NAME: Jean-Paul "JP" Jude Morrell
YOUR CAMPAIGN WEB ADDRESS: http://www.jpmorrell.com
CONTACT INFORMATION FOR PUBLICATION:
Address: 6600 Franklin Avenue, Suite A-6; New Orleans, LA 70122
Phone: 504.286.2334
FAX: 504.286.2335
Email: jpforsenateinfo@gmail.com
PARTY AFFILIATION: Democrat
PROFESSION: Attorney
PRESENT EMPLOYER/POSITION (if self-employed, what type of business):
Partner, Morrell & Morrell, LLC
HIGHEST LEVEL OF EDUCATION (include graduation date):
Juris Doctorate, Tulane University Law School, 2004
CIVIC EXPERIENCE:
Board Member, New Orleans Center for the Creative Arts (http://www.nocca.com)
Board of Directors, DESIRE Nola, (http://www.desirenola.org)
POLITICAL EXPERIENCE AND POLITICAL ORGANIZATION MEMBERSHIPS:
Currently:
Louisiana State Representative, District 97 (2006 - Present)
Member, Orleans Parish Democratic Executive Committee (OPDEC) (2008 - Present)
1. What are your top three priorities and what would you do to implement them?
Crime: Create more incentives for individuals to join the New Orleans Police Department, in particular, and Law Enforcement, in general. Such measures include, but are not limited to, graduate loan forgiveness, financial aid for college increased supplemental pay.
Healthcare: Force the issue on the location and timeline of the completion of a new Charity Hospital or rehab of the existing building, through legislative action. Additionally, resist all efforts to reduce/cut medicaid and/or medicare spending to our most needy population and expand the LAChip Program.
Education: Increase accessability to vocational training through out High School and support the expansion of Charter Schools, as needed. Additionally, introduce legislation to aid the school system to aid in the eventual intergration of Charter Schools into an umbrella system upon the termination of the Recovery School District.
2. What are your thoughts on the ethics reform measures and do you think they are adequate for investors to take a new look at business in Louisiana?
I think that measures we currently have in place are the right steps towards convincing business to relocate to Louisiana, but it is absolutely necessary that we provide adequate funding to the Ethics Board for enforcement or the law were passed for naught.
3. How would you address the state's impending economic recession?
Depending on the sevarity of the recession, all options have to be on the table (Budget Cuts, Taxes, etc.). However, the budget is no longer as tied to the price of gas as it was in the 1980's so I would have to see exactly what the shortfall is, as it is constantly fluctuating, before making a concrete recomendation.
4. Education:
a. What can the legislature do to better educate and prepare our state's workforce to meet current and future economic needs?
The abolition of the Department of Labor and creation of the Workforce Development Commission was a good start, and the availabilty of skilled vocational labor is absolutely necessary for the expansion of industry in this state. Providing additional funding and support to this newly created Commission is essential for meeting those industrial needs.
b. Comment on the use of state funds going to public school students who attend private schools.
I do not support private vouchers. Currently we are operating a hybrid system of public and charter schools and to introduce another variable in our ongoing public education experiment is wrong. Additionally, until public education is fully funded we cannot adequately gauge how effective it could be and accountability measures for privately funded instituation is inadequate for comparable performance measures.
c. What can the legislature do to improve public education?
We could fully fund education and support previously introduced legislation for facilities planning, as we have the most derelict public education facilities, statewide, in the country.
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