State legislature’s expenses dwarf Buckingham Palace’s

Austerity notwithstanding, no one can say that the Louisiana Legislature doesn’t live like royalty. Just ask England’s Queen Elizabeth.

HB-1417, as yet unsigned by Gov. Bobby Jindal, calls for the appropriation of a cool $67.8 million to pay expenses of the House and Senate, as well as salaries and allowances of members of both the House and Senate, officers and staff, the Legislative Auditor, the Legislative Fiscal Office, the Legislative Budgetary Control Council, and the Louisiana State Law Institute.

The proposed budget represents a decrease of $1.2 million from the 2009 legislative budget but it still dwarfs the budget of the international symbol of luxury, excess, and ostentatious lifestyle: Europe’s most expensive monarchy, the British royal family.

News reports on July 5 revealed that Her Majesty had to make do with a $57.8 million budget for Buckingham Palace for the current year. That’s 14.7 percent less for supporting the Royal family and a household of 1,250 employees, plus travel and ceremonial duties than that required by the Louisiana Legislature and its support staff of some 600 employees.

While many of those state employees work for the Legislative Auditor, the Legislative Fiscal Office, the Law Institute, the Budgetary Control Council and the Legislature itself, the 144 legislators themselves are part timers. And although part of that $67.8 budget is earmarked for repairs and maintenance to House and Senate chambers and the respective committee rooms, none of that is for the overall upkeep of the 24-story State Capitol Building itself. Nor are the House and Senate chambers or their respective committee rooms used more than three or four months a year.

By contrast, running Buckingham Palace’s 775 rooms – including 19 state rooms, 52 Royal and guest bedrooms, 188 staff bedrooms, 92 offices and 78 bathrooms – is a full-time proposition by anyone’s standards, and Queen Elizabeth is now being asked to trim even more from her budget.

She has already sold her helicopter to free up money. The Royal Train, which costs more than $75,000 each time it is used, is now used only sparingly. The Queen’s furnishing budget was cut from $607,000 to $455,000 and the budgets for staff uniforms and for computers were each cut in half and repairs to the palace’s leaky roof will have to wait another year.

But that’s staid old England. Back here in Louisiana, it’s quite another story.

Of the $67.8 in HB-1417, more than $27.6 million is allocated to pay the salary and allowances of “members, officers, and staff of the House of Representatives, and the salary and allowances for the speaker of the House of Representatives and for expenses of his office, including reimbursement for actual expenses as presiding officer for his service to or for the benefit of the House of Representatives, the Legislature, the legislative branch of government, or the state, as determined by the speaker….” The speaker, Rep. Jim Tucker of Terrytown, of course is the presiding officer as well as author of the bill.

Another $18.8 million is earmarked for the same purpose on the Senate side, including expenses for the president of the Senate, Joel Chaisson, “as determined by the president of the Senate.”

If approved by Gov. Bobby Jindal, HB-1417 will pay a cool $67.8 million to cover expenses of the House and Senate. The total exceeds even the $57.8 million budgeted for Her Majesty’s Buckingham Palace this year. COURTESY PHOTO