Collection:LPB

Genre: Speech

Place Covered: Baton Rouge, East Baton Rouge Parish, Louisiana

Copyright Holder: Louisiana Educational Television Authority

Date Issued: 1988-03-21

Duration: 00:27:53

Subjects: Roemer, Buddy | Louisiana. Legislature | Louisiana Legislative Session, 1988 | SPECIAL SESSIONS | Politics | Government | STATE BUDGET | Budget deficits | Taxes | Government reorganization | Louisiana. Department of Health and Hospitals | Louisiana. Department of Health and Human Resources | Louisiana. Department of Social Services | Louisiana. Department of Urban and Community Affairs

Contributors:

• Lormand, Ken Host
• Roemer, Buddy Speaker
• Sockman, Roger Reporter

Ken Lormand hosts live coverage of Governor Buddy Roemer’s opening address to a 1988 Special Session of the Louisiana Legislature on March 21, 1988. In his speech, Governor Roemer discusses: inheriting a $2 billion budget shortfall for the 1988-1989 fiscal year; his legislative package giving him the temporary authority to cut each department’s budget up to 20%, reduce and eliminate programs, consolidate governmental functions, raise fees, and forgive loans; the cost savings measures already put in place; his commitment to not raising taxes until the current budget has been scrubbed; and his plan to reorganize state government through abolishing the Department of Urban and Community Affairs and splitting the Department of Health and Human Resources into the Department of Health and Hospitals and the Department of Social Services.