Should the federal government fund a effort to stem the tide of wetland lose in LA ?

[Jolie Rouge]

The Louisiana bayou, hardest working marsh in America, is in big trouble—with dire consequences for residents, the nearby city of New Orleans, and seafood lovers everywhere.



Get a taste of what awaits you in print from this compelling excerpt. http://magma.nationalgeographic.com/...re5/index.html



It was a broiling August afternoon in New Orleans, Louisiana, the Big Easy, the City That Care Forgot. Those who ventured outside moved as if they were swimming in tupelo honey. Those inside paid silent homage to the man who invented air-conditioning as they watched TV "storm teams" warn of a hurricane in the Gulf of Mexico. Nothing surprising there: Hurricanes in August are as much a part of life in this town as hangovers on Ash Wednesday.

But the next day the storm gathered steam and drew a bead on the city. As the whirling maelstrom approached the coast, more than a million people evacuated to higher ground. Some 200,000 remained, however—the car-less, the homeless, the aged and infirm, and those die-hard New Orleanians who look for any excuse to throw a party.

The storm hit Breton Sound with the fury of a nuclear warhead, pushing a deadly storm surge into Lake Pontchartrain. The water crept to the top of the massive berm that holds back the lake and then spilled over. Nearly 80 percent of New Orleans lies below sea level—more than eight feet (two meters) below in places—so the water poured in. A liquid brown wall washed over the brick ranch homes of Gentilly, over the clapboard houses of the Ninth Ward, over the white-columned porches of the Garden District, until it raced through the bars and strip joints on Bourbon Street like the pale rider of the Apocalypse. As it reached 25 feet (eight meters) over parts of the city, people climbed onto roofs to escape it.

Thousands drowned in the murky brew that was soon contaminated by sewage and industrial waste. Thousands more who survived the flood later perished from dehydration and disease as they waited to be rescued. It took two months to pump the city dry, and by then the Big Easy was buried under a blanket of putrid sediment, a million people were homeless, and 50,000 were dead. It was the worst natural disaster in the history of the United States.

When did this calamity happen? It hasn't—yet. But the doomsday scenario is not far-fetched. The Federal Emergency Management Agency lists a hurricane strike on New Orleans as one of the most dire threats to the nation, up there with a large earthquake in California or a terrorist attack on New York City. Even the Red Cross no longer opens hurricane shelters in the city, claiming the risk to its workers is too great.

"The killer for Louisiana is a Category Three storm at 72 hours before landfall that becomes a Category Four at 48 hours and a Category Five at 24 hours—coming from the worst direction," says Joe Suhayda, a retired coastal engineer at Louisiana State University who has spent 30 years studying the coast. Suhayda is sitting in a lakefront restaurant on an actual August afternoon sipping lemonade and talking about the chinks in the city's hurricane armor. "I don't think people realize how precarious we are," Suhayda says, watching sailboats glide by. "Our technology is great when it works. But when it fails, it's going to make things much worse."

The chances of such a storm hitting New Orleans in any given year are slight, but the danger is growing. Climatologists predict that powerful storms may occur more frequently this century, while rising sea level from global warming is putting low-lying coasts at greater risk. "It's not if it will happen," says University of New Orleans geologist Shea Penland. "It's when."


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If everyone would go to the http://magma.nationalgeographic.com/ngm/0410/index.html
and vote yes to the poll saying that yes the Federal gov. should kick in
money to help save the wetlands.

[Advertisement]

[Jolie Rouge]

Related Links

LAcoast
www.lacoast.gov
Maintained by the National Wetlands Research Center, this is an excellent site for articles, newsletters, and general background information on Louisiana's disappearing coastline and the restoration efforts to save it.


Save Louisiana Wetlands
www.savelawetlands.org
Find out more information about this program run by Louisiana's Department of Natural Resources.


Louisiana Coastal Area Ecosystem Restoration Plan
www.lca.gov
A comprehensive site that includes history and statistics on the coastal area, land change maps, and a link to the LCA draft plan.


National Wetlands Research Center
www.nwrc.usgs.gov
Read factsheets, news releases, and hot topics on Louisiana's coastline and wetlands in general, from this research center of the U.S. Geological Survey.

