With budgetary challenges and fiscal reforms taking center stage when the 2009 Legislative session begins on Monday, the Jindal administration has launched this web log - The Ledger - offering citizens across the state (as well as Baton Rouge-based budget geeks and policy wonks) an additional resource for following the latest developments on those important issues.

While state government budgetary issues can often be complex and (let's be honest here) do not always make for the most compelling reading, they nonetheless have meaningful and tangible impact on the everyday lives and livelihoods of the people of Louisiana.  So the purpose of The Ledger is, in part, not only to highlight recent news on those issues.  It's also to use the less formal format that a 'blog' provides to help make those issues more accessible, more understandable, and (hopefully) more interesting.

That's not to say that some of the discussion that appears here won't be complicated (or geeky and wonkish, if you prefer).  It will.  And just because the tone used on these pages may be more casual than the usual governmental press release or policy paper doesn't mean that the issues being addressed are not approached with the seriousness and respect they deserve.  They are.

The point is that, whether they are considered by citizen or policymaker, the fiscal issues state government will be grappling with for the foreseeable future will require new ideas, unconventional thinking, and innovative solutions, as well as a frank assessment of the situation at hand and a clear understanding of the facts.  And perhaps that effort could stand to gain from having the kind of new, unconventional, and innovative way of disseminating information, as well as the frank and clarifying mode of communicating, that the online technology of a 'blog' offers.

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