agencies that are already implementing them, he said.

"A lot of things we are going to recommend will be in place before our report comes out" in January, said Sen. Jack Donahue, R-Covington, the panel's chairman. Martin said the agencies that have recommended the cuts need to know "we are behind them."

The major items recommended by Martin include having the Department of Environmental Quality contract out its lab services, to save about $1.6 million; a reduction in the department's work force by 20 employees, designed to save more than $1.26 million; turning over the mailroom and print shop of the State Police and other related agencies to a private vendor, designed to save about $1.5 million; and outsourcing doctors' services at the state-run veterans homes, designed to save about $1 million.

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Ed Anderson can be reached at eanderson@timespicayune.com or 225.342.5810.