[Jolie Rouge]

Students turn swamp into classroom
Monday, January 31, 2005 Posted: 10:24 AM EST (1524 GMT)


Kristen Magee, of Houma, Louisiana, navigates a swamp at the Jean Lafitte National Historic Park and Preserve in Marrero, Louisiana.


NEW ORLEANS, Louisiana (AP) -- Fourteen-year-old Kristen Magee knows all too well about Louisiana's disappearing wetlands. Her family's fishing camp had lots of land around it five years ago. Now there's almost none.

This week, she and 11 other students will appear in daily live satellite broadcasts to teach 1.7 million students around the world about Louisiana's wetlands loss and related topics. Magee is a ninth-grader at Houma Junior High, an hour's drive from New Orleans. The others are from as far afield as New York, California and Mexico.

Their week in southern Louisiana is part of the Jason Project, an educational enterprise launched 16 years ago by oceanographer Robert D. Ballard. "Students need to know the scientific process. The best way is to put them right into the field with the field teams -- be assistants to our field scientists," he said.

One of the first things the students learned to do on the Louisiana expedition was walk through a swamp in waders -- something they need to do to take water samples and do other tasks during the next week. "I've been in hip-boots before. But waders are a lot different. A lot heavier," Magee said. And, although she'd been in a marsh, she'd never been in a swamp. The water and weeds hide a treacherous surface. "At one point you'd be on level ground; at another you'd just fall," she said.

Josh Blackwell, a ninth-grader at Bedford High near Cleveland, Ohio, said he fell many times. Thanks to the waders, he only got a bit muddy. And, he noted, the boots are thick enough to protect him from snake bites.


Outdoor classroom

This week they'll be in three teams, working with Louisiana scientists studying marsh restoration, frogs, nutria and oyster ecology. For the classes taking part in the Jason Project, the expedition culminates a year of study with Internet-based lesson plans for field "expeditions" on students' home ground and "digital labs" where students can catch animated frogs and tadpoles.

"We tend to cover the major sciences -- the chemistries, the biology, geology. We also like to bring in the social issues we're facing in the disappearance of the wetlands, and where we see it heading," Ballard said.

The five hourlong live broadcasts from will take place in Jean Lafitte National Park, the Louisiana Universities Marine Consortium's laboratory at Port Fourchon and its marine center in Cocodrie. Ballard said he got the idea from kids. After he discovered the wreckage of the Titanic in 1985, he said, he got a flood of letters from schoolchildren asking if they could go on his next expedition.

His Mediterranean expedition four years later was covered with live satellite broadcasts to 250,000 schoolchildren at 13 museums. About 33,000 teachers and their classes are currently involved, some as far away as Australia. He said that, as an oceanographer, he's known for a long time that Louisiana's wetlands are eroding, but became "acutely aware" of it after being named to the President's Commission for Ocean Policy three years ago.


http://www.cnn.com/2005/EDUCATION/01....ap/index.html

[Freebeemom]

Isn't this part of the evolutionary process? The earth is shifting, things will change. Personally, if this is funded and approved, then who is to pay when the project fails? Insurance rates for those who live there will be through the roof.

[Jolie Rouge]

Isn't this part of the evolutionary process? The earth is shifting, things will change. Personally, if this is funded and approved, then who is to pay when the project fails?

No, the federally funded projects have created the problem.

The river floods - brings down soil from the North to create a Delta. Rivers change courses, leaving behind fertils land for crops. Levees, dams, and other flood control projects channel all the flood waters directly into the Gulf. Erosion is eating away at the coastlands - we are lossing more than 2 football fields worth of land EVERY DAY. We have lost several of the Barrier islands in the last few years. Since the federally funded projects created the problems shouldn't they fix it now ?

Insurance rates for those who live there will be through the roof.

Not possiable to get insurance when your property is under the Gulf. Several companies simply will not insure in certain areas at all.

[Dragonfairie]

yes, the loss of the wetlands affect everyone and although it may have happened eventually - mans interference has increased the rate of "evolution".

