CORPS TO CONGRESS: CLOSE THE COASTAL CANCER

Yes, that's right, the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers bucked pressure from the shipping industry and picked a complete closure of the MR-GO at the La Loutre Ridge as the preferred option for their mandatory December report to Congress. As it's Congress which holds the purse strings for federal navigation projects, that's a critical step. As much as the GRN has maligned the Corps for past failures, we agree with this morning's NOLA Times-Picayune editorial that this is a relief. A big thank you to the MRGO Must Go coalition and the 5,000+ folks who sent e-mails to Congress demanding this step last year - apparently they listened!

Unfortunately, left out of the plan is any attempt to address the 27,000 acres of lost wetlands and cypress swamp (read: critical natural flood protection) that MR-GO has killed. In addition, the Corps plan is consistant in forwarding the Corps belief that MR-GO did non contribute to the storm surge that destroyed much of St. Bernard Parish and New Orleans in Katrina's wake. Their plan may not effectively stop future hurricane-related surge. These elements will need to be addressed by the Corps' LACPR (Louisiana Coastal Protection and Restoration project) that is a few steps behind the Congressionally-mandated MR-GO closure plan.

Hmm, so what did we get? We got another step along in the journey to secure our coast and communities. It's not a quick trip, but we'll be watching the Corps every step of the way.


Aaron Viles is the GRN's Campaign Director

LOUISIANA'S COASTAL CRISIS HITS YAHOO NEWS

Last October, Yahoo's Assignment Earth headed down to NOLA to get the story about Louisiana's coast- the problem, the solutions, and a sense of the urgency.

I worked with producer Peter White to get the story, which has finally shown up!

It has some great interviews with University of New Orleans Coastal Geology expert Shea Penland, Tulane University's Enviro Law Guru Oliver Houck (check out his provacative "Can We Save New Orleans?" treatise here), and a really cool flyover of the MRGO piloted by the Lake Pontchartrain Basin Foundation's Executive Director Carlton Dufrechou (if you look carefully you'll see a telling shot of degraded wetlands with the telling 'wheel spoke' impressions left behind from dragging cypress trees through the marsh as they logged out these critical natural storm defenses).

It also features interviews with Louisiana's official point people on our restoration efforts - Sidney Coffee and Randy Hanchey. Sidney, who as Chair of the Coastal Protection & Restoration Authority (CPRA) recently delivered to the State the draft Integrated Ecosystem Restoration and Hurricane Protection - Louisiana's Comprehensive Master Plan for a Sustainable Coast. Hearings on this document and plan are this week - scroll down for a post with the dates and times - I'll be heading out to UNO tonight to offer my $.02, and hear what others have to say.

Hopefully, news pieces such as this Yahoo video will help tell the nation what's occuring on our coast, and how critical grassroots support for this fix is.


Aaron Viles is the GRN's Campaign Director

DEFENDING OUR NATURAL DEFENSES

Big developments this week around the planning and actions needed for coastal restoration and hurricane protection for South Louisiana. I attended a meeting of the Coastal Protection and Restoration Authority (CPRA) up in Baton Rouge on Tuesday, where the draft Integrated Ecosystem Restoration and Hurricane Protection - Louisiana's Comprehensive Master Plan for a Sustainable Coast was unveiled.

Jon Porterhouse from the state's Integrated Planning Team presented to the Authority and highlighted elements of the plan, such as the need for closure of the Mississippi River Gulf Outlet (MRGO) above all else, but while reserving opportunities for a functioning shallow-draft transportation system. Sounds like the state has been leaned on to support fast-tracking the inner harbor navigation canal (IHNC 0r industrial canal) lock replacement project, holding St. Bernard and our natural defenses hostage until that questionable expansion is finished. Shipping interests claim that they desperately need the old lock replaced and expanded in order to stop using the MRGO as an alternative route when the lock is broken.

This flies in the face of the information I recieved last night from the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers at a meeting of the Lake Pontchartrain Basin Foundation's board. The Corps that states that since 2001, the industrial canal lock has only been closed 4 times for a period of one day or longer. While no one likes to see our shallow-draft shipping industry impeded - 4 times in 5 years doesn't sound like a terribly onerous track record. On top of that, the Corps interim report to Congress on the MRGO deauthorization states that the economic benefits of maintaining shall0w-draft navigation on the MRGO don't outweigh the ECONOMIC costs, let alone the environmental costs. To make New Orleans and St. Bernard safe as soon as possible, and provide the necessary confidence to those considering rebuilding, this coastal cancer needs to be closed now, starting with the earthen plug at Bayou La Loutre and progress must not be held hostage by narrow, self-centered economic interests.

