Inside Report for May 29, 2008

• By MARSHA SHULER
• Advocate Capitol News Bureau
• Published: May 29, 2008 - Page: 7B - UPDATED: 12:05 a.m.

• Print
• Email
• Save
• Twitter
• Social Media

• Del.icio.us
• Digg
• Facebook
• Reddit
• 

Gov. Bobby Jindal is touting Louisiana’s new ethics laws every chance he gets on the national scene.

From “Jay Leno’s Tonight Show” in Burbank, Calif., to the National Press Club in Washington, D.C. In between he told national Republicans about how things have changed in Louisiana in just the past four months.

But back home, legislators are struggling to fix the flaws in those laws, largely without any help from Jindal.

Left uncorrected, those flaws could derail implementation of the very laws that Jindal touts.

Meanwhile, a provision of one of the new laws Jindal pushed could tie the hands of state ethics officials as they try to enforce the rules on conflict of interest, nepotism, personal finance disclosure and other laws. This comes at a time when Jindal says he wants to put Louisiana on the map as a God-fearing, ethical state.

Add to that some legislators pushing bills that would allow people to engage in conduct that would otherwise be legally unethical.

Jindal is nowhere in sight. Ethics that was top on Jindal’s radar as a candidate and in his first special session appears to be no more than a notch under his political belt.

He’s made a splash and now it’s on to something else.

Legislators filed dozens of bills in the 2008 regular session to change — for good or bad — the ethics laws passed in February.

Jindal has had no comment.

Some of the bills are key to implementing his financial disclosure legislation.

For instance, Jindal takes no public stance on how far the personal financial reporting should go for volunteer members of state boards and commissions he appoints.

Jindal was asked repeatedly about where he stood and what would be his role in the ethics cleanup.  Press secretary Melissa Sellers responded with a statement: “The governor announced today (March 25) that his primary focus in the regular session will be to reform our workforce development system to make Louisiana workers the most highly trained and skilled workforce in the world.”