[Jolie Rouge]

[b]Well, protecting New Orleans against the elements. It's never been easy. Marshlands have provided a natural barrier against hurricanes, but over the years many of those swampy areas have vanished. CNN's Rob Marciano has this "Best of CNN" report.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

ROB MARCIANO, CNN CORRESPONDENT, (voice over): The marshes around New Orleans are disappearing, slowly sinking into the Gulf of Mexico. The marshes are shallow waters that block a hurricane's surging waters as it comes ashore.

CHRIS PIEHLER, DEPT. OF ENVIRON. QUALITY: The marsh is really the first speed bump that the storms come through that slows down their energy and so they're not as strong by the time they get up to New Orleans.

MARCIANO: Chuck Velerubia (ph) has been monitoring the health of the marshes for Louisiana. Over the years, he's seen fewer and fewer of the big trees whose roots anchor other plants.

PIEHLER: We used to have cypress down here, which are no longer here in a lot of areas because of salt water intrusion.

MARCIANO: This is a diversion. A gated lock that helps move water from the Mississippi River into the marshes.

PIEHLER: They deposit sediment and nutrients out into these wetland areas.

MARCIANO: There are only two diversions in place along the lower Mississippi, but several more are planned. Velerubia says a bad situation got critical when Katrina bulldozed through the Louisiana marshes.

I'm standing in the marsh about 15 miles south of New Orleans. Before Katrina, we'd be waist high in healthy marsh grasses, but the storm ripped up those grasses leaving little more than mud flats and open water behind.

In other words, first the trees disappear and then, when the grasses are gone, there is little to keep the soil from washing out to sea. Imagine what the loss of the marshes means to the fishing industry here.

Pete Gerica is a Louisiana fisherman. He's worried about the fish and the crabs that make their homes in the marshes.

PETE GERICA, LOUISIANA FISHERMAN: And without that marsh being their protection to protect them from larger criters, you're not going to keep them.

MARCIANO: The marshes are a nursery. Shrimp, crabs and fish all rely on the wetlands to grow. Gerica knows that no marshes means no fishing.

GERICA: You look at this pass here and you can see where the birds are. They're standing. They're on land. This pass here, the shoreline, probably came out another hundred feet this way.

MARCIANO: Velerubia is also worried. He knows the next hurricane season is little more than four months away and worries if another big one comes there is little to stop its full force.

PIEHLER: Certainly this next season or two until the levees get put back together a little bit and some of the marsh comes back, this area will certainly be more vulnerable.

http://transcripts.cnn.com/TRANSCRIP...26/sun.02.html

[Jolie Rouge]

Carpe coast
Thursday, February 23, 2006

Louisiana has fought a lonely and losing battle to boost its share of offshore oil royalties, but the state might gain some new allies if oil and gas drilling expands in response to high energy costs.

Strategically, this is a critical moment for Louisiana, and the state's congressional delegation is wisely seizing it. Last week, Sen. Mary Landrieu, along with Sen. Trent Lott of Mississippi, threatened to withhold support of a bill to open up a new area in the northeastern Gulf of Mexico to drilling unless coastal, energy-producing states get a greater share of the royalties.

Rep. Bobby Jindal has filed a bill that he hopes will broaden support for revenue sharing. His measure lifts a federal moratorium on Outer Continental Shelf drilling by 2012. States would get control over what happens off their shores for the first 125 miles -- a provision that's designed to ease environmental concerns. They'd also get a generous share of offshore royalties: 75 percent for the first 12 nautical miles and 50 percent farther out.

The revenue sharing would be phased in over 15 years. Louisiana would get $600 million per year immediately; $1 billion annually by 2011 and $2.2 billion per year by 2022.

Rep. Jindal's bill would give states on the East and West coasts a stake in the revenue-sharing debate. He's also seeking inland support by giving those states a share of revenue from oil shale and tar sands mined within their boundaries.

Louisiana lawmakers aren't the only ones who are looking at this issue. A bill filed by Sen. John Warner of Virginia and Sen. Mark Pryor of Arkansas that would allow states to opt out of the drilling moratorium also provides a 50 percent share of royalties.

