LA- Jindal's sex offender ideas scaled back after blunt questions from House speaker

To obtain a copy of the letter, try contacting the AP journalist to see if they will reveal it.

5-2-2009 Louisiana:

BATON ROUGE, La. -- Louisiana Governor Bobby Jindal has scaled back plans for toughening sex offender laws.

House Speaker Jim Tucker and another lawmaker sent Jindal an unusually blunt letter questioning whether the proposals were constitutional and how they would be paid for in a tight budget year.

Tucker is a Jindal ally on most issues. Representative Ernets Wooton is chairman of the House Criminal Justice Committee. The letter amounts to a long list of problems in Jindal's plans to crack down on sex offenders -- a topic that has remained a favorite of Jindal's since his 2007 election campaign. It was written in February. The Associated Press obtained a copy.

Wooton said his committe staff poured over the proposals and found problems with their purpose, costs and constitutionality.

In January, Jindal's office said the governor wanted to ban "sex offenders from being around children, period." Tucker and Wooton's letter questioned how the state could entirely ban convicts from being in the presence of minors, in such places as jobs.

Jindal is now backing nine sex offender bills. Nne of them prohibits sex offenders from being in the presence of children. Instead, the governor is backing a measure that strengthens already strict laws regarding convicted sex offenders working in public schools.

A Jindal spokesman characterized the Tucker-Wooton letter as part of the back-and-forth process of developing legislation. ..News Source.. by WWLTV.com