Jim Beam column: Talking on phone doesn’t cut it

Published 6:22 am Wednesday, July 30, 2025

Public meetings are just that. They are always supposed to be open to the public. Some years ago, I asked a member of the Calcasieu Parish Police Jury how they managed to avoid controversial public meetings.

It’s no problem, he said, because they just discussed those issues over the phone.  I was surprised Sunday when I read a story in The Advocate about Republican Gov. Jeff Landry’s LA DOGE work and its leader said the group no longer meets and just “talk on the phone as needed.”

First, some background.

LA DOGE is Landry’s copy of President Donald Trump’s Department of Government Efficiency that was led by billionaire Elon Musk who paraded around with a chainsaw to show he was cutting government by firing people and gutting programs.

Landry asked his friend and businessman Steve Orlando to become the state’s “Fiscal Responsibility Czar.” Orlando, who is a volunteer, built a major business providing services to oil and gas companies.

The two men say the goal of Louisiana’s DOGE isn’t slashing government jobs or services. It’s using a business-minded approach to help agencies use taxpayer dollars wisely.

The effort is primarily directed at the Louisiana Department of Health, the largest agency that gets $3.2 billion in state general funds and $16.4 billion from the federal government.

One of its major successes, according to the health department and not from a public meeting, so far has saved the state $73 million. It did that by finding out when Medicaid recipients had moved out of state. The newspaper said at LA DOGE’s urging the health department in April began using Office of Motor Vehicles data to help get those people off the Medicaid rolls.

Mike Waguespack, Louisiana’s legislative auditor, who is working closely with LA DOGE, said, “We’re tickled to death that the governor has really pushed his folks to dust off these reports and implement the recommendations that this office has given to the executive branch.”

LA DOGE is also trying to transform the state Department of Children and  Family Services, which has needed changes for much too long because of job losses dating back to when Bobby Jindal was governor.

Orlando said savings at the state technology office have saved $4.5 million so far. He is also working with the University of Louisiana at Lafayette and the health department to use AI to detect Medicaid fraud. It’s the first we’ve heard about the ULL plan.

Like most Louisianans, Orlando said, “I just want to know that when I pay my taxes, my money is actually being put to good use.”

The success so far is commendable, but the fact remains that what LA DOGE is doing is public business and the public deserves to know how and when it is achieving success. We only know about these latest savings because Landry or Orlando told us that is what they have done.

Meeting by telephone isn’t the answer. It’s dodging the state’s public meetings and public records laws. State government is a business and taxpayers are the stockholders. They want to read about DOGE having meetings open to the public.

Steven Procopio, president of the Louisiana Public Affairs Research Council, said, “They (Landry and Orlando) are making plans about how state spending should be done. That is state tax dollars, and so therefore, the citizens have a right to be involved in that process, or at least to be informed (at public meetings and not just by their reports about what is happening).

The Advocate said transparency experts said DOGE is subject to open meetings laws, which require a “public body” to give notice of meetings that the public can attend.

Bruce Hamilton, a civil rights attorney, said, “The fiscal responsibility program (LA DOGE) looks like a public body, acts like a public body and functions like a public body. So to me, it’s a public body, and it has to follow legal requirements for a public body, including holding open meetings.”

Yes, and here is why Landry has a free hand in running state government by his rules and not by open meetings laws: When he was elected On Oct. 14, 2023, 1,904,669 Louisiana voters (63.7%) stayed home.

Jim Beam, the retired editor of the American Press, has covered people and politics for more than six decades. Contact him at 337-515-8871 or jim.beam.press@gmail.com.