{"id":249,"date":"2026-06-03T17:14:31","date_gmt":"2026-06-03T17:14:31","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/pioneerrelocationnews.com\/?p=249"},"modified":"2026-06-03T17:14:31","modified_gmt":"2026-06-03T17:14:31","slug":"this-social-worker-wants-to-help-kids-with-special-needs-louisiana-wont-let-her","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/pioneerrelocationnews.com\/?p=249","title":{"rendered":"This Social Worker Wants To Help Kids With Special Needs. Louisiana Won’t Let Her."},"content":{"rendered":"
\n

Is your business “needed”?<\/p>\n

Bizarrely, in many states, if you want to start a business, you first must convince bureaucrats that your business is “needed.”<\/p>\n

Read more Cutting Tariffs on Farm Equipment Is Another Admission That Trump\u2019s Trade Policies Are Increasing Prices<\/a><\/p>\n

Four years ago, Louisiana blocked social worker Ursula Newell-Davis from helping kids with special needs. Bureaucrats said she hadn’t proved her business was needed.<\/p>\n

“Why does the state of Louisiana have the right to stop me from doing what I love?” she asks in this update video.<\/p>\n

Good question. Newell-Davis has a master’s degree and a social work license. For two decades, she’s helped kids with special needs.<\/p>\n

One, Kamal, told us he struggled to make friends, until Newell-Davis “helped teach me how to talk to people.”<\/p>\n

Kamal’s mother is grateful: “She explained to me things that I didn’t understand about my kids. It allowed me to go back into the community and work.”<\/p>\n

Newell-Davis helped many families. But four years ago, she tried to help more kids by doing short-term respite work.<\/p>\n

Louisiana wouldn’t let her.<\/p>\n

“You have these skills, you could help people,” I tell her. “What do you think is going on with these regulators?”<\/p>\n

“Louisiana wants to limit how many agencies they have to regulate,” she replies. “Make it easy for the state.”<\/p>\n

Anastasia Boden of the Pacific Legal Foundation is helping Newell-Davis sue Louisiana, arguing that its regulation is unconstitutional.<\/p>\n

“Louisiana gives you no clue about how<\/em> to prove you’re needed,” says Boden. “That would be difficult for even the best entrepreneurs. Nobody can prove with any certainty that they’re needed.”<\/p>\n

Right. I can’t prove Stossel TV is “needed.” Is McDonald’s needed? What about the local phone store?<\/p>\n

Read more Trump\u2019s Self-Promotion Is Always Shameless and Sometimes Illegal<\/a><\/p>\n

“The only way to find out is to open up your doors and try,” says Boden.<\/p>\n

But Newell-Davis isn’t allowed to try, even after giving regulators what they demanded: She rented office space, paid fees, and wrote seven pages about why her work is “needed.”<\/p>\n

Louisiana decided that wasn’t good enough.<\/p>\n

That’s what usually happens. The year Newell-Davis applied, the state turned down 75 percent of applicants. The health department says it limits “the burden on regulators.”<\/p>\n

“That’s just not a legitimate excuse,” complains Boden, “that government doesn’t have enough money to administer people’s constitutional rights.”<\/p>\n

Stossel TV reached out, but state officials wouldn’t talk to us about their rule.<\/p>\n

Thirty-five states and Washington, D.C. have (appropriately named) “CON” laws requiring entrepreneurs to get a Certificate of Need before opening certain businesses.<\/p>\n

This creates nasty side effects. Try not to get injured in Kentucky. The state’s CON law for ambulances results in longer wait times for transportation.<\/p>\n

But Louisiana is the only state that applies this nonsense to social workers doing respite work. The result: “Consumers in Louisiana are less satisfied with their care,” says Boden. “It might be easier for the government, but that’s not benefiting consumers.”<\/p>\n

If these laws don’t benefit consumers, why do they stay on the books?<\/p>\n

“Hospital [and] medical associations give money,” explains Boden.<\/p>\n

“They don’t want the competition,” I ask.<\/p>\n

“Of course not! But the result is to deprive people of economic opportunity and to make care worse,” says Boden.<\/p>\n

Now, four years later, Boden’s latest lawsuit winds its way through America’s bureaucratic courts, and bureaucrats still won’t let Newell-Davis do respite work.<\/p>\n

But good news: Newell-Davis now helps people with special needs by employing them<\/em> at her new fried chicken restaurant.<\/p>\n

At least Louisiana’s government doesn’t get to decide if a new restaurant is “needed.”<\/p>\n

Read more Fewer Migrants, Fewer Homeless<\/a><\/p>\n

What Louisiana’s bureaucrats do is just wrong.<\/p>\n

So often, government just gets in the way.<\/p>\n

COPYRIGHT 2026 BY JFS PRODUCTIONS INC.<\/strong><\/p>\n