Admissions Changes, Agriculture Update, Medical Marijuana, LA Film Trail | 09/07/18 | LSWI

Support. Comes from Entergy. Provides, much more than, power, we, support science and engineering at, local schools to, build a brighter path to better jobs and help, prepare the next generation because together we, power life, energy. Additional. Support provided by the Fred B and Ruth B Ziegler Foundation, and the Ziegler Art Museum located in Jennings City Hall the, museum, focuses on emerging Louisiana, artists and is an historical, and cultural center, for Southwest, Louisiana and. The. Foundation, for excellence in Louisiana, public broadcasting, with, support from viewers, like you. I, think. That's a question for consumers, what's, in store for the states of medical marijuana. You. Can't can't. Win the championship every. Year you got a you. Know okay finished second place Louisiana. Farmers, get ready for harvest, Louisiana. Has been serving, as one of Hollywood's, favorite, leading ladies, for. Well over a century now. Promoting. Famous, film locations. This. Is the first institution that I've been at that did not practice a holistic, review of applications, a change, that's being challenged. Hi. Everyone I'm Andre Mauro much more on those stories in a moment on this week's edition of SWI, but, first a check on some of the top headlines. Louisiana. Is one of twenty states listed as plaintiffs, in the latest push to scrap the Affordable, Care Act once, and for all a judge's. Ruling could bring the law that gives 20 million Americans health, insurance, to a halt at issue, our core principles, of the law including. Protections, for people with, pre-existing medical conditions. And limits. On how much older, customers, can be charged, Republicans. Say that when Congress, eliminated the penalty for not having health insurance as, part of last year's tax bill, lawmakers. Rendered, the entire health law unconstitutional. Democrats. Do, not agree a new. Study is finding, a tragic, link between, bullying, and attempted. Suicide and says. Louisiana is, ground zero, the, wallet hub survey, found our state has, the nation's worst problem, with bullying leading. To the highest attempted, suicide, rate in the country the, survey found Louisiana, has the highest percentage of high school students. Who have attempted suicide and, the. Highest percentage, of high school students, bullied online. Congressman. Ralph Abraham, from Richland, Parish is working, on a new farm bill and is, pushing for major reforms, for, food stamp eligibility. Abraham. Supports, a worker school, requirement. For someone able-bodied. To, be eligible for snap he, says employers are desperate, for labor and this is a good step towards moving the unemployed, into, the workforce more, than, 150. Soldiers with, the Louisiana national, are back, home after, a nine-month deployment in, Kuwait, Iraq and, Afghanistan. The. Marksville based unit returned September, 1st after working, in support of operations. Spartan, shield freedoms. Sentinel and inherent, resolve while, deployed officials, say the unit completed, 35, projects, exceeding. 15 million dollars in construction, costs. LSU. Today all smiles, announcing. That record, freshman class there's, some controversy though, about, an LSU decision, that came to light this past weekend, it's over a new admissions, policy, at Tiger town. After. Nearly 30 years of, rejecting, applicants, whose AC t-- scores failed to meet the minimum LSU. Was adjusting, its enrollment standards, and embracing. Holistic, admissions the. Holistic philosophy gives, greater weight to personal, recommendations. Student. Written essays and outside, activities. LSU. Board of supervisor, Chairman Steven Perry tells me holistic. Means LSU, has every tool to evaluate a student's, potential, not, based solely on a test score he, says the school will offer more flexibility, to applicants, and overall. Standards, won't change, LSU. Vice-president, Hosea Vilas will oversee, the change and says, it is long overdue. I've. Been in this business of, college admissions for the last 20 years I. Would. Say that this was by, far the. Most. Archaic, practices. Of, admissions. That I had seen not. Everyone. Agrees. Successful. Baton Rouge businessman, Richard Lipsy, tells, me he is concerned, and points, the finger at LSU president, f king alexander, he, questions, why makes such a change when, LSU's freshman AC T scores are at, an all-time high and their stability, after years, of financial cuts, to LSU, Lipsy.

