Lawmakers approve LSU-OLOL deal
Lawmakers easily approved a deal to move LSU's Baton Rouge-based medical education and hospital care to Our Lady of the Lake Regional Medical Center. The move, backed by Gov. Bobby Jindal, would keep the state from needing to build a new $400 million replacement hospital. The joint House and Senate budget committee approved the agreement today. The outdated, state-owned Earl K. Long Medical Center, which serves the poor and uninsured, will close in 2013 and its would-be patients would be admitted to OLOL. Existing LSU medical student training programs also will move there.
$13 million available for new downtown library, official says
David Farrar, executive director of the East Baton Rouge Parish Library, says his staff projects that $13 million in the system budget could go toward a new downtown branch proposed at the site of the current River Center branch. “The possibility of a new library is real,” says Farrar, who was speaking at Forum 35’s monthly lunch meeting at Juban’s. Although the library board will decide the fate of the current building, Farrar says the budget also allows, alternately, for $6 million to $10 million to renovate the property. Farrar says he is in talks with local business groups to leverage another $5 million in new market tax credits to offset the expense of a new structure, previously estimated by Trahan Architects in a conceptual design study to cost $20 million to $24 million. Farrar also says he hopes to encourage ExxonMobil to help with fund-raising efforts and perhaps to consider naming rights involved in a new downtown branch; the company is interested in physics fairs and other partner events, the director says. “We need to stay on that property, in my opinion,” Farrar says of the current site along the North Boulevard Town Square revitalization project. Farrar also says the Burbank Drive location for a new south Baton Rouge branch is out of the running because the board has not re-upped a donation offer for the land. Instead, Farrar urges support for a Rouzan branch, despite developer Tommy Spinosa’s financial troubles. “We need a library in that part of town,” Farrar says. —Todd R. Brown
Pay raises suspended for state workers
Annual pay raises for most government workers in Louisiana are suspended next year because of state budget problems. The Civil Service Commission agreed today to suspend raises for more than 60,000 rank-and-file state employees, called classified employees. Gov. Bobby Jindal followed that decision with a suspension of pay boosts for political appointees, known as unclassified workers, in the cabinet agencies under his control. The orders strip state agencies of their ability to give the usual 4% annual "merit raises" to employees in the 2010-11 budget year that begins July 1. The orders don't affect workers for statewide elected officials, the Legislature and the Louisiana Supreme Court, but Jindal's executive order urges them to join in the pay raise ban. State workers called the ban unfair, saying the state's budget shouldn't be balanced on their backs.
La. initial jobless claims barely rise
Louisiana registered a slight increase in first-time claims for jobless benefits last week. The Louisiana Workforce Commission says there were 4,027 initial claims for the week ending Saturday. That's up just a bit from 4,007 for the week ending March 6. For the comparable week ending March 14, 2009, there were 4,526 first-time claims. Last week, there were 59,461 people continuing to receive unemployment, down slightly from the previous week's total of 59,933.
Cyclists tackle the toughest bike race in America . . . near St. Francisville
At the top of the gravel hill, they squint with strain, their mouths—white with salt in some places, blackened by dirt in others—hinge open, tongues dry. Their chests rise and fall rapidly as they breathe in air noticeably scented by overhanging branches beginning to bud. They surge forward at a quick pace, and then, as the road before them inclines again and grows rocky, rutted, they sway back and forth. Their pumping legs threaten to give out. Where once some of them were speeding along, they now walk. It is the walk of the finished: eyes cast downward, images of home and mother alternating with thoughts on the roads just traveled. This isn’t a war party. It’s a group of bicyclists competing in Rouge-Roubaix (pronounced roo-bay), reputed to be one of the most difficult bike rides in America. And it takes place an hour's drive north of Baton Rouge. The grueling 100-mile race is in its 12th year, yet the Capital City has barely noticed it. Read the full story in 225 magazine by clicking here.
Nominations wanted for Women in Business awards
Nominations are now open for Business Report's Influential Women in Business awards. These annual awards salute women business owners or managers who are making a fine and noticeable difference in the Capital Region. Winners will be spotlighted in the June 1 issue of Business Report. All nominations must be made online here. The deadline for nominations is 5 p.m., April 16.
News roundup: Cao joins rest of La. delegation against health revamp ... No. 12 seed Cornell dominates Temple 78-65
Sole Republican to vote for reform won’t do so again: U.S. Rep. Joseph Cao, the only Republican to vote for a Democrat-backed health-care overhaul late last year, doesn't expect to do so again when the Senate version comes up for a vote this weekend. Cao says he's "pretty much a definite no." Louisiana's seven-member House delegation is expected to unanimously oppose the Senate version of the bill, which will likely be voted on in the House on Sunday. Cao, an attorney and staunch abortion opponent, says he has studied the Senate language and it doesn't go far enough to prohibit government funding of abortions.
Big Red win: Cornell lived up to its billing, showing why it's the best team to come out of the Ivy League in more than a decade. Down to their last chance to experience success on college basketball's biggest stage, seniors Ryan Wittman, Louis Dale and Jeff Foote led the 12th-seeded Big Red to its first win in five NCAA appearances on Friday, a 78-65 upset of No. 5 seed Temple in the East Regional. Dale scored 21 points, Wittman had 20 and Foote chipped in 16 points and seven rebounds. This win came in dominant fashion. Cornell (28-4) took the lead early and never looked back. Temple (29-6) lost in the first round for the third straight year under coach Fran Dunphy, whose former assistant, Steve Donahue, has led Cornell to three straight Ivy League titles and the winningest season in school history. In other first-round action, West Virginia shook off early wobbles to beat Morgan State 70-55, and Xavier beat Minnesota 65-54. After the game, Minnesota Coach Tubby Smith brushed off a CBSSports.com report that Auburn was close to hiring him. Smith, who coached at Kentucky and Georgia, says the reports are “just talk.”