The other aspect of the State's Draft Master Plan that jumped out at me during the CPRA meeting was the utter absence of discussion about putting so much of our restoration & protection hopes on the relatively untested idea of 'leaky levees.' During the discussion of the Draft Plan by the CPRA, folks like Secretary Angelle from the Departement of Natural Resources, and King Milling of the Governor's Coastal Advisory Board talked a lot about the 'tough choices' we're going to need to make to enact this plan.

I really hope the CPRA looks at Appendix C to the plan, which includes the significant scientific questions that remain about these possible cross-basin 'leaky levees.' So while yes, the state, its citizens and the CPRA will need to make tough choices - let's make sure these are informed choices. If we don't fully understand the ramifications of impounding some of our most critical fisheries nurseries before we develop & construct these structures, 'adaptive management' won't put the genie back in the bottle.

Aaron Viles is the GRN's Campaign Director

MRGO MUST GO - BUT WILL IT? (II)

Their ad:

http://healthygulf.org/images/MRGO2.jpg


Our ad:

http://healthygulf.org/images/MRGO_cheat.JPG

So the Corps rolled out their closure 'study' yesterday in New Orleans. At a pre-rollout, stakeholder meeting earlier in the week, the Corps let us know that we'll see the same range of 'closure' options that have already been discussed (gate/closure at LaLoutre ridge, Gate at Seabrook on the Lake Pontchartrain/Inner Harbor Navigation Canal, gate on Intracoastal Waterway, another gate no MRGO).

There will be no recommendations as to which options the Corps supports, because that terrifies the Corps that they may be ahead of the National Environmental Policy Act (NEPA). The Corps gets sued over NEPA frequently, so I can understand their concerns.

The concern I continue to hold is that the absence of an actual plan flies in the face of what Congress requested. They asked for a plan that at a minimum, closed the MRGO to deep draft navigation. Congress is not going to get what they asked for. Citizens are not going to get what they have demanded - which is to be kept safe from the MRGO as soon as possible. We need action now, we need a plan now, and we need that plan to move forward ASAP. Until the MRGO n0 longer threatens our city, any rebuilding is a gamble.

At the last stakeholder meeting I learned two interesting things:
1) MRGO creates a dead zone in Lake Pontchartrain which is keeping benthic organisms like clams from growing in the robust numbers necessary to truly clear and clean up the Lake.
2) Shipping interests continue to push for deep-draft navigation in the MRGO.

Sigh.


Aaron Viles is GRN's Campaign Director

MRGO MUST GO - BUT WILL IT?

I just got back from the second MRGO Stakeholders meeting, arranged by the Army Corps of Engineers, supposedly to help them develop their 'closure' plan that needs to be delivered to Congress in December. This meeting featured the presentation of four different closure plans developed by non-Corps interests, to an audience of 'stakeholders' which was was teeming with shipping interests, and Corps reps from three different districts.

Stakeholders presentations came from:
Bring New Orleans Back, Biloxi Marsh Lands Corporation, Lake Pontchartrain Basin Foundation, and St. Bernard Parish.

Bring New Orleans Back (I thought the BNOB planning process utterly fell apart in the absence of Hizonner's support for what they were doing - what the heck are these guys doing presenting?)
At any rate, they did get to present their plan, which started by Billy Marchal laying out his bonafides, in the form of his and the plan committee's absence of financial ties to shipping and the MRGO. He immediately launched into a description of what the Corps planning process is currently up to and the 4 options they are looking at. This of course begs the question as to why the Corps wasn't presenting on their plan alternatives, but at any rate:
1 - no new structures, just raise existing levees and storm walls
2 - Structure at seabrook & Paris road
3 - MRGO Structure & rerout GIWW across lake borne
4- 2 gates 1 east of Michoud on iww, 1 on MRGO.

Option four seems to have the most support and interest at this point, at least in the eyes of the BNOB. Of course, none of the other 'stakeholders' have seen the plans, so remind me what we're doing here again?

Billy then laid out that the principles that the BNOB feels must drive their plan selection: plan must 1) protect people & property, 2) protect and enhance the environment,3) and allow commerce consistent w/ 1 & 2. After that point, it seemed like the rest of his presentation was rationalizations for point 3.

Billy made the point that the MRGO wasn't actually a 'Hurricane Highway' and that while the MRGO indeed destroyed wetlands, that's all about saltwater intrusion, and anyway, all the marsh in the area was underwater before the big storm surge came through the area anyway, so it wouldn't have been of much help to protect people or property. As to point 2, Billy suggests: We can stop saltwater intrusion via weir at La Loutre ridge - reintroduce fresh water via violet diversion or increase canarvon - or use MRGO Locks to reintroduce fresh water through MRGO.

With that all taken care of, BNOB suggests we can reauthorize a narrower, shallower chanel (no inland dredging would be necessary) also armor banks, slow down boats, install configurable depth weir or sector gate at LaLoutre - to let 28 foot draft through. Cost - less than $100 million over cost of a weir of 14'x125' dimensions. BNOB figures the sector gate configuration saves $75-300 million in relocation funds. So the clear winner in the eyes of the BNOB is to keep the thing open to deep draft.

