BATON ROUGE, La. (AP) — The Louisiana House has narrowly refused to extend an existing tax break given to the New Orleans Hornets that saves the team $3.7 million a year.
The extension proposed by Metairie Rep. Cameron Henry, a Republican, fell four votes short of passage in a 49-46 vote Wednesday.
The NBA team gets a tax break through the state Quality Jobs Program. Henry proposed continuing that for the length of the Hornets' new lease with the state, which is set to go through 2024.
Henry says the extension is part of the deal for keeping the team in New Orleans. But critics say the state doesn't have enough money to continue offering multimillion dollar tax credits to wealthy team owners.
Henry plans to bring the proposal up again for another vote.