If you think you heard this story before, it is because you have and in fact it has been repeated in every one of Jindal's state budget since he became governor. In two articles published on the subject matter in the Times Picayune dated Dec. 15 and 17 writer Ed Anderson reported the following: Jindal's chief budget architect told lawmakers Friday that the state is running $251.3 million short of funds and cuts in dozens of programs will be necessary to keep the books in balance through the end of June.
Revenue collections are off by about $198 million so far this budget year that ends June 30. One of the articles pointed out fiscal office chief economist Greg Albrecht told the panel. He said the biggest shortfall is in the state's collection of personal income tax, which is off about $142 million from earlier projections. The oil and gas severance tax followed it closely, down about $128.5 million from what had been projected.
Albrecht's analysis said the severance tax on oil and gas is down because increasing amounts of oil and gas production is occuriring that are substantially tax-exempt. He said that gas production appears to be diverting away from taxable production as development of the largely tax-exempt Haynesville Shale site in north Louisiana continues.
The short fall in the severance tax is just another ongoing example how big oil is in bed with our elected officials who grant tax exemption to the oil and gas industry. The industry lobbies for and receives tax exemptions for drilling in the Haynesville shale and then divert their other drilling to this project so they can invoke their tax-exempt status. It is the old shell game. Our elected officials knew this would happen but still granted the exemptions and to top it off did not adjust the revenue short fall that would come about because of the exemption when addressing the budget.
Jindal and the republican controlled legislature balance the state budgets with accounting gimmicks and over stating revenue and announce the budget is in balance only to have announcements such as the above a few months later of the budget being out of balance. This writer has been pointing out Jindal's game on the budget and predicted this would happen again in this budget year. Like conservative republicans on the national level, Jindal's administration gets into the pockets of the average citizen 100 different ways. Somethings never change. No republican President has presided over a balanced federal budget in over 50 years and Jindal has not balanced one state budget since he has been governor.
When it comes to accurate information on the state budget or the oil and gas industry, log into politidose not the Times Picayune who's two articles on the subject matter are written as though those things just happen. The same Times Picayune and Oil industry who blamed everything on the government that took place during the BP oil spill. What a shame.
Note: See previous commentary dated 11/5/11 titled, Louisiana Governor Bobby Jindal and New Orleans Mayor Mitch Landrieu.
