With the House and Senate taking today off, this is a chance to update you on some of what happened in the flurry of activity, changing over from the regular session to the second special session.
For example, what about the Attorney General grabbing $7-million of BP settlement money that was supposed to go to the Coastal Fund? The conference committee on HB 409, the Supplemental Appropriations bill, ended up saying he has to give it back.
“The Attorney General knows that those dollars will go from the Treasurer’s Office to Coastal, and Coastal will make the distribution and provide for the accounting,” Senate Finance chairman Eric LaFleur explained, during the final few minutes of the regular session.
No repercussions have developed for the Treasurer, for his giving the A.G. the money, however.
But the Treasurer is embroiled in the middle of another dispute – contradictory House and Senate resolutions.
The first was authored by House Speaker Taylor Barras.
“This resolution is directing the state Treasurer to withdraw that money from the Bond Redemption Fund, and basically reimburse the State General Fund – or free up -- $74-million in the State General Fund,” Barras explained last Friday evening.
This was a revision of the funds sweep the House had put in the preamble to the budget bill, which the Senate subsequently stripped out. The House approved the resolution, 89-6.
Senate President John Alario authored a different resolution that got unanimous approval on Monday afternoon.
“What SR 199 says is the Treasurer is not to do things any differently than what he’s done, I think, for the last 20 years,” LaFleur explained to the upper chamber.
Senator Sharon Hewitt asked the crucial question: “So what action will the Treasurer take then when he gets two different resolutions – one from the House and one from the Senate – with different instructions?”
Technically, the most recent resolution is supposed to supercede anything done earlier.
Treasurer Kennedy has said he may seek an Attorney General’s opinion on it.