Louisiana has long sought a fair share of the wealth that's produced off our coast, and we have a strong case. Oil and gas exploration is one of the factors in this state's wetland loss, and we need a stable, sufficient stream of money for coastal restoration. This is the logical source.

Oil and gas activity has undeniably cost us, in terms of environmental damage and in terms of what the state has to spend to support that industry. Yet coastal, oil-producing states don't enjoy the same 50 percent share of revenue that inland states get for drilling done on federal lands within their boundaries.

Those arguments haven't convinced Congress to support a fair split. But making it worthwhile for other states might finally be the approach that will work. And now, while gasoline lines and high winter heating bills are fresh on people's minds, might at last be the right time.

http://www.nola.com/news/t-p/editori...8045495180.xml

[Jolie Rouge]

A timely alarm on eroded coast
Opinion page staff
Published: May 11, 2006

In the battle to fund coastal restoration for Louisiana, sympathetic national media coverage of the issue is one of the few things the state has going for it at the moment.

The total price tag for restoring the wetlands has been estimated at $14 billion — a cost so large that federal investment in the restoration is imperative.

But that’s been a tough sell in Washington, D.C., where Louisiana has little seniority in its congressional delegation, and the high cost of coastal restoration carries more than a little sticker shock on Capitol Hill.

Given the challenges, and the dire consequences of doing nothing, it helps when influential national media organs throw a spotlight on Louisiana’s ravaged coastline and make the case for strong action.

A heartening case in point was a recent New York Times editorial bemoaning the short shrift that Louisiana’s coastal restoration efforts are getting in Congress.

“Wetlands restoration has been pushed to the bottom of a very long post-hurricane priority list,” the Times lamented. “That may not be surprising, but it is a big mistake.”

The Times went on to say:

“Much of the wetlands-shrinking is due to a long line of bad decisions before the hurricane. Since the 1930s, Louisiana has lost wetlands equal to the size of Delaware. The Army Corps of Engineers built dams, levees and canals along the Mississippi River that held back or diverted much of the sediment that had naturally replenished the delta soil. Channels dug for shipping have allowed salt water to infiltrate and kill off vegetation. In effect, our tinkering starved the wetlands and barrier islands. That makes it all the more important to seize this moment, when the whole country’s attention is focused on making southern Louisiana more secure, and begin to undo the damage.”

Local supporters of coastal restoration have been sounding such an alarm for years. But it can’t hurt when the message gets national attention in America’s leading newspaper.

We hope that helps build some much-needed momentum for making Louisiana’s coast whole again.

http://www.2theadvocate.com/opinion/2782201.html

[Jolie Rouge]

Pecan Island recovering slowly
Some residents vow never to go; others won’t be back
By RICHARD BURGESS -- Acadiana bureau
Published: May 11, 2006

Pecan Island resident Neil Bourque saws lumber Wednesday as he builds a new house. Bourque's former home was swept off its foundation by Hurricane Rita in September. Bourque is taking on the home-construction task largely by himself.

PECAN ISLAND — Garland Winch can remember when Hurricane Audrey plowed through this tiny Vermilion Parish community in 1957.

The 74-year-old can also remember a time when groceries, mail and visitors came only on a boat that made the trip every day except Sunday.

He was born and raised in a house next to his own, and despite Hurricane Rita or the prospect of another storm, he has faith that Pecan Island will survive. “They said after Hurricane Audrey it would never be the same, but it came back and got better,” Winch said. “It’ll come back. Just give it time.”

Pecan Island rests on a ridge that pushes out of the marsh about 6 miles from the Gulf of Mexico. When Hurricane Rita struck southwestern Louisiana on Sept. 23-24, the storm pushed an estimated 10-foot surge of water over this community, twisting mobile homes around trees and tossing houses off their foundations into the marsh.

Winch said he was lucky. His home is still standing, and he was able to return about a month after Rita.

Most residents were not as fortunate, and only a fraction of the homes are livable.

Some houses have been demolished or await demolition. Others remain in the marsh where Rita left them.

Only one of the two stores in town has reopened, and the Vermilion Parish School Board closed the Pecan Island School earlier this year, less because of damage than because of the small student population — about 50 before the storm and fewer afterward.

