Guillory: Overturn Jindal veto

Rep. Mickey Guillory said he wants legislators to reconvene in Baton Rouge to override Gov. Bobby Jindal’s veto of a cost of living raise for state retirees.
“The governor vetoed the most prominent bill in this area,” Guillory, D-Eunice, said.
Guillory said retirees would have received a 1.5 percent increase if House Bill 42 had not been vetoed.
“I’ve been hit up here in the restaurants and with phone calls,” he said of interest in the bill.
“They are asking if I’m going to vote for a veto session,” Guillory said.
“There are a lot of other bills too that were veteoed,” he said, but the retiree raise is the he hears about.
“I think it passed through with a high percentage rate of the vote,” he aid.
Rep. Sam Jones, D-Franklin, authored the bill.
Guillory said Jones called him about a veto override session.
“He thinks, on the House side, he believes we will be able to override the veto,” Guillory said of Jones. “On the senate side he is concerned”about the having the two-thirds vote to override the veto.
After the veto, Jones told the Daily Review of Morgan City the retirees earned the raise by paying into the retirement system.
“The irony of it is that the money is sitting in the account for that purpose and nothing else,” Jones said.
The cost of living raise would have gone to retired teachers, state troopers, Wildlife and Fisheries agents and other state workers, Jones said.
“I really feel sorry for 135,000 people that would be eligible for this and their families,” Jones said.
In Jindal’s veto message regarding HB 42, he said the bill “jeopardizes the state’s credit rating by violating previous retirement reform efforts.”
In 2014, Jindal signed Act 399, which granted a 1.5 percent cost of living starting in July 2014 as long as cost of living increases were granted every other year until the system was 85 percent funded, Jindal said in the letter.
During the 2015 session, Jindal and his staff worked with the author to amend HB 42 “to maintain consistency with Act 399 and grant a cost of living adjustment next year,” Jindal said. In the last minutes of the 2015, Jones removed these amendments, Jindal said.
“Unfortunately, in its final form, this bill undoes prior reforms and undermines our commitment to keep our promises to Louisiana retirees,” Jindal said in the letter.
Jones said HB 42 had reforms in it, which would have made the retirement system stronger.
The Advocate reported the State Employees, Teachers and State Police systems had asked Jindal to approve the bill, sending him an actuarial analysis that concluded bill provisions would help improve the system’s long-term financial liabilities more quickly.
Additional reporting by Zachary Fitzgerald of The Daily Review of Morgan City contributed to this report.