La. La. Land - A White School's Winnings

Monday's Blogs from the Bog!

Monday's Blogs from the Bog!

• A WHITE SCHOOL MAKING MONEY IN INNER CITY

  JUL 14 Blogger Lamar White Jr. writes a revealing piece here about a (private white) Alexandria school that opened (coincidentally, we're sure) during the first ordered integration of parish schools back in the 1960s. That's not such a unique story, but this school's fundraising efforts are. The school operates a bingo hall in the middle of the city's inner city neighborhood - which of course is mostly black.

• WHISTLE BLOWING ON CNSI CONTRACT

  JUL 14 This post in the Advocate reveals some details surrounding the cancellation of a Medicaid processing contract with CNSI, a company that had previously employed the Jindal secretary overseeing the contract award. The Jindal administration cancelled the contract, in part because the federal agency that oversees Medicaid advised of a whistleblower's accusations about the situation, Marsha Shuler reports.

• UM... WHAT?

  JUL 14 This editorial in the Picayune is interesting. It's a gushing endorsement of a new group of business people who are banding together to support coastal restoration and the state's pie in the sky master plan for accomplishing it. Two questions come to mind. One, where were these people during the last session? And, two, why is the Walton Family funding this? These guys are not exactly known for environmental activism. What's really going on here?

• FAT RETIREMENT CHECK SLIPPED IN FOR JINDAL BUDDY

  JUL 14 Blogger Tom Aswell lets us in on a change in State Police Commander Mike Edmonson's retirement package that had some interesting timing. Seems the change (which Aswell says will add $30K to Edmonson's annual retirement income) was "slipped in" on the very last day of the legislative session.

• NYT ON COASTAL RESTORATION FOR MONEY SCHEME

  JUL 14 This interesting post on the New York Times examines a coastal restoration project taking place near Alligator Bend. The company performing the work is earning credits it will sell to other companies (and the US Army Corps of Engineers) who need the credits to offset damage they're doing. Hmmm.

• THIS RIGHT HERE IS WHAT ST. TAMMANY FEARS

  JUL 14 As residents of St. Tammany Parish fight against a proposed fracking project in their area, a Houston company gets slapped with a $2.5 million fine for discharging untreated wastewater, some of it from fracking operations, into the Red River, KTBS in Shreveport reports. The company dumped the water into the river at the Port of Caddo-Bossier, the story reports.

• DO WE REALLY BELIEVE 'INNOCENT UNTIL PROVEN GUILTY'?

  JUL 14 Blogger Bob Mann is writing about our criminal justice system again in this post, and this time focuses on the public defender. In particular, he's looking at the experience of one public defender - Hillary Clinton - who is now being vilified for doing her job, he says.

• DESHOTELS: OBAMA NEEDS A NEW GUY

  JUL 14 Blogger Mike Deshotels has some advice for President Obama: get better advice on the education front. Many of the obstacles facing teachers and school systems today stem from policies promoted by Obama's education secretary, Arne Duncan, Deshotels opines.