But there are signs of life.

Residents have come together to clean the community graveyard and fix up the churches.

A mobile home has been brought in to replace the community’s only lounge, the Coastal Bar.

Travel trailers are slowly beginning to fill lots while residents work to rebuild, most choosing to elevate their new homes several feet off the ground.

Neil Bourque worked Wednesday to finish up the walk-around deck on what he hopes to call home by next year. The large creosote poles he set to support the new home rise 7 feet. “I was 20 years younger when I built the other one. This one is harder,” said Bourque, 49, an oilfield electronics technician.

Bourque is building 4 miles down the road from his first home, which remains pushed up against a tree that stopped the home from washing into the marsh. He had hoped to hire the construction job out, but considering the price and the wait for good carpenters in the wake of the hurricanes, he opted to do the work himself with the help of family. He and his wife are living with his father-in-law, Winch, until the new house is ready.

Bourque estimated that more than half of the community will eventually return. “A lot of people said they weren’t coming back,” he said.

The younger generation, those with children, may not want to return to an area where the nearest school is more than 20 miles away. Bourque said many of the young people most likely would have left anyway. “They didn’t want to be here before the storm. They want to go to Wal-Mart every minute,” Bourque said. “… I like the peace and quiet.”

Some residents are choosing to sell their land for what appears to be an increasing number of hunting camps taking shape in the area, for its waterfowl. “You can’t find property for sale,” Winch said. “There are probably as many camps as residents.”

Betty Broussard said she can’t conceive of coming back after the storm. “I lost my home, like many others,” she said, sitting at a table in the only store open in Pecan Island — The Pecan Island Food Store.

Broussard once worked there as a rural postal clerk. At 69, she is starting over, living with her daughter in Lafayette while waiting for a rent house in Abbeville. Broussard, who had made the trip back to Pecan Island on Wednesday to buy some shrimp and visit, said “city life” in Lafayette leaves much to be desired. “It’s not like here,” she said.

Despite her love for the area, Broussard said, she has trouble even visiting a community that remains tattered. “I’m 69 years old, and I’m sure not coming back,” she said.


http://www.2theadvocate.com/news/2782731.html

[Jolie Rouge]

Governor Seeks Oil Revenue For Louisiana
Blanco Threatens to Block Federal Auction Of Offshore Leases if Proceeds Aren't Shared
By CHRISTOPHER COOPER
June 5, 2006; Page A4

WASHINGTON -- Federal officials want to open part of the Gulf of Mexico to oil drilling this summer. But their plans are being complicated by Louisiana Gov. Kathleen Blanco, who says she'll try to derail the effort unless Washington shares the proceeds with her state.

Gov. Blanco is bucking an industry she generally has favored, and risks the ire of Washington, which is providing billions of dollars in reconstruction money to her storm-racked state. Even so, she says she will try to block the August auction of offshore oil properties in the western Gulf unless the federal government agrees to help restore the state's wetlands, which scientists say are disappearing at an alarming rate.

These scientists say decades of oil exploration have taken a toll on Louisiana's marshes, which are seen as the most effective way to combat storm surges that accompany hurricanes, such as those of Katrina and Rita, which hit the state last year. It is a problem Congress began addressing last year, when it agreed to provide some $500 million in restoration money. But with federal estimates projecting the state will need as much as $16 billion to restore the Bayou state's marshes and swamps, Ms. Blanco wants a sustained stream of money to address the problem.

Unlike onshore oil drilling, in which the federal government shares royalties from leased lands through a 50-50 split with the state, Washington has never shared the proceeds from the biggest offshore properties it leases to energy companies. Ms. Blanco aims to change this. "All we want is what the interior states get," said Blanco spokeswoman Denise Bottcher, who says Gov. Blanco risks angering Congress and the Bush administration just as Capitol Hill is debating the merits of providing several billion dollars in reconstruction money to the state.

"I think where they could be vindictive is on the levee money," Ms. Bottcher said. "But you can't build levees to protect New Orleans if the coast isn't there."


