In case you have not heard, the City of New Orleans is insolvent and does not have enough cash to pay its employees, nor to continue to provide the much-needed services to its people.  This financial insolvency is a fiscal apocalypse burning down New Orleans’ plans for the future.  This disaster must be overcome by the joint operation of the city and state leadership with the temporary appointment of an “Independent Fiscal Administrator” for the city, coupled with the state funding a $160 million temporary loan.

Here is how we got here and how we can reform and rejuvenate our great New Orleans.

THE REALLY BAD NEWS:

Mayor LaToya Cantrell has been indicted for misuse of public funds.  But that is not the bad news.  Indictments of government officials in New Orleans are just normal government news.

The really bad news for the people of New Orleans and the state of Louisiana is that New Orleans is the victim of a unified governmental malfeasance by the city’s mayor, the city’s administrative department, and the City Council, who together have been defiantly running a gigantic, illegal spending spree of over $160 million in just the most current year (2025).  This is deficit is not a “small deficit.”  Consider that the City’s 2025 spending ($927 million) exceeds the City’s annual revenue ($767 million) by a full 20%.  Said differently, for every $1.00 that the City is spending in 2025, it only has 80 cents to back it up.

The mayor, the Chief Administrative Office, and the Council all knew in the spring of 2025 that they were spending our tax money at an astronomical level that could not be covered by city revenues.  Shirking their responsibilities, the city officials chose not to reduce expenses. With city elections coming in 2025, all official concern for their own malfeasance and unconstitutional spending was ignored by all those city participants.

Then, in late October 2025, after the city elections were substantially concluded, and all incumbents had safely landed in their new electoral offices without any public accounting for the city’s ever growing fiscal disaster, the Louisiana Legislative Auditor delivered its emergency review of  “. . . of the budget of the City of New Orleans . . . .”  Low and behold, the Legislative Auditor’s report confirmed what all the city officials already knew.  New Orleans has been operating with the likelihood of an illegal fiscal deficit of around $160 million in its current year (2025).  This astronomical spending deficit means that the mayor, the Chief Administrative Officer, and likely the members of the City Council are all caught up in a grand unconstitutional and illegal fiscal crime, likely “Malfeasance In Office” (see, LSA-R.S. 14:134) based upon this intentional pattern of gross fiscal mismanagement.

But the real victims of this unconstitutional spending are the people of New Orleans and the State of Louisiana.

And what is the response of these city officials to the disclosure of their mountainous level of deficit spending that now has New Orleans unable to pay its normal operating bills and expenses as they come due?  Why, simply, audaciously ask the State of Louisiana to bail out the city government, and pay all the full $160 million deficit that the city can not pay, without any correction or accountability by the city officials.

With shameless bravado, the city officials (Mayor-Elect, Chief Administrative Officer, and City Council members) have demanded that the State fund this irresponsible and unexplained fiscal fiasco, without any state oversight, and without any future hard reforms to the city’s unrestrained deficit spending going into 2026.  The wild city spenders are claiming the royal right to be bailed out by the State at the tune of $160 million, and thereafter to be left alone to operate New Orleans as they see fit.  As any sane state official should respond, the Governor, the Attorney General, and the State Treasurer have all said “NO!”

That is the best governmental decision made in New Orleans in twenty years.

THE REALLY GOOD NEWS:

The State of Louisiana has a statutory method for publicly and expeditiously reform and rejuvenate cities and parishes in Louisiana that lose control of their financial affairs.  This occurs when legally a local government become “fiscally unstable.”  When a local government is found to be “fiscally unstable,” the state is called upon under the “Louisiana Fiscal Administrator Law” (La R.S. 39:1351 et seq) to temporarily take administrative control over the insolvent municipality.

In the case of the City of New Orleans, the city has already declared that it is unable to pay for trash services, is unable to pay its settlement debt owed to the Orleans Parish School Board, and most egregiously admits that it does not have enough cash to pay its police officers and other employees their reoccurring compensation owed and upcoming through 2025.  The fact that the city of New Orleans with an operating deficit of $160+ million is financially insolvent, can not pay its bills when due, makes it clear that the state is obligated to take over the operation of the city through a state appointed and judicially approved  “Fiscal Administrator.”

This financial debacle is undeniable.  The fact that the people of New Orleans and the employees of New Orleans can be protected by a “Fiscal Administrator” is part of the good news.

The additional good news, is that the state officials in charge of curing this financial fiasco (Governor, Treasurer, and Attorney General) have publicly indicated that they will not authorize the state to bail out the city government with a $160 million loan, on the state’s credit, without appointment of a “Fiscal Administrator.”  Now is the time for the appointment of the Administrator, and governmental cooperation to protect the people and cure this fiscal disaster.

The best immediate protection of the people of New Orleans is for the state and city to begin immediately to operate with a court-appointed “Fiscal Administrator.”  This new administrative operation will stop the unsustainable deficit spending, while protecting public safety and fiscal integrity of the city and the state.  Further, the Fiscal Administrator can see that the borrowed funds amounting to $160 million for New Orleans are protected from frivolous expenditure by those city officials that created this tidal wave of financial errors.

Now is the time for Governor Landry, Attorney General Murrill and Treasurer Fleming to stand together and revive New Orleans, as the jewel of the South.  The appointment of a temporary Fiscal Administrator” offers the people of New Orleans a new future, a bright future, with fast growing prosperity, increased tourism, job surges within the cCity, improved public safety, improved public street lighting, working traffic signals, effective street repairs, and outside investment in the greatest city in the South.

We all love New Orleans.  We are all ready to reform and rejuvenate the greatest, and most unique city in America.  Come together for a “Fiscal Administrator” for the New Orleans renaissance that will surely occur.  The immediate reform, rejuvenation and renaissance of New Orleans under the Fiscal Administrator is the “Really Good News” for Louisiana.