Healthy Gulf joins Focus on St. Tammany Forum: A Panel on Flooding and Development Issues
Healthy Gulf Participated in the “Focus on St. Tammany” forum last Friday night and addressed floodplain and wetland issues on a panel of speakers.
Protect Clean Water
Floodplain Resilience Presentation Debut in Hammond, La.
The first of two community meetings on wetlands and floodplain resiliency was held in Hammond at the old train depot. Wetland fill permit data from the past 5 years for St. Tammany, Tangipahoa, Livingston, East Baton Rouge, St. John and St. James Parishes was presented in a series of maps showing where impacts have been most intense. We also looked at available mitigation banks to offset those fill permits. Possible restoration of sand and gravel mines was also presented as a way to stabilize river floodplains and restore riverine wetlands above population centers along the Interstate 12 Corridor along the north shore of Lake Pontchartrain.
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Bayou Bridge Pipeline: Field Notes
A spoil bank is the pile of soil and debris left behind by the excavation and dredging machines that dig a trench through the swamp. In coastal Louisiana, all of the pipelines are buried or submerged (as opposed to being built above ground). The method for burying the pipe, then, is to dig an enormous trench. The material from the trench is then dumped right next to the new channel, and suddenly a wall is created that cuts off water and organisms from each other that were connected before. Companies are required by law, according to their permits, to return these spoil banks to their natural state once constructions is complete. However, very few companies comply with this stipulation in their permit leading to a basin filled with spoil banks, limited access to bayous and less productive crawfishing harvests.
Bayou Bridge Pipeline: Field Notes Read More »
Community forum discussion veered away from Bonnet Carre Spillway at Sun Herald event in Gulfport
At the Sun Herald newspaper’s recent Community Forum on the opening of the Bonnet Carre Spillway and its effects on coastal Mississippi, the discussion moved from the advertised topic to Louisiana’s Mid-Breton Sediment Diversion, as yet unbuilt, but part of the Coastal Protection and Restoration Authority’s coastal master plan. Unfortunately, the sponsoring Louisiana agency, CPRA, was not represented on the Sun Herald’s speaker panel to take part in the discussion.
Miss. River Commission’s Low Water Inspection Tour visits Vicksburg
Damage to Mississippi and Louisiana fisheries from the 2019 River Flooding, Nutrient levels in the River, Climate Change, the Yazoo Backwater Pumps, and the operation of the Morganza and Bonnet Carre Floodways were some of the topics the Mississippi River Commissioners heard when they docked their towboat in Vicksburg and invited the public to go aboard and address them.
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Louisiana Watershed Initiative sets regional watershed boundaries
The Louisiana Council on Watershed Management met and voted on boundaries for the 8 watershed regions of the state and announced the availability of Capacity Building Grants for Parishes.
Louisiana Watershed Initiative sets regional watershed boundaries Read More »
North Gulfport citizens address MDEQ Permit Board on inland rail port
MDEQ should protect people, and not wedge projects into communities that already have plenty of health and environmental problems to deal with. The August 13th Permit Board meeting was another example of why the MDEQ Environmental Permit Process needs to be examined by the Legislature soon, and made more responsive to the citizens whose health and property are meant to be protected by the agency.
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Wetlands at the ballot box
This is a guest blog from Cameron Bertron, a summer legal extern with Healthy Gulf. Cameron, a 3L at Tulane University Law School, is a Gulf Coast native and enjoyer of all things wetlands except mosquitoes. The Gulf of Mexico is the ninth-largest body of water in the world, and it is in part bordered
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Hurricane Barry’s wake-up call
In the wake of Hurricane Barry, a lot of ink was spilled over whether the projections of the storm were too dire or not dire enough, whether the city of New Orleans made the right call to tell people to shelter in place, and whether we can trust the Army Corps to keep us safe.
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New Jersey-sized Gulf Dead Zone Threatens Gulf Fisheries
Today, scientists from Louisiana State University (LSU), the Louisiana Universities Marine Consortium (LUMCON), and National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) announced the results of their recent expedition to map the size of Gulf Dead Zone– 6,952 square miles, or about the size of New Jersey. While not as big as originally estimated, likely due to
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