Is A longtime member of the State Board of Regents but, says he only first heard of the major policy change, in the newspaper he. Says quote I hate, to see King Alexander, tear all that down. Emphasizing. That this is strictly his, personal, opinion, and not a statement of the board there's. Been a war of words between Lipsy and Alexander, this week with, the latest entry, an opinion. Letter penned by Lipsy, in this week's Advocate newspaper, it's headlined, don't, lower LSU, standards, does. It surprise you that there's. Been some backlash from, some of the, education. And community leaders who are thinking. This is not a good thing, if frankly it is surprising, because again, holistic, review is not new when you look at the top 50 institutions. According, to u.s. News & World Report the top, 50 public all. But two of those institutions, practice, holistic review. In admissions among. The flagships, there's only there's 50 flagships, in the country right these are some of the oldest and most prestigious institutions in, the world, LSU's. In that class of institution. There's. About seven, or eight institutions. That do not practice holistic review state, representative. Pat Smith is a lifelong. Education, advocate, and believes, the change will, be one of growth for LSU we. Are a very, diverse state, and. I think that, when we start looking at policies, and procedures, no matter at what level they are we. Should be looking at the diversity that we have on the state and higher, ed is just one example of, that and this policy. That I was just putting in is indeed. Not going, to diminish, the. Fact that they bring in the best best and the brightest students and, another, note about that record freshmen class, it also features, more out-of-state, students, than ever before. The. End of the summer is a busy time for Louisiana farmers, corn, soybeans. Rice, and cotton are in various stages of harvest healthy bees Kelly spires has more on the state's, multi-billion. Dollar AG industry. Andre, that's right after worrying, all season, about weather and market, prices some farmers, in the northwest, part of the state are facing what seems like another insurmountable. Hurdle, shipping. Logistics. He's. Just really the biggest problem. We have every, day during harvest season is figuring out you know lining, up drugs and, where. They're at and where they're going and you know how much they weigh harvest. Season is a hectic, time on. Kyle Bill's farm outside of Shreveport, where he grows soybean, and corn. Geographically. Dill is in a tough part of the state he's, 60, miles from his corn buyer and a hundred and twenty miles from a grain elevator for, soybeans, just, for example our corn harvest our. Normal year would take seven trucks find one combine and. We would try to get those trucks three loads of people a day. You. Know that's, and. That's everything going right we had to space them out where you know they're they're. All here the more when we get started and we just slowly, file them out Agriculture. Commissioner Mike, strain says it's a problem a lot of farmers, in that part of the state have the, further you are from a grain elevator the. More time it takes and, the, more it costs you to move your product corn. Strain, says is of use to the poultry industry, so farmers, can sell it to inland, facilities, there, is no, soybean, crushing, facility, in the state so, soybeans, largely, go to a facility on a river for export, on the, Red River there's not one north of Alexandria, dredging. Is a huge, huge, issue we. Need to dredge the red we need to congressional. Simply River and keep that open, on Dill's, farm the transportation. Coordination, has stalled. So his combines, are sitting still and his corn is waiting, in the field in a window of perfect, weather and the, weather hasn't, done Dill's corn crop any favors, this year we, started off with a really really, wet spring. We. Were sitting on Sarno every day just trying to like you know it's, dry enough it's a drought in a business drought and we finally started planning it was dried. Enough for the tractor to go across but probably not ideal conditions to plant into in April. We. Got a few rains the beginning of the month and then by. The middle of the month - in, the gym there was just I mean no rain hardly you know we were expecting, low low, yields, but they end up being lower than we thought bad, luck with rain is not the case everywhere in, Louisiana, strain says we've. Had pretty good weather I mean really all we've been spared, we, haven't had any major storms. You know the storms, that literally. Knocked the plants down or what we call Lodge them Lodge them down on the ground and if, folks irrigate, their crops strain, says those bushel per acre yields, are really, looking up 200. Bushel corn 100 bushel beans really, really nice and our cotton, a bale and a half cotton so, we're very fortunate what we have in Louisiana some, great advantages one.

