Two-plus years of debates, multiple studies and three special sessions now come down to this: The Louisiana House will take up three revenue-raising bills today, each one renewing a different fraction of the temporary “clean penny” of sales tax that expires on June 30. All of the bills fall short of raising the minimum $507 million needed to avoid cuts to critical and popular state services. House Bill 4 by Rep. Stuart Bishop comes closest. The bill, which narrowly passed the House Ways and Means Committee on Wednesday, would raise $453 million, in its current posture. The AP’s Melinda Deslatte breaks down what passed.

The majority-GOP Ways and Means Committee, without objection, advanced a proposal by Chairman Neil Abramson, a New Orleans Democrat, to renew 0.33 percent of the tax. Members voted 12-5 for a measure by Baton Rouge Republican Rep. Paula Davis to renew 0.4 percent. They also voted 9-7 for a bill by Lafayette Republican Rep. Stuart Bishop to renew half the tax, but scale it down in phases. The committee, however, narrowly rejected Edwards’ favored sales tax bill of a straight 0.5 percent sales tax renewal.

Gov. John Bel Edwards told a group of stakeholders this morning that Davis’ bill for 0.4 percent renewal does not have the minimum 70 votes to pass in its current form, and that he will continue pushing for a renewal of a half-penny of sales tax which avoids cuts. The Advocate’s Elizabeth Crisp:

Edwards said on his monthly call-in radio show on Wednesday that he’s optimistic that legislators will reach some agreement and he is still pushing for the half-cent proposal that could be resurrected. “I think we’re on the right track there, I look for success next Wednesday,” Edwards said.

Republicans appear to be rallying around Davis’ House Bill 10, which the author describes as a compromise between the competing one-third and one-half cent proposals. However, there is still a chance that the rate could be increased to the higher amount, which would avoid unnecessary budget cuts. Gannett’s Greg Hilburn:

Davis voted against both a one-third cent sales tax and a one-half cent sales tax in the previous session. We’re meeting in the middle,” she said of her turnabout. When asked if she would kill her own bill if it were amended to a half-cent in the House or Senate, Davis said no. “I will respect the will of the body and let them vote,” she said.

Reality check: The difference between the 0.5 and 0.4 renewal is 10 cents on a $100 purchase.

What about the budget?
Renewing four-tenths of a penny instead of the full half-cent would mean that roughly $85 million in “below the line” priorities would not be funded next year. The House Appropriations Committee outlined its preference late Tuesday in a bill by Rep. Cameron Henry that restores funding for Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (SNAP), higher education and district attorneys but leaves shortfalls in TOPS, juvenile justice and local sheriffs. Nola.com/TimesPicayune’s Julia O’Donoghue was there:

The TOPS scholarship would be short $29.5 million — about 10 percent — for the coming academic year and every TOPS recipient would get less money than expected. Local sheriffs would also receive $11 million less than they say they need to continue housing thousands of prisoners for the state. Louisiana would also have to delay implementing a law change that allows 17 year-olds to be treated as children by the criminal justice system instead of as adults. Southern University and Grambling State University also would lose a combined $4.7 million they had requested.

The budget bill passed the Appropriations Committee on a largely party-line vote, as Democrats object to any sales-tax measure that doesn’t fully fund the priorities outlined in the budget.

Democrats only make up 39 members of the 103-person chamber, but tax bills take 70 votes to pass. A number of Republicans won’t vote for tax bills under any circumstances, so nearly all Democrats are usually needed to get any tax bill out of the House at all. “We consider TOPS a priority,” said Marksville Rep. Robert Johnson, the head of the House Democratic Caucus. “If taxpayers are going to pay a portion of that penny, they should get the services they need.” It’s unlikely that many Democrats, particularly members of the Black Caucus, will be enticed to endorse Henry’s budget plan that reduces funding for Southern University and Grambling State University, two historically black institutions.

New plan, same results
A new report from the Center on Budget and Policy Priorities breaks down the latest proposal to repeal the Affordable Care Act, which would have the same devastating effects on health insurance coverage, access to care, health and financial security as the Cassidy-Graham plan pushed last year. That ill-advised legislation championed by Louisiana Sen. Bill Cassidy would have caused an estimated 21 million people to lose health coverage. The CBPP’s Aviva Aron-Dine and Matt Broaddus have the lowlights:

• eliminate the ACA’s expansion of Medicaid to low-income adults and its subsidies that help moderate-income consumers afford individual market coverage, replacing them with a flawed and inadequate block grant to states;
• severely disrupt the individual market for health insurance, potentially causing markets in some states to collapse; and
• end critical ACA protections for people with pre-existing conditions, including the requirement that plans cover essential health benefits, such as mental health and substance use treatment, prescription drugs, and maternity care.

Louisiana no longer prison capital
The criminal justice reforms enacted last year have allowed Louisiana to shed its shameful title as the national – and world – leader in per-capita incarceration. That designation now belongs to Oklahoma, as The Advocate’s John Simerman reports:

The 2017 measures, which included prison-time reductions for many nonviolent offenders that led to a wave of early releases last fall, were aimed at redirecting an estimated $262 million in savings over 10 years from emptied prison beds into re-entry, treatment and other programs that target recidivism, or a return to criminal activity by former inmates. Unlike Louisiana, which has shed several thousand inmates from a peak in 2012, Oklahoma has been on a fast-rising vector, anticipating a 25 percent increase in its prison population over the next decade.

Number of the Day
$11 million – Remaining cut to local sheriffs’ funding for housing state prisoners, in budget plan passed by House Appropriations on Wednesday. (Source: Nola.com/TimesPicayune)