Biloxi Marsh Land Corporation -
largest land owner in Biloxi Marsh been hustling to get CWPRRA $, other resources to protect the land. Their MRGO plan really had nothing to do with closing MRGO and everything to do with restoring Biloxi Marsh Lands. Understand there are three lines of defense out there: chandleur is, biloxi marsh, land bridge. Wants to use MRGO for freshwater conveyance. Don't care about MRGO depth, they'll leave that to the experts. Well, at least they were honest and stayed within their alocated time.

Lake Pontchartrain Basin Foundation -
John Lopez presented on the Lake Foundation's Lines of Defense plan, and the components that apply to the MRGO. He began by pointing out the three reaches of the MRGO:
1) Innerharbor Navigation Canal to the Intracoastal Waterway -This reach is the storm surge delivery system- At this point John vehamently disagreed w/ BNOB's assertion that MRGO played no role in flooding New Orleans, and that this 1st reach is indeed a hurricane highway.
2) Intracoastal Waterway to the LaLoutre ridge - the reach that killed the marsh
3) LaLoutre ridge to the Gulf - the reach that costs so much to repeatedly dredge.

Take a look at the link above to see the full depth of the plan. It's well thought out, and critically important to the region. John also underscored that while the LPBF initially supports a 125' x 14' dimension and weir, they will only support that if it is proven to be a safe alternative through modelling, and will effectively block storm surge.

St.Bernard Parish -
St. Bernard President Junior Rodriguez in his singular way then presented the St. Barnard plan, while basically telling the shipping interests in the audience that they killed his Parish. Junior is pushing for a total closure at LaLoutre. He's opposing the Seabrook & Chef Pass closures. He supports an Industrial Canal closure at Lake Pontchartrain - just like they're currently doing for the 17th St. Canal - if it's good for the rich folk, Junior sez, it's good for the poor folk. Junior and the Parish also support a levee along golden triangle, an increase 40 Arpent levee to 15', and a Violet fresh water diversion. It all hinges on the plug at LaLoutre - no plug, freshwater will take the straight-shot out to the Gulf - weir or no.

Also, stirring the pot, Junior supports a Mississippi River floodgate at Bohemia for hurricane storm-surge. If we don't build something along those lines, the water that used to go into Lake Pontchartrain will go up the river. He pointed out that the Carrollton gauge went from +4' three days before the storm to 12'+ the day of Katrina - just imagine how high that water would have been without the pooling of Lake Borne and Lake Pontchartrain - all of a sudden, the dry sliver by the river, would be some of the most inundated area in the city.

At this point the meeting basically went into 'fight for your interest' mode, with the shipping folks raising holy hell to defend shallow-draft use of the MRGO. They're also going to do their damndest to marry the industrial canal lock expansion to MRGO closure. Need to make sure powerplants in AL & FL panhandle get their coal (turns out this is one of the largest tonnage uses of the intercoastal waterway - moving coal from Ohio to Alabama and Florida to give our fish mercury and increase green house gas emissions - great, we certainly wouldn't want to stand in the way of this important commerce).

Oh, and the Corps spelled out that the 'closure' plan they present to Congress won't actually include a closure plan so much as a range of options! Great, what were we doing at these meetings again? I'd direct the Corps back to the legislation that Congress passed forcing us to all go down this road:

Public Law 109-234 (enacted June 15, 2006) provides $3.3 million for the Corps to "develop a comprehensive plan, at full Federal expense, to deauthorize deep draft navigation on the Mississippi River-Gulf Outlet, Louisiana, extending from the Gulf of Mexico to the Gulf Intracoastal Waterway ..." The accompanying report (H.Rept. 109-494, page 113) provides, in pertinent part:

"Funds totaling $3,300,000 are provided for the Corps to develop a comprehensive plan, at full Federal expense, to deauthorize deep draft navigation on the Mississippi River-Gulf Outlet, Louisiana. The plan shall include recommended modifications to the existing authorized current use of the Outlet, including what navigation functions, if any, should be maintained and any measures for hurricane and storm protection. The plan shall be developed in consultation with St. Bernard Parish, the State of Louisiana, and affected Federal Agencies. An interim report summarizing the plan shall be forwarded to the appropriate House and Senate authorizing and appropriations committees within six months of enactment of this Act and final recommendations shall be integrated into the Louisiana Coastal Protection and Restoration Plan, due to Congress in December 2007."

Heaven help us if we can't get this right.

Aaron Viles is the GRN's Campaign Director

LOUISIANA'S COASTAL PROTECTION AND RESTORATION AUTHORITY (CPRA) STATE BODY NEEDS CPR FOR SIGNS OF LIFE

The CPRA is the state's official partner for the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers' Louisiana Coastal Protection and Restoration Project (LACPR) See that, CPRA & LACPR? - Highly interchangeble, easy to get them confused, of course, you probably wouldn't confuse the different meetings of the two projects. CPRA meetings continue to be a bunch of politicos and state agency heads recieving reports and doing precious little. Check out an earlier post on an earlier meeting here.