With, Our temperature, we, get crops in the ground generally. A few, weeks ahead of the rest of the country, so ours is ready to go to market first. Secondly. We have some wonderful beautiful, soil here some of the richest alluvial, soil anywhere, in the world and we, have water, you, know we have water from our rivers we have waters from my bayous we have water underneath the land so, we have significant, access to water whether. You you pump it or whether or not you can you know you get, it from well the, price farmers, can get for soy and corn now, that is something to worry about strain, says if you look at corn, 360. 370 380, is. Break. Even and we're trading at 343. We're trading at 870, Midwest at 7 and so. It's a things. Are very tight so we hopefully will recover, our, local. Our variable, cost our planting costs but not the long-term fixed. Cost buildings. Land etc interest, rates string. Says the key to bringing prices back up is another, giant force outside of farmers controls, International. Politics what. Is really looking to try to get these trade deals you, know resolved. And if you look what's going on Mexico. Has now said we're going to sign a deal Canada. Has just finished you know multiple days of intense negotiations, we're, getting close and we think hopefully within, the next week or two we can go ahead and have an agreement with Canada. Now China's gonna be a little more difficult but, the European Union's has agreed to buy more beans and other products for us but, that's why the trade, promotion activities. Are so. Critical, that we can open the new markets, while we're trying to re-establish the. Current markets so we can have fair and free trade a lot, of farmers under contracts to sell their products months in advance, a lot, of this year's crops they, were sold months ago you're, normally a farmer some farmers I've looked at some balance, sheets today where. The farmer sold almost nine, ten months before. Delivery, they went ahead and booked their crops but, normally, most farmers, sell, about half of the crop right around planting, another, hat another half of what remains right. About midway through and, then very. Close to harvest they will sell the other so they'll stage it because they have to deliver what they've sold dole, says he's looking forward to next year and it's thankful, that years in the past have been good when, we run into challenges, you kind of have to see. That through as well because, this. Year we're having a horrible corn crop that. Last year was our best, corn crop we've ever had you just kind of have to look at the balance of it.

You. Can't can't. Win the championship every. Year you got a-you know okay, finished second place. Sugarcane. Processing. Will also, start this month again with this crop experts, are expecting lower yields, than last year, strain, says that they are watching, an influx, of sugar from Mexico - all right Kelly thanks so much. The. Medical marijuana programs. Here. And in many other states operate outside, the scope of federal agencies, that regulate pharmaceuticals. But, what about the role of insurance. Companies as these, new meds are dispensed, kelly spires talked with Blue Cross Blue Shield of Louisiana economist. Michael Berto, to, sort things out, to, get started Mike I'd like to ask you kind of for. You to outline the basics of the. State's medical marijuana program for me well, as I understand, it the. Legislature, just approved, and added to a pretty, significant. List of conditions, for. Which you can qualify for a recommendation. For. Medical, marijuana doctors, can, apply. To the State Board of Pharmacy and, be approved to make recommendations. For certain conditions of medical. Marijuana there'll. Be ten. Pharmacies. Scattered, around the state who have licenses, to distribute, the, medicinal product, typically, in the form of an oil like, CBD, oil there's. No provision for allowing, anything that's smokeable, to, be legal and, then those. Opportunities. For. The doctors to offer, a recommendation, that, recommendation, will allow you to purchase the. Cannabinoid. Oil when, you go to one, of the ten pharmacies, scattered. Around the state right limited number of doctors, limited, number of patients per doctor, and a limited number of places where you can actually go. To get. This product right when you think about you know the medical economy. Insurance. Of course plays, a huge role in that how does. Blue Cross Blue Shield deal. With medical, marijuana in states where this is established already well, in general, until. Very recently, as recently, as a month ago the, FDA has, never approved a drug, that. Was a substitute, for medical marijuana and, we don't typically. Cover any drugs that, are not fda-approved and, we, typically don't pay for drugs that are over-the-counter drugs so. If, a doctor can't prescribe it, the, odds are pretty good that an insurance company won't pay for it, we're very concerned, about things like purity, and safety, and. The most. Of the medical marijuana products, haven't reached that threshold yet. Maybe, we should take a step back and can you explain to me how the, FDA and the DEA, interact. With medical. Marijuana well. Normally. When a drug gets approved, it goes through a very detailed, and lengthy process, at, the FDA. They. Do research, they do trials. Clinical trials, ultimately, human trials, and then, once the FDA is, comfortable, that the drug is efficacious, it's, safe and it, has the effect it's supposed to without too many side effects the, drug gets approved and then after, that if it's a Schedule one or a controlled, substance that, the Drug Enforcement Administration, cares. About then, they'll issue guidelines on how is prescribed. You. May have run into a situation where some drugs you get from your doc you get a prescription it's, on paper you have to carry it to the pharmacy you get a field once and then it's over and other, drugs the nurse can call in and you get a 90-day refill, and it goes on forever all, of that's kind of determined, by the way the DEA sees the compounds, can you tell me more about what.

