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Inside the LMA<br />
Governor’s Column<br />
STRENGTHENING LOUISIANA’S FUTURE<br />
BY JOHN BEL EDWARDS, GOVERNOR OF LOUISIANA<br />
Autumn is here and admittedly, this is<br />
one of my favorite times of the year.<br />
With the cooler weather, the holidays<br />
and of course, lots of football, there are<br />
so many great things to look forward<br />
to. I certainly hope that all of you<br />
enjoy it as well. Given your diligent<br />
and dedicated work for the citizens of<br />
our great state, you certainly deserve<br />
to do so. The heartbeat of any place is<br />
its people, and it is your service to our<br />
people that is greatly appreciated. Real<br />
leadership matters.<br />
There’s good news for our state. For the second year<br />
in a row, Louisiana will have a budget surplus, some<br />
$300 million from the fiscal year that ended on June<br />
30, <strong>2018</strong>. It’s mainly attributed to personal income and<br />
corporate taxes coming in higher than projected, and<br />
we hope that’s an indication that our state’s economy<br />
is continuing to improve. There were more jobs, people<br />
brought home better paychecks, and businesses were<br />
more profitable. This is quite a contrast to our state<br />
budget situation, when I first took office, when we<br />
were facing a nearly $3 billion shortfall. With your help,<br />
for the first time in nearly a decade, we have been<br />
able to stabilize our budget and revenues, and we are<br />
budgeting more responsibly.<br />
With all of this progress and the hope we have for<br />
strengthening Louisiana’s future, it is incredibly<br />
important that we focus on ensuring that our children<br />
are better prepared for the opportunities we hope to<br />
provide them. That is why I am making it one of my<br />
top priorities to support the hardworking teachers of<br />
our state for a pay raise. Teachers are pillars of every<br />
community in Louisiana and deserve to be paid much<br />
more for the hard work that they put into educating<br />
our next generation of leaders.<br />
I know that one of the major issues everyone is<br />
concerned about is providing increased flood<br />
protection to our communities. We know that what<br />
happens in one watershed either directly or indirectly<br />
impacts another, which is why we must to come<br />
up with regional and innovative ways to mitigate<br />
the risks. Nearly every parish was impacted by the<br />
historic flooding of 2016 and we have learned so much<br />
about how to further strengthen our resilience. That’s<br />
why I created the<br />
Louisiana Watershed<br />
Council earlier<br />
this year, and I’m<br />
happy to report that the work has<br />
already started. The Council, which<br />
has launched the Louisiana Watershed<br />
Initiative, held its fourth meeting last<br />
month and received updates on the<br />
planning, projects, community outreach<br />
and ongoing flood risk reduction efforts<br />
that are currently taking place across<br />
the state. The Council is comprised<br />
of the Office of Community Development (OCD),<br />
the Department of Transportation and Development<br />
(DOTD), the Coastal Protection and Restoration<br />
Authority (CPRA), the Governor’s Office of Homeland<br />
Security and Emergency Preparedness (GOHSEP), and<br />
the Louisiana Department of Wildlife and Fisheries<br />
(LDWF). By working together we will make things<br />
better for our people and our state. The Council will<br />
travel around the state in the weeks ahead to promote<br />
the initiative and inform local officials. I hope that you<br />
can attend one of the events. Here are the dates and<br />
locations:<br />
Lafayette - <strong>October</strong> 8<br />
Monroe- <strong>October</strong> 16<br />
Shreveport- <strong>October</strong> 17<br />
Alexandria - <strong>October</strong> 18<br />
Houma/Thibodaux - <strong>October</strong> 23<br />
Lake Charles - November 7<br />
Baton Rouge - November 14<br />
Hammond - November 15<br />
God bless you all, and thank you for your unwavering<br />
service towards making Louisiana the best that it can be.<br />
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<strong>LMR</strong> | <strong>October</strong> <strong>2018</strong> Page 5