Representative Jerome “Dee” Richard Spoke to Rotary to update about 2011 legislative session. Obviously, redistricting and Higher Ed funding was a big part of the discussion. The shortfall the state is wrangling with has made it politically charged for where the cuts will happen.

A bill that would raise millions in increased tuition for Nicholls State University and thousands for Fletcher Community College has stalled in the Legislature.

House Bill 448, by Rep. Hollis Downs, R-Ruston, would increase the full-time tuition cap from 12 hours to 15 hours.

Currently, a student who takes 12 hours is considered a full-time student. Any student who is full time pays a flat rate for tuition, even if they take more than 12 hours. Students taking fewer than 12 hours pay per credit hour.

Downs’ bill, which is supported by Commissioner of Higher Education Jim Purcell and Gov. Bobby Jindal, would increase the full-time designation to 15 hours, meaning students taking that number of credits would have to pay more in tuition.

But Rep. Dee Richard, a Thibodaux lawmaker with no party affiliation, says passage of the bill may be doubtful.

“It doesn’t look good for the bill,” he said.

Richard said Downs pulled the bill from the House floor after a bill that would have increased an existing student fee failed by a wide margin.

Dee also spoke about the challenges and political maneuvering which ultimately resulted in splitting Terrebonne and Lafourche. It has been over 150 years that Terrebonne and Lafourche were separate.  The last-ditch measure this week to keep Terrebonne and Lafourche parishes in the same congressional district ultimately failed.

Still, it was a good effort by a local lawmaker to keep the state from robbing the local region of its political clout.

State Rep. Damon Baldone, D-Houma, tried one last time to avert the dire consequences that now seem almost certain. Baldone’s bill calling for another go at remapping the local area was shot down in a House committee on Wednesday.

Rather than making up nearly a third of a congressional district as the two parishes do now in the 3rd Congressional District, the northern parts of Terrebonne and Lafourche will comprise about 15 percent of the district focused in Baton Rouge while the southern part of the local area will make up about 12 percent of the district focused in Jefferson and St. Tammany parishes.

Local folks turned out in droves during the public-hearing part of the redistricting process earlier this year, but their pleas for local unity went disregarded.

That means local voters will be relegated to the outlying areas of two faraway districts rather than making up the core of one. The plan that now stands to go into law will deprive us of our political power at the very time when regional approaches to challenges are most in need of a dedicated spokesman and salesman in Congress.

The dual coastal needs of restoration and flood protection demand regional action.

Coastal erosion and the threat of flooding — issues that go to the heart of this region’s continued ability to support this population — threaten all of us.

We cannot help but wonder whether those issues will get the attention they deserve from Metairie and Baton Rouge lawmakers.

Unfortunately, this compelling need, too, will have to compete for attention from congressmen who are unlikely to be familiar with the questions and answers or the people and businesses that rely on them.

Other regional causes such as Nicholls State University and our local population of American Indians will no longer find an automatically interested and sympathetic ear in Washington.

Instead, it looks inevitable that our region will be divided into two congressional districts, separating common interests and hacking apart a powerful voter base.

Excepts from the Daily Comet were used in this article