It is unclear whether Ms. Blanco can force the cancellation of the August lease sale, but she may be able to delay it, since she can file an objection with the Interior Department. If the department rejects her complaint, Ms. Blanco can appeal to the Commerce secretary. If the Commerce secretary overrides her, Ms. Blanco has hired a Washington lawyer and threatened a suit. Because that suit would be heard in federal court in New Orleans, a venue presumably sympathetic to her case, some industry officials say Ms. Blanco's threat could delay or force the cancellation of two oil lease sales in the northern Gulf of Mexico, one in August and one scheduled for next spring.

The western and central Gulf is one of the few areas off the continental U.S. where drilling is allowed, and accounts for about 30% of the nation's domestic oil production. Auctions of these properties generally are held twice a year.

"Some might see this as an idle threat," Ms. Blanco told a group of activists in New Orleans last week. "They shouldn't. For decades, Louisiana has made its case. We have asked for a reasonable share of outer continental shelf revenues. And we were snubbed."

The proceeds from offshore oil auctions in the Gulf are significant: With oil prices at historical highs, an auction of offshore oil tracts off Louisiana in March fetched nearly $1 billion in bids from a variety of integrated and independent exploration companies. Though the properties in the proposed August action aren't thought to contain as much oil or natural gas as those in the prior sale, the Interior Department -- which supervises the process -- expects the auction to generate spirited bidding.

It is not unusual for governors to block offshore drilling. Florida has battled Washington in recent years to ban such activity, arguing that the potential for spills vastly outweighs the economic benefit.

Though the Louisiana congressional delegation supports Ms. Blanco's decision to challenge Washington for a share of the offshore lease proceeds, the strategy troubles some members. The Bush administration endorsed a $4 billion proposal to improve the levee system around New Orleans, but it is included in a supplemental spending bill languishing on Capitol Hill. With enthusiasm for Gulf Coast reconstruction waning in some quarters, congressmen such as Bobby Jindal, a Republican who represents a slice of suburban New Orleans, fret that payback could be in the offing if Ms. Blanco follows through on her threat. Mr. Jindal and Mary Landrieu, the state's senior senator, have sponsored bills that would force the federal government to share offshore oil lease proceeds.

Mr. Jindal supports Ms. Blanco's goal of forcing the federal government to share the proceeds but avoided endorsing her legal strategy, saying he would rather "make it moot" by winning passage of his bill. Mr. Jindal says he has been told by the House leadership that his bill will get a hearing this month.

Last week, Ms. Blanco formally complained that the proposed sale conflicts with Louisiana's coastal-management plan. Her attorney, William Szabo, said he assumes the Interior Department's Minerals Management Service will overrule the governor, after which the Commerce secretary will determine whether her objection has merit. If Commerce overrules her, Mr. Szabo said he intends to file suit against the Minerals Management Service in New Orleans, to block the sale.

A spokesman for the Interior Department said it is considering its response to Ms. Blanco's objections.

The oil industry opposes the governor's move. Larry Wall, a spokesman for the Mid-Continent Oil and Gas Association, which represents a number of potential bidders for the offshore tracts, says Gov. Blanco is spiting herself by opposing the sale.

He points out that the state gets revenue, indirectly, from the leases, through a severance tax on oil and gas production when the properties are developed. "If she blocks the lease sale, she's going to block revenue sharing," Mr. Wall said. He said that while the association doesn't object to a revenue share from federal auctions, he fails to see the urgency. "We have paid the state billions in royalties and severance taxes over the years, and none of that has been set aside for coastal restoration," Mr. Wall said. "This is not a new problem."

http://online.wsj.com/public/article...html?mod=blogs



Several point to make :

Why do they continually refer to her as Ms. Blanco - a subtle disrespect - the title they should be using here is Gov. Blanco....

CA and FL recieve 75% of their offshore leases - if we received a more equidable portion then we might not need as much Federal Funding - but that also means the the Feds would not have CONTROL of the monies - and we are talking A LOT of money.

If the Feds had allotted more to preserving the Wetlands as we have been begging for YEARS - then we might not have the level of damages from Katrina and Rita. Every mile of Wetlands decreases a foot of a hurricane's storm surge. The Barrier Islands have that title for a reason.