I attended last week's meeting up at the Capitol in Baton Rouge. As with earlier meetings, the Corps reported on the status of levee projects and coastal projects. Dan Hitchings, the civilian head of the projects presented on a range of topics, including the preliminary technical report (which so enraged Louisiana politicians by the DC edits which removed 5 specific project recommendations). Hitchings pointed out that the report does include the Gov's letter protesting the removal of the 5 projects, which means the projects were listed in the document in a fashion. Now that's spin!

He also pointed out that the report includes a risk-based decision making framework for moving forward with the project. This is a significant departure from the standard Corps cost/benefit analysis which takes into consideration assets at risk, looks at storms and their recurrence, will look at structural & non-structural & restoration measures. This is a huge boon to protecting coastal Louisiana and turns the usual Corps decision-making on it's head. If the question isn't 'how much will the project cost?,' but instead, 'how much does it cost us if we don't do the project?' Louisiana suddenly becomes much more of a priority.

How will this departure influence other future and on-going national projects? Will this matrix make the cut when the project actually is recommended to Congress? For that to happen, backers will need to develop and wield national support & consensus to make sure this risk-based decision making moves forward.

GREAT WALL OF LOUISIANA
As to the protection development that the Corps is working on, Hitchings mentioned that the Corps has modeled one big cat 5 storm and put it through state on 10 different tracks to test 5 different levee alignments - He stressed that these are just 'typical' alignments, not suggested alignments - whatever that means? See the alignments here. They certainly didn't look at different coastal rebuilding scenerios!? His take was that this modeling shows coastal features dampen impacts, but not they haven't quantified it. The modeling shows that the Greater New Orleans area still vulnerable to Category 5 storms and that any effective strategy must include multiple lines of defense, and that construction techniques affect structural sustainability. Now, how do you factor in the effect of either killing off or developing all the wetlands on the back side of the Great Wall?

One other sticking point in his presentation is the failure to acknowledge the fact that Congress directed the Corps to develop a closure plan for the MRGO.

Inundation maps were developed looking at high rainfalls open and closed gates. current and projected pumping capacities. 17th st canal is still deficient. Maps with depths were released at the end of the meeting. Closed gates add a foot or two to the flooding. The State's Homeland security points out we could see 6 feet of flooding in the New Orleans bowl.

The Hitchings presention was the best opportunity for the CPRA to call the Corp on the carpet and really press on timelines, engineering problems, or any other challenges the region faces that the Corps is charged with fixing. Do we see any spine or fire from the CPRA? Predictably Plaquemines Parish President Benny Roussel got on Hitchings about Plaquimines pumping stations and their hurricane protection system cost and inclusion. Wendell Curole from Lafourche Parish asked about the Corps budget for South Louisiana generally. Hitchings thinks the funding levels will remain the same which means continued project backlog, which makes the case for aggressively supporting efforts to secure distinct, non-Corps budget, federal resources. Randy Roach, the Mayor of Lake Charles was able to ask a number of questions about the federal commitment to his area as well.

Deparment of Transportation and Development Secretary Bradberry noted that the Corps has been accused of being one dimensional (structures only) and from his perspective the models will only be acceptable when they're two dimensional). While I completely agree with Secretary Bradberry, there wasn't a ton of tough questions fired at the Corps, which is disappointing.
More disappointing is the continued absence of New Orleans voices on this panel, the preeminent Corps accountability vehicle this side of DC and being elected chair of the Appropriations Committee. Where is City Council President Oliver Thomas, or the head of NOLA's Sewerage and Water Board, or an effective representative from the Mayor's Office (I kid)?

I fear that without that NOLA voice we'll continue to see few tough questions and few real answers from the Corps about the real state of New Orleans' flood and hurricane protection.

Aaron Viles is the GRN's Campaign Director

ARMY CORPS GETS A LITTLE REFORM

So this is big. Not as big as the levee failures that primed the pumps, or the Isreal-Hezbolah conflict that kept the issue off the front page of most papers, but when it comes to helping protect people, property and the very fate of cities from Sacramento, California to Belle Glade, Florida, the decision by our Senate this week to require independent review of U.S. Army Corps of Engineers projects, the news can't get much bigger.

It’s too bad that our own Senator Vitter, Louisiana's leader who has spent the most time lambasting the Corps, chose to support sham reform instead of the fundamental paradigm shift that independent review offers. Check out the roll-call vote on independent review here.

