A recent poll of Louisiana citizens found that Bobby Jindal was our state's least favorite governor. I am pretty sure that you will have a less than favorable opinion of Mr. Jindal after you hear about his lame duck maneuver in his final weeks in office. That maneuver is going to cost you and I several million dollars.

While I am never against deserving people being paid what they deserve to be paid. I am a realist. When your state budget is in a $750 million dollar hole, you probably shouldn't be grabbing your shovel to make it deeper. That's what Jindal did according to LAPolitics.com publisher Jeremy Alford.

In some cases these were retroactive pay raises.  There's at least $19 million in these pay raises.

Alford's comments were reported by the Louisiana Radio Network. He went on to say that the raises have already taken effect. As you might imagine new Governor John Bel Edwards is not really thrilled with this little leftover gift from Governor Jindal. According to Alford,

It's a tough issue because, as they're finding about these kind of surprise pay raises, lawmakers are also talking about possible furloughs to deal with the shortfall for this fiscal year and next fiscal year.

According to state records the pay raises were made in the Department of Transportation, The Coastal Protection Restoration Authority, The Department of Wildlife and Fisheries, and The Department of Environmental Quality.

I'm told that Governor John Bel Edwards has told his secretaries to find out when these pay raises were implemented, how much they're going to account for, and report back to him.

Chances are there isn't much that can be done at this point. The only real option is to find a way to pay for these increases and move forward. Chances are the money is going to come from you and I in the form of either higher taxes or new taxes. It will be up to our elected officials to decide how those taxes will be spread across the state's population.

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