Columns

By Stephen Waguespack

By Stephen Waguespack

By Stephen Waguespack

Sitting in an empty committee hearing room in the US Senate in Washington, it struck me. We really are on our own with flood recovery. Three small business representatives traveled to DC to deliver powerful personal testimony on the flooding event and the days that followed, yet only the two Louisiana senators were present to hear it. Every other chair remained empty. True, a few senators floated in and out to make a brief remark about their own concerns in their districts, but did not stay to hear the Louisiana experiences. The hearing was scarcely mentioned in national or local media.

By Stephen Waguespack

By Stephen Waguespack

For the first six months of the year, a constant barrage of state budgetary doom and gloom littered news reports and incessantly occupied the airspace. This political messaging machine was revved up and driven hard to stress the need for taxpayers to pony up much more money for the government to solve state spending problems – despite the increasingly worsening economic conditions encountered by our residents. As the story went, there was simply no other choice, and failure to pay would lead to a chaotic world filled with a litany of unacceptable consequences, such as canceled football seasons and shuttered hospitals and universities.

By Stephen Waguespack

Why again do we live here? Summers in Louisiana can be brutal, with oppressive heat and swarms of mosquitoes an annual tradition. Our coastline is eroding, our topography is flat and many of our communities are threatened by water. We have a history of political corruption and low-performing schools, both which are slowly starting to improve after decades of poor outcomes. Our tax code is a mess, and our public infrastructure needs updating.