Thankfully, Senator Landrieu stood firm and supported both reform measures offered by Sens McCain and Feingold. Sadly, their prioritization measure failed, leaving the appropriation of Corps project funds in the politically motivated hands of key members of Congress. This guarantees that life-saving levees will have to compete with economically questionable projects like the industrial canal locks expansion for scarce funds. Hint, even Louisiana's own politicos consistently pushed for big 'economic development' projects backed by the Port of New Orleans and other shipping interests instead of making the levees whole. See the roll-call vote on Corps projects prioritization here.

Big step forward for MRGO closure as well, with money and loans totaling $375 million for business relocation assistance, making it far easier to get the channel completely shut. The bill also authorizes $1.1 b for projects developed through the Corps Louisiana Coastal Area (LCA) study. That's a significant chunk of change, and should be incredibly valuable in the critical effort to shift the plumbing of our coast and the Mississippi River to slow and reverse the loss of our wetlands - of course, all the projects that the money is supposed to go to were all developed pre-K, and are wholey inadequate to deal with far-larger scope of the problem we now face. These projects could be expanded or tweaked in conference, but that's going to take leadership.

The big question now is what will survive a conference committee, and whether the winds of change will be able to penetrate the closed-door, backroom dealing that’s sure to follow this bill.

If independent review doesn’t make it through, be ready to flood Washington with outrage, because they will have guaranteed that more communities will see floods like ours.

Aaron Viles is the GRN's Campaign Director

CORPS TO CONGRESS: COAST IS IMPORTANT, BUT NOT SO IMPORTANT YOU HAVE TO DO ANYTHING RIGHT NOW

Alright, that's probably not a fair headline, but after all the buildup to this Louisiana Coastal Protection and Restoration interim technical report, you'll forgive Louisiana coastal residents for expecting to see a little more meat, and a little less hemming and hawing.

This is the report from the Corps of Engineers to Congress, laying out the options available to get Southern Louisiana Category 5 protection - to avoid ever seeing anything similar to Katrina play out again.

While some of the more coastally engaged national environmental groups immediately leapt upon the Corps and the Administration for some of the levee alignments laid out in one of the multiple appendices, the executive summary certainly sings the praises of our natural barriers and buffers that GRN has urged the protection and enhancement of - barrier islands, coastal marsh, forested estuaries and ridges. That's a relief. But is the Corps comfortable enough with those systems and features to avoid their inherent tendancy to build big structures, dredge big channels, and permit wetlands development? That's the $30 billion question.

The report response highlights the critical importance this federal flood-control effort represents to Louisiana, and the very future of the state's primary economic engine, New Orleans. Both Senators and the Governor commented on the plan immediately:

Sen. David Vitter, R-La., called it"nothing more than another slap in the face of Louisiana"and said the Army"decided to gut the report and remove all substance."

Sen. Mary Landrieu, D-La., said she would demand congressional hearings to investigate omission of the five recommendations."Levee and flood control is a life-or-death situation for the people of coastal Louisiana,"she said."So it is very disappointing that this report fails to do what Congress mandated."

I attended a briefing of the House Science Committee last week at which the Governor's folks accused the Administration of pulling out all the specific recommendations that had been included in a previous draft. Seems like those fears have been borne out, and with them we see less urgency and more delay in dealing with MRGO closure, and a few other specific projects.

The bottom line is that the state of our coast is in shambles and we need action sooner, rather than later to deal with it. Every month that passes without a funded plan in place makes it that much more likely that the Katrina tragedy fades from the collective consciousness, and with it, the nation's resolve to fix what the nation's hunger for oil & gas and shipping routes to the midwest hath wrought.

Aaron Viles is the GRN's Campaign Director

WETLAND LOSS ON TWO FRONTS

A couple of weeks ago, I was given the opportunity to hop in a five-passenger seaplane and fly over some of the hurricane ravaged coast of southeastern Louisiana, including the devastated Lower 9^th Ward of New Orleans, disturbed wetlands, hard-hit fishing communities, and the ever-widening MRGO. Now, as y’all have hopefully heard, congress has de-authorized the Mississippi River Gulf Outlet (MRGO) as a deep-draft navigation channel. Now a plan has to be developed to effectively close it. So, during this flyover, I was given visual conformation that this plan is extremely necessary…I was amazed to see how wide the MRGO really was. Originally MRGO was dug to be 650 feet wide, but due to wave action and erosion, it spreads out to over 2000 feet wide. This widening has increased salt water intrusion that has subsequently contributed to the destruction of our coastal wetlands. I have heard this statistic before, but when I saw where the banks of the MRGO were completely eroded away, allowing the salty ocean water from Lake Borgne to pour in, I was flabbergasted.


In order to start rebuilding the wetlands of southeastern Louisiana we need to first make sure that no more wetlands are needlessly destroyed. This destruction can come from saltwater intrusion or from newly permitted development. A prime example of destructive development came across my desk a week ago. Apparently Newport Environmental Services is requesting a permit to destroy over 200 acres of wetlands right where the MRGO and Intracoastal Water Way meet…in order to dig a landfill! While I acknowledge that there is a lot of debris in the New Orleans metro area that needs to go somewhere, destroying wetlands that could buffer neighboring communities from flooding from storms and subsequent surges is ludicrous.

