Louisiana voters on Saturday will decide the fates of four proposed amendments to the state constitution in the final statewide election of 2024.
The measures would change how Louisiana officials conduct oversight of judges, deliberate spending bills in the Legislature and deal with the properties of delinquent taxpayers.
Amendment No. 1 would revamp the process for investigating and disciplining judges for misconduct. It would expand the Judiciary Commission from nine to 14 members by adding five political appointees named by the House speaker, the Senate president and the governor. It would grant the Supreme Court the power to authorize an investigation of a judge or discipline a judge through a majority vote of the court.
Amendments 2 and 3 both would give legislators more time to craft, review and consider spending bills before having to vote.
Amendment No. 2 would require a 48-hour waiting period before a spending bill could be voted on and require that a written summary of proposed changes to the bill be distributed to each lawmaker at the start of that window. It was drafted in the wake of the 2023 legislative session, when lawmakers passed a $45 billion budget package in the final 30 minutes before adjournment with few details about what the bill included.
Amendment No. 3 would allow lawmakers to extend a regular session of the Legislature by up to six days to complete and pass a spending bill.
Amendment No. 4 would change how Louisiana handles sales of property where the owner is delinquent on tax payments. Under current law, such properties can be subject to a mandatory sale. The amendment would replace that system with a tax lien system.
The proposal is in response to a 2023 U.S. Supreme Court ruling that a Minnesota county unconstitutionally took the property of a 94-year-old Minneapolis woman without paying “just compensation.” After the decision, the nonpartisan Louisiana State Law Institute said in a report to the Legislature that current Louisiana law may violate that ruling.
Saturday’s proposals require a simple majority vote to become law.