Happened, Over the summer we're in the process of maybe. Getting an FDA approved, yeah yeah. A British. Drug company, was able to put, marijuana. Compounds. A version of very purified, version of CD CBD. Oil through. The normal FDA processes. And the FDA signed off on the drug and now it's at the DEA and they're going to determine how it will be prescribed, and I wouldn't be at all surprised, to see CBD. Oil go, through normal channels and, be, available, in. Drugstores within, the next six to eight months Wow so is there a chance that, the. Fda-approved. Product. Will. Outpace. The medical. Marijuana economy. That we're seeing come up here I think that's a question for consumers. If. You, have the opportunity, to, purchase a drug at your. Normal drugstore, with a normal, prescription, from your normal doctor and it's, been you know the FDA has over watched over that product, versus. Buying, it with a recommendation, from, a person from a prescriber, so, something that's locally, grown and produced. Where you don't have the FDA oversight, on purity, and that sort of stuff you the, consumer has to choose I wouldn't. Be surprised, if consumers. Preferred, the established, process, versus. The new one what are you hearing from Blue, Cross Blue Shield consumers, we've, had enquiries, about people whether we would cover medical, marijuana. Under. Our insurance plans today that's not possible it's. Not fda-approved number, one number, two the, dispensaries. Are essentially, cash businesses, in every state and so. We're not really set up to pay cash for stuff usually. There's. No way to process, that I also have concerns I get to, see the. Reports. From the regulators. In other states on when, they do visits, to dispensaries. When, they secret, shop dispensaries. And some. Of the samples. That they're taking, have. Shown. Evidence, of. Pesticides. And fungus. And mold, and. Bacteria, Listeria. And. They've. Got people working in the dispensaries, in some of the recreational, states who, make medical, recommendations. To their patients, things, like recommending. Weed to women. Who are pregnant which, the American Society for Pediatrics. Has said no no no you can't do that so, it's still kind of the wild wild west and so I do have some concerns about how, that will evolve to its credit the, legislators, in Louisiana, have been very strict about how they want to dispense medical, marijuana this, whole system where Doc's, have to be cleared with the Pharmacy, Board where, they only issue ten licenses, that, makes it easy to police rights if you only have to police ten locations, I think, that if they're going to go down this road they're going about it the right way and, there. Are so many people who believe that these, products, are helping them that, I actually do believe within the next few years you'll see several, different drugs in the normal pipeline, based on marijuana, that, will have a positive, impact on people's health but. Jumping. The gun on that sometimes, can have a cost and I, just want to make sure people are advised of, the sort, of consumer, protections, they have today all, right well thank you for filling, us in and, mr. time thank you absolutely, you can find out more on this topic and others, on the BlueCross BlueShield and, louisiana blog it's, straight talk la dot-com. You. Know it's just in the past decade, or so that Louisiana, earned the, reputation as, Hollywood, South the, result of a boom in movie, and TV production, that happened after, the state court at Hollywood with, that lucrative, tax incentive, plan the, pitchfork the industry, grew and now at, your fingertips a way to visit the places where, all of those films were made. Land. While from the Louisiana Office of Tourism the. State is now taking, a next, step, with. The, movie making process, it's a natural, to, allow visitors. To see where some of these films, were made lights. Camera Louisiana. Lights camera Louisiana, you're right Andre. Louisiana. Has been serving, as one of Hollywood's, favorite leading ladies, for. Well over a century now we. Kind of forget. How far back, our history, goes. Because. It's gotten so much more attention in recent years with the film tax credit laws. Has. Renewed the industry, but, Hollywood, has literally been coming here for well over a, century and. Louisiana. Has served as when, a Polly Woods favorite stars and there are all these locations, where so, many films. I think, 2,500 is, a total. Have, been made so, an opportunity. For people visitors. Tourists, to, come and see, where some of these were made for. Example hush hush sweet Charlotte, Betty, Davis you can go to, the plantation, and they'll, show you the bedroom where she.