So as we bask in the victory of the de-authorization of the MRGO, we must remain vigilant to make sure that the closing of the canal is done in a way that best protects our coast and communities. Our congressional victory is a good step, but we must go further and prevent projects that will continue wetland destruction and the further erosion of our coastal resources.

Matt Rota is GRN's Assistant Director of the Water Resources Program

TWO HUGE WINS AND A LITTLE DISAPPOINTMENT

I tell ya, sometimes the stars line up in a big smiley face... The great news is that ConocoPhillips withdrew their proposal for their fish-killing open-loop LNG terminal off Dauphin Island, AL in the face of Governor Riley'’s unwavering opposition. Read the article here. We owe the Governor a big debt of gratitude for his willingness to stand toe-to-toe with Conoco and say "do better and protect the Gulf's fish." Tell him thanks here.

The other huge win was shutting down the MRGO - the hurricane highway. The House-Senate conference committee, due to Senator Mary Landrieu's leadership, included language deauthorizing the MRGO as a deep-draft navigation channel, and directing the Corps of Engineers to develop a plan to close this wetlands-destroying, public-safety nightmare. Clearly, the details of that plan are going to be critical, as there will be a lot of pressure to keep it as navigable as possible to appease the Port of New Orleans and other shipping interests.

I'm hopeful that this marks a new day for our political leaders, indicating a commitment to restoring wetlands and protecting people through our natural barriers, even if it means bucking the status quo and the knee-jerk, short-term concerns of corporate interests. Read the AP article on the issue here. Thank Louisiana's Senators here.

The one disappointment was the decision by the Federal 5th Circuit Court of Appeals on our challenge to Shell's LNG terminal permit. You can read the ruling here.

We a’re disappointed, but we know the writing is on the wall for future open-loop LNG terminals in the Gulf, and will continue to appeal to Shell to abandon their flawed proposal, and close-the loop on Gulf Landing. On the whole, the continuing opposition to open-loop LNG by Gulf Governors is far more important than the 5th Circuit’s denial of our appeal, and the pressure is on future off-shore terminals to only move forward in the permitting process if they're serious about closed-loop options.

That said, TORP technology will be holding scoping hearings for their terminal next week in Mobile. The TORP terminal will be 63 miles south of Mobile, in the Gulf and is yet another open-loop proposal! Please make plans to come out June 14th and point out the error of TORP'’s ways. Here'’s the low-down from the Federal Register.

I think we've drawn the line in the sand, but the pressure is on to defend it. TORP provides an important opportunity, but we need to tell Shell about the Conoco decision, and urge Shell to mend their flawed proposal, lawsuit or no. Take action to thank Governor Riley and urge Shell to follow his lead here.

For our fish and our future,

Aaron

Aaron Viles is the GRN's Campaign Director

Walking on egg shells

Yesterday was the day that shell-shocked Gulf Coast residents have been eyeing with growing trepidation for the past few weeks... (no, not Ray Nagin's inaguration) the commencement of hurricane season, 2006.

The GRN spent the week working with the Sierra Club around the Gulf to urge the public and politicians to wake up to the critical layers of protection nature provides – from barrier islands to natural flooding cycles – and what hurricanes of the past have taught us about the consequences of compromising and undermining natural systems.

Bruce Hamilton, the Club's national conservation director came down to the third coast to help us roll out our joint report, The School of Big Storms: The High Cost of Compromising Our Natural Defenses and the Benefits of Protecting Them. The report shows that if we allow the continued destruction of our natural barriers, such as coastal wetlands and barrier islands, then we take away nature’s ability to protect us by reducing the strength and impact of hurricanes.

The School of Big Storms provides a lesson from each Gulf state: Houston's floodplain redevelopment plan, the MRGO in Louisiana, the Mississippi barrier islands, coastal development setbacks in Alabama due to the protection of habitat for the Alabama beach mouse, the need to apply hurricane building codes uniformly in Florida, and a Gulf of Mexico lesson that our oil and gas infrastructure needs to be out of harm's way or if immobile, strengthened to withstand cat 5 storms.

We released the report in Mississippi by renting a plane and flying over the barrier islands, providing a great view of the problem to the media. Similarly in Louisiana, we enlisted our MRGOMustGo.org coalition partner, Carlton Dufrechou of the Lake Pontchartrain Basin Foundation to use his plane and pilotin' skills to fly the media over the Mississippi River Gulf Outlet, that cancer of a navigation channel built by the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers. During Hurricane Katrina, experts at the LSU Hurricane Center contend that the MRGO acted as a funnel – increasing the height of the storm surge by several feet and sharply increasing its speed – causing levees to crumble under the assault.

