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This month’s bills for Louisiana’s two million or so electricity customers are $11.67 higher, on average, than they were in October 2020, according to the reports compiled by the Public Service Commission, which regulates the privately owned for-p…
Gov. John Bel Edwards on Thursday announced an interim replacement to head up the Governor's Office of Homeland Security and Emergency Preparedness following the resignation of Gen. James Waskom, who led the agency since January 2016 and is taking…
Louisiana's legislative leaders balked Thursday at a $63 million debt forgiveness plan for the Superdome's oversight board that Gov. John Bel Edwards' administration framed as a key piece of striking a new deal with the New Orleans Saints.
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State gambling regulators are close to approving the first phase of sports betting, but Louisiana State Police aren't quite ready to recommend which of the 13 applications will be first to allow on-premises, in-person wagering on sporting events.
After dump trucks tore up a road the St. Helena Parish police jury recently spent $258,000 to fix, a few local officials and residents want to shut down the gravel company responsible for the damage — an effort the business owner calls “harassment.”
Three Baton Rouge-area fire departments that owed around $1.5 million in federal loans doled out after 2016's devastating floods won't have to pay them back anymore now that Congress voted to forgive the debt as part of a stopgap government fundin…
A Louisiana House leader offered blistering criticism Monday of Gov. John Bel Edwards' temporary housing program for people with severe home damage from Hurricane Ida, slamming the effort as moving too slowly to assist suffering residents.
Trina Edwards, widow of the late Gov. Edwin W. Edwards, said the former four-time governor wanted to be buried near Huey P. Long in the park in front of the State Capitol.
Louisiana residents at odds with their insurers over Hurricane Ida damage claims may now be able to resolve their disagreements through a voluntary mediation program set up by the state's Department of Insurance.
Louisiana is poised to become a hub for carbon capture technology to curb greenhouse gases but environmentalists and some state climate task force members question if that's such a good thing.
Louisiana collected enough business taxes during the last budget year to deposit the first $205 million into a never-used, five-year-old trust fund created to curb the state's boom-and-bust cycles of budgeting.
With two years to go until voters select Louisiana's next governor, state Sen. Rick Ward, R-Port Allen, said he's contemplating a run for the state's top office.
A coalition of major civil rights organizations demanded Monday that Louisiana legislators redraw election districts to increase the chance that a second Black person can be elected to Congress.
With the topple of the first domino later this week in Baton Rouge, the Saints football team could either be in New Orleans for the next 30 years or headed out of town sooner than you think.
The exercise is as old as the Republic, but the first thing you need to understand about redistricting is that hot-water cornbread is as ubiquitous in north Louisiana as étouffée is in the south, says Rick Gallot, the Ruston Democratic representat…
Louisiana ICE centers ignore agency protocol on release of asylum seekers, advocates, immigrants say
Hundreds of asylum seekers at the ICE detention centers in Louisiana are being forced to pay for private transportation options to get to an airport or bus station once they are released, a move that does not comply with the ICE release protocols,…
For Renata Payne, the decision to evacuate ahead of Hurricane Ida was a no-brainer. Years of devastating storms had helped her develop a simple rule: “If it’s a Category 3, that’s when I leave.”
Staffers will see 8% more in their pay envelope, probably as early as next week, after the Senate Executive Committee approved a pay bump on Friday.
About 10 weeks after former Gov. Edwin W. Edwards died, his widow had him dug up from a Baton Rouge cemetery so she could have him cremated.
After years of struggling with billion-dollar shortfalls, the state starts out this budget year with a surplus of about $1 billion.
More than 250 trees are set to be removed around the Interstate 10/Interstate 12 split as part of the overhaul of the College Drive exit, the executive director of Baton Rouge Green said Monday.
CHAUVIN – Leroy Picou spends most of his time perched on his porch, listening to swamp pop alongside his pooch, watching utility trucks and debris contractors drive back and forth – and avoiding the inside of his mold- and mildew-infested home.
Storm water had moved a tomb near the front door. When the door was opened a snake slithered out from the accumulated marsh grass.
Bureaucracy doesn’t faze Houma Republican state Rep. Tanner Magee. You deal with it, he says, particularly when trying to find temporary shelter for the 10,000 Terrebonne Parish families left homeless by Hurricane Ida.
13 of Louisiana's 20 casinos have applied for sports betting licenses, becoming close to operational
Thirteen of Louisiana’s 20 traditional casinos have applied to handle sports wagering — the other seven are expected to apply before the Jan. 1 deadline — and the first applicants are close to being able to start booking bets on baseball, football…
In August, Gov. John Bel Edwards told state workers that once a coronavirus vaccine received full approval, they would likely face a choice: get vaccinated or undergo regular testing.