Slept They will show you the bedroom where she slept that of course is in homas house they. Have that sight very well documented and, that's. What we're looking for for. You're exactly right there have been over 2,500, films, shot. In Louisiana. We, are starting. Our project with, about 20 or 25 and. We will continually, be adding, on to it as more, and more films, are made, just as, another, example. We, just, celebrated, the 100th. Anniversary, of tarzan. Lord of, the louisiana, jungle, being, shot in Morgan, City that was shot in 1918. And interestingly. It, was only the fifth or sixth, movie, a hundred years ago to ever gross yeah, a million dollars which is a big, big deal and now if you don't gross a million dollars in the first what 48 hours you're a failure but in 1918. That, really, put, Louisiana on the map what do people need to know where, do they need to go though if, they want to begin see, some, of these sights on this movie. Traile perfect. Well we invite all visitors. Whether you're, a Louisiana. And who wants to explore your state a little more or you're from someone from outside of the state or even in another country, we, invite everybody to always start with Louisiana, travel.com. And, when. You get to Louisiana, travicom you can just do a search for movies, if, that's your interest and it will take you to our microsite. There. You, will see again, and keep checking back because, this is a site that's going to grow and grow and grow and grow the, evolving, thing it's gonna be ever evolving, we have a map. On. There we have individual. Tiles, for about, 20 25 different movies you can click on those tiles it'll. Tell you where you can go it will describe a little something about that movie that maybe you didn't know about and, it. Will give you, importantly. For us in tourism it lets, you know when. With. Days and hours they are ready. To accept you, to come by and learn more about, the. Movie that was shot their basic information that someone making plans to go do something or to travel to, visit, would. Need to know those basic things but lieutenant governor Billy Nungesser has, really. Made it his. Charge, to push. Forward and promote, Louisiana, to, the hilt one, question here what is what's, your first stop on the. Movie trail what would you go to first. Well. I have, been to several of these what I recently, went, to though, because I did not know that John Wayne had. Shot, a. Film. Here. And he. Did, and. It, was it was a Western of course and he filmed it up in the Natchitoches area so there's, a historic, site up there that, I, just. Wanted to go I wanted, I want it I get it now I wanted my little pumps. To, follow, in those cowboy, boots that. John Wayne stepped, in so that's your first stop that was my first stop but then mine would be at homeless house with. Charlotte. As, a kid that's a movie that scared me but I loved it and the. History of it is very fascinating so that would be my first stop but, we. Could, spend our lifetime, visiting. All these places we, can't and we have a lot, more that we're going to be adding. On the one I've got my eye on which, we're going to be adding pretty, shortly, is going to be Tom Hanks just. Recently. Disembarked. From the state where. He was aboard. The USS, Kidd. Filming. A movie, called Greyhound. World. War two movie and of, course Louisiana, has such a history when it comes to world war two we, have the beautiful Museum we have the USS Kidd Andrew. Higgins built the boat that Eisenhower, said won the war right here in Louisiana, so, I'm. Looking forward to putting Greyhound, on that. And getting some visitors down on that beautiful. Riverfront. Here, in Baton Rouge what, does that movie come out do we know I don't know that yet or if I did I'd have to kill you if I. Thank. You. Thanks. And everyone. That's our show for this week remember, you can watch LPB, on demand on your phone or tablet with, our LPB, anywhere, app the Downloads free from your app store you can catch LPB, news and public, affairs shows and other, Louisiana, programs, that you've come to enjoy over the years and please, be sure to follow us on Facebook. Twitter and Instagram, for. Everyone at Louisiana Public Broadcasting. I'm Andre Moro thanks, for watching us until, next time that's, the state word. Support. Comes from Entergy. Provides, much more than power, we support science and engineering and, local schools to build a brighter path to better jobs and help, prepare the next generation because, together we, power life. Entergy. Additional. Support provided by the Fred B and Ruth B Ziegler Foundation, and the Ziegler Art Museum, located in Jennings City Hall the, museum, focuses on emerging Louisiana, artists and is an historical, and cultural center, for Southwest, Louisiana and.

The. Foundation, for excellence in Louisiana, public broadcasting, with, support from viewers, like you.

2018-09-10 22:56

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