Legislators negotiate ethics differences

• By MARSHA SHULER
• Advocate Capitol News Bureau
• Published: Feb 26, 2008 - Page: 1A

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House and Senate negotiators reached compromises Monday in a series of disputes involving key ethics bills sought by Gov. Bobby Jindal.

Their action sets the stage for votes today on the agreements reached by panels of three senators and three representatives.

It also means the special session dedicated to revamping the state’s ethics laws could end today. The special session was scheduled to end Saturday.

Conference committees usually meet behind closed doors. Monday’s negotiations took place in meetings open to the public.

Senate President Joel Chaisson II, D-Destrehan, and House Speaker Jim Tucker, R-Terrytown, told their colleagues that they would have plenty of chance to go over the recommended final version of the bills before today’s votes.

Scheduled to be up for final approval in both houses are four of Jindal’s key proposals:

• House Bill 1 would require many state and local elected and appointed officials to generally disclose their financial business.
• Senate Bill 1 would generally ban elected and some other state government officials from doing business with the state.
• Senate Bill 3 would limit elected and some other officials access to free tickets to sporting and cultural events.
• Senate Bill 8 would set a $50 per event cap on the wining and dining of legislators and other elected officials by lobbyists and others trying to influence them.

On HB1, the Senate had voted to delay the first financial disclosure reports until May 2010. The compromise hammered out Monday sets the date at May 15, 2009, as originally proposed.

More extensive reporting would be required by members of state boards and commissions that deal with $1 million or more in state funds.

Tucker said the House is still unhappy that judges are not included in the disclosure bill “but we are willing to let the judges move forward on their own.”

He warned that he will file another judicial disclosure bill in the regular session just in case the judges don’t meet a June 15 deadline as promised.

SB1, the contracts ban, would allow legislators and heads of executive branch agencies to renew their current state contracts until 2012. But they could not enter into any new contracts.

The negotiators stripped a House-passed provision that Chaisson said would have allowed professional service contracts to continue. “That would basically defeat the purpose of the bill,” Chaisson said.

SB3, the free ticket prohibition, would not be a total ban because exemptions would stay for certain types of activities.

Under the House version, the change would not take effect until Dec. 31, 2008. The committee version makes the ban effective on signature of the governor.