The biggest surprise of the media coverage of our flyovers was a great package that WWL put together with the Corps of Engineers standing on the MRGO levees declaring them ready for the season, and one of the camo-clad Corps honchos called the idea that the MRGO played a role in flooding New Orleans ridiculous. I almost shot Abita Reconstruction Ale out of my nose. I've heard them argue that the MRGO only added 6 inches of storm surge, which seems a stretch, but to discount any role at all? After the MRGO has destroyed ~20K acres of wetlands that would have been protecting NOLA? Ludicrous!

Please click here to send a message to Congress, urging them to seal the deal and close the MRGO forever.

Oh, and if you want to get a copy of The School of Big Storms, you can get a cd with a pdf for a $5 donation here. Or, you can recieve a hardcopy for a $10 donation, here. Or, the BEST way to get a copy is to become a member of the GRN with a suggested $35 (minimum $15) and we'll throw in a complimentary copy. Do that, here.

Aaron Viles is the GRN's Campaign Director

Challenging the Corps – How can we corral these camo-clad bureaucrats?

So I’ve heard there’s an ‘ancient Chinese curse’ that may apply to my life right now: “May you live in interesting times.” Of course ‘interesting’ is a bit of an understatement. ‘Insane’ hits closer to the mark. How’s this?

• We had a bit of a levee problem down here (close to 60% failure rate in the storm-affected area).
• We have a bit of an eroding coastal wetland problem down here (background loss rates of a football field’s worth of wetlands becomes open water every ½ an hour, but in the 18 hours of Katrina we lost an estimated 120 square miles!)

Now here’s the interesting or insane part: The same agency that screwed up the levee thing is in charge of fixing the wetlands thing. Speaking of which, I’ve got a really nice 2 bed/2 bath camelback shotgun for sale Uptown – high ground, for now.

I’m being ridiculous here, of course. Why, it’s the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers in charge of both, and heck, they’re the Army – who would believe they couldn’t get the job done? They built Mississippi River levees, and those massive mountains are amazing, and still very solid.

Recently though, the Corps’ had some bad press. The News Hour with Jim Lehrer found some experts questioning the type of dirt the Corps’ is using to rebuild the failed MRGO levees (turns out it’s the same dirt that failed spectacularly 6 months ago). The Times-Picayune has reported and opined on the Corps engineering failure at the first Mississippi River diversion project, Davis Pond. The success of the Louisiana Coastal Area plan to restore our wetlands hinges on projects such as Davis Pond. Ill tideings indeed.

So it’s with a mixture of terror and excitement that I greet the news that the Corps is asking for an ongoing and significant amount of money to move forward with coastal wetlands restoration projects geared towards protecting New Orleans wetlands. I’m all for restoring our wetlands, but how are we going to ensure the Corps actually puts the money to work in an effective way? It seems odd to be questioning the Corps’ effectiveness. I’ve always thought of the Corps as an incredibly powerful, blunt object. You never questioned whether the hammer blow was going to work, it was more a question of whether you needed the thing wacked. But now it turns out the Corps doesn’t always wack very well. Far more hammered thumbs than I ever expected.

Of course, Louisiana got it’s act together and passed a levee board reform package, which keeps the patronage and corruption from screwing up the multitude of local level boards that used to exist, and kicks all that patronage and corruption to the state level, with a newly created Coastal Protection and Restoration Authority in charge of the graft now. I kid. Kind of.

I was at the CPRA meeting this week in Baton Rouge and was amazed by the Authority’s lack of members from the New Orleans area (mostly agency heads and a few token levee board reps – none from NOLA). Isn’t all this reform due to the fact that NOLA got incredibly screwed up? I didn’t notice CNN broadcasting the floating bodies in Baton Rouge, where most of the CPRA folks seem to hail from.

But why be parochial about the Authority, as long as they’re taking their duties seriously and wielding the state’s power judiciously, right? Hey – they had two Corps’ presentations on the agenda for this week’s meeting, so ample opportunity to get to the bottom of the significant questions being raised. Randy Hanchey, former Assistant Secretary at the Department of Natural Resources and now primary staffer for the CPRA got right into it and pointed out how hard it was to work with the Corps, that they weren’t treating the state as an equal partner, and weren’t sharing information well. Didn’t really illuminate what kind of info the state was looking for, but it was clear he was annoyed. Kind of like when the principle won’t show his bathroom pass to the hall monitor.

As to the two Corps presentations: one was on the study for a category 5 plan, and the other was an update on repairing the levees to already authorized levels (cat 3). Different guys headed up either presentation. The first was Dan Hitchings director of the New Orleans Reconstruction Task Force Hope, and he clearly expected to get lambasted and beat up by the CPRA members. He didn’t. The next Corps presentation was by Colonel Wagenaar, who marched in wearing camouflaged fatigues and immediately got red in the face, dressing down the CPRA for questioning his commitment to Louisiana’s coast by questioning the Corps effectiveness.

