Sunshine Week coincides with the start of the Louisiana Legislature’s three-month regular lawmaking session.If you’re not familiar, Sunshine Week is a nonpartisan collaboration among journalists, educators, government offices and the private sector that places an emphasis on open government and unhindered access to public records.In Louisiana, we find ourselves at an interesting juncture where the zeal for open records, usually …

Louisiana Gov. Jeff Landry signed an executive order on Feb. 21 removing school boards’ veto power over corporate property tax breaks that take money away from schools. It also did away with a requirement that projects granted the tax breaks create jobs and retain jobs.Now, companies that apply for Louisiana’s Industrial Tax Exemption Program, which can grant property tax breaks …

The precipitous loss of residents that Louisiana has seen over the last three years has been spread across nearly every parish, with urban and rural areas alike seeing large decreases, according to a new U.S. Census Bureau estimate of local population changes that offers another stark sign of the challenge facing state leaders.Some of the steepest declines were in areas …