New Roads spent more than $20,500 last year on a personal police security detail for first-term Mayor Cornell Dukes with no apparent public purpose, an audit says.
Louisiana intends to divvy up the $325 million it expects to receive from a national settlement of opioid epidemic lawsuits to parish sheriffs and local governments to provide addiction treatment, response and recovery services, Attorney General J…
In their latest attempt to undermine Gov. John Bel Edwards’ response to the COVID-19 pandemic, a small group of Republican state lawmakers is trying to resurrect a petition drive to end Louisiana’s public health emergency and lift a mask-wearing r…
Gov. John Bel Edwards said Wednesday that he's joined Louisiana to the international Race to Zero Campaign, a climate change initiative that seeks to reduce net carbon emissions around the world to zero by 2050.
A combat veteran Baton Rouge fighter pilot who now flies commercial airlines announced Tuesday he is challenging the reelection of Republican U.S. Sen. John N. Kennedy in the fall of 2022.
Houma Rep. Tanner Magee has weathered many a hurricane in his lifetime but says Hurricane Ida was the most destructive, leveling Terrebonne and Lafourche parishes like Allied bombers in World War II.
Four-day workweeks at 10 hours per day for state employees are being considered to reduce traffic during the widening of Interstate 10 in Baton Rouge, state officials said.
Louisiana lawmakers say COVID vaccines aren't fully approved. Experts say that's 'complete nonsense'
When Louisiana lawmakers passed legislation back in June barring schools and universities from enforcing COVID vaccine requirements, they agreed that the protections would only be needed for a limited period of time.
Throughout my life, our family gatherings were basically cops and pastors of all political stripes and religious philosophies sitting together to break bread and explore differences, usually at the top of their lungs. Then everyone hugged, rearmed…
Louisiana Congressman Troy Carter says the president’s decision to put his $1 trillion infrastructure bill on hold and to relink the legislation to his $3.5 trillion social proposals is the correct strategy.
About 18% of the state’s population will be seeing a dramatic increase in the amounts of groceries regular food stamps can buy starting Friday.
The trucks came from as far as Wisconsin and Florida, driven by people who are normally loggers but descended upon Louisiana after Hurricane Ida produced untold amounts of wreckage that needed to be hauled somewhere.
A top state health official tasked with overseeing nursing home admissions has parted ways with the Louisiana Department of Health, as questions swirl over the agency's role in the deadly evacuation of hundreds of nursing home residents ahead of H…
Democratic representatives in the U.S. Congress were none too excited when after five terms of representing the New Orleans-Baton Rouge 2nd Congressional District, Cedric Richmond moved to the White House as a top aide to President Joe Biden.
Congress on Thursday afternoon broke a partisan impasse that keeps the federal government operating for two more months and frees up $28.6 billion in aid, much of it headed to Louisiana to help storm survivors.
After a flood of calls from people wanting to apply for disaster-related food stamps, the federal government agreed to extend the application period through Oct. 13.
Though stymied earlier this week by partisan bickering over technicalities, Sen. Bill Cassidy said Wednesday a measure that would provide disaster relief should clear the U.S. Senate late Wednesday night or Thursday.
Six months ago, as lawmakers pushed for answers from LSU officials amid a sexual assault scandal roiling the flagship campus, several vented frustrations over the lack of an agreement between local law enforcement and LSU to track sexual assaults.
Despite improvements in recent weeks Gov. John Bel Edwards said Tuesday he is extending his indoor mask mandate until Oct. 27 and said COVID-19 remains a deadly problem in all 64 parishes.
The U.S. Senate failed Monday night to approve legislation that would both keep the federal government afloat and provide emergency disaster aid for Hurricane Ida in a partisan fight over the proposed Democratic budget.
Arches and pelicans will be the themes of the new bridge on Interstate 10 across City Park Lake, state officials announced Monday.
All we know is that someone or a group of someones hacked into a public Zoom meeting to throw up explicit scenes of people having sex when Louisiana Public Service Commission members tried to discuss what happened to utility and telecommunications…
Since the East Ascension drainage panel voted to remove the parish president as head of drainage this summer, a clutch of council members and the president have been privately negotiating a new power-sharing arrangement that would oversee drainage…
While still busy, the phone lines to apply for disaster food stamps calmed down considerably on Thursday.
Gov. John Bel Edwards is optimistic that Congress will approve billions of dollars in disaster relief for Louisiana by the end of September, even as partisan bickering in the nation's capital threatens to slow the state's recovery.