As climate change continues to produce more intense storms and rising seas, part of Louisiana’s congressional delegation wants to make protecting the country’s coastline a top priority for the US Army Corps of Engineers.
Senator Bill Cassidy and Representative Garret Graves presented legislation late last week to prioritize funding for federal projects that would help prevent coastal erosion and remove barriers that have blocked ongoing projects.
The Shoreline Health Monitoring, Restoration, Resilience and Improvement Act, or SHORRE Lawcomes as Congress begins to consider projects to include in the latest iteration of the Water Resources Development Act. Updated every two years, Congress authorizes infrastructure projects and studies for the Corps to pursue, often focused on flood risk or navigation. But authorizations are not necessarily synonymous with funding.
As of October 2021, the corps had a $109 billion construction backlog between new infrastructure projects and rehabilitation works. Congress approve more work the Corps can achieve within its annual budget, which ranged from $4.72 billion to $7.65 billion between 2013 and 2020.
Currently, Louisiana’s coastal restoration projects, while authorized, do not compete well for this limited pool of money, Graves said. While