Here’s the outrageous thing, besides Hanchey’s whining, NO ONE went after the Corps. If this is the official state body that’s making sure our levees are up to snuff and our coast is restored, I want to see fireworks, I want to hear shouting, I want dogged determined to get to the bottom of things. I don’t want to see a bunch of simpering politicos falling all over each other to be the most grateful pol on the panel. I don’t know if you saw Anderson Cooper yell at Sen. Mary Landrieu for thanking people in Katrina’s aftermath while dead bodies lay in the streets, but I felt like Mr. Cooper would have been a welcome addition to this CPRA meeting, bringing a bit of reality to these Authority members.

I don’t want to give the impression that there was no passion or purpose in attendance – two elements stood out:

1. Mark Davis, the Executive Director of the Coalition to Restore Coastal Louisianago here to take action and support that suggestion). and the head of a subcommittee for the Governor’s Coastal Commission (full disclosure – also a board member of the GRN) presented suggested language to close down the MRGO (
2. Representative Ken Odinet (not a CPRA member, and most recently in the spotlight for his role as the skunk at the ‘One Levee Board’ garden party, was incredibly passionate about shutting down the MRGO.

On the whole, the CPRA meeting was shockingly devoid of passion and purpose, and top heavy with polite politicos who seem oblivious to the fact that we are living in interesting times, and that we’re desperate for leadership willing to ask the tough questions, and challenge the blunt object that is the Corps to ensure South Louisiana’s safety and sustainability.

Aaron Viles is the GRN's Campaign Director

Signs of a Turning Tide

Wow. Reading today's paper was something akin to unwrapping an awesome Christmas present, getting handed a coconut at Zulu, watching Entergy hook up the juice for your FEMA trailer, waking up to a team of roofers lugging composite up a ladder, or some other sort of karmic pat on the back.

Three stories gave me hope, and of course all of them were tied into New Orleans rebuilding.

1. Bush requests more help for Louisiana. Not just help, but cold hard cash. Nearly $20b in a new request to Congress. This includes $4.2b in community development block grants, to bring the state's cdbg total to just over $10b. This should buy a lot of houses - getting homeowners out of mortgages and letting them walk away with equity to plunk down on a more intact or higher-elevation home. Of course the devil's in the details, and many remain to be worked out. Also in that spending request was a key component of our "Flood Washington" campaign - $$ for coastal restoration. While a far smaller allocation than the money for block grants, this request includes $300m for the restoration of wetlands around New Orleans. Given that every 2 miles of intact wetlands will decrease storm surge by a foot or so, this is one of the most affordable ways to reduce the danger that NOLA and other populated areas in S. Louisiana face as the Gulf shifts into a 25 year cycle of increased storm activity, coupled with warmer Gulf water due to global warming, feeding more monster, killer storms. The Louisiana group that will be deciding on spending plans for the cdbg $ and other resources is the Louisiana Recovery Authority, so we'll be keeping an eye on them. And of course all this $$ has to get appropriated by congress, so keep the pressure on.
2. Louisiana house OKs levee board bills: A pleasant surprise, as I had written off our lege, convinced they didn't have the sense to realize that without fundamental levee board reform our chances of securing necessary fed relief (see above) were about as solid as the 17th St. Canal levee. While the bill the lege passed wasn't as strong as reformers would have liked, it's a huge departure from the business-as-usual, patronage and payback levee boards that led to death and destruction in Katrina's wake. Let's hope the Senate doesn't screw it up.
   
3. Army corps feels heat from critical senators: This was the surprise red rider in the corner. Sens McCain and Feingold introduced legislation requiring independent review of Corps projects w/price tags over $25m and creates an independant water board to send priority projects to the Corps - this is so big, IF this legislation ever gets the business end of the President's pen, we could cut boondoggle projects out of the budget; removing environmentally damaging make-work projects and saving taxpayers a big bag of cash. Of course, Corps projects are part of the earmarks & district pork that Congress uses to buy off the critical attention of their constituents, so I can't see many members of that big domed building responding with any more enthusiasm for this law than for this famous pair's last reform offering, which took a handful of years to pass in a watered-down form. But I'm still celebrating - this bill should fire up the grassroots and guarantee some serious discussion about increasing oversight of the corps and their big money projects.

Watch our website, as we'll be tweaking our "Flood Washington" effort soon to demand an immediate closure of the Mississippi River Gulf Outlet (Mister Go). If the McCain/Feingold Corps legislation had been law 40 years ago, Mr.Go would never have been built. This hurricane highway has been bad news for St. Bernard Parish and coastal wetlands since it was first built and now is a critical time to shut 'er down.

Aaron Viles is the GRN's Campaign Director