A Call to Action

Why isn’t Louisiana the very best place in the world?

It could be. If you consider all that we have, you soon realize there are few places on Earth blessed with as much as we possess right here in Louisiana.

We have the Mississippi River and the Gulf of Mexico that let us conveniently do business with the whole world. We have oil and gas and seafood for the nation. We have timber and cotton, rice and sugar cane. We reward our young people for high school performance by providing scholarships to continue their education. We are a sportsman’s paradise. Perhaps most wonderfully, we have a generous, lively culture of family and food; of faith, music and merriment that attracts visitors from across the globe.

*Telephone survey conducted 29 March-11 April 2007 with 600 likely Louisiana voters; Source: Harris, DeVille & Associates, Inc. and Southern Media & Opinion Research, Inc.

Given all these advantages of geography, natural resources and culture, why is Louisiana regularly found near the bottom on good lists and close to the top on bad lists? Look at almost any important measure of economic success or quality of life (personal income, educational achievement, citizen health, and road safety – just to name a few) and you will find that Louisiana lags behind the rest of the nation.

There is no good excuse for this. And we cannot just lay the blame on our elected leaders. We all have a responsibility to make Louisiana the best it can be. But that day will not come until we say it must.

Impossible?

Remember the splendid lesson of levee board reform. Many said Louisiana’s politics would never allow for the levee board system to change…even after its failures were exposed by Hurricane Katrina. They were almost right! But then the people came together – stubborn, inspired groups from New Orleans joined by others around the state – to speak in one clear, decisive voice. And just like that, it happened. In the time it took to press a few buttons at the State Capitol, Louisiana became a better place.

Blueprint Louisiana is a citizen-driven effort. Our agenda includes five essential changes that will fundamentally improve the future of our state. Join us and together we can build a place that will make us all rightly proud to say: “I live in Louisiana.”

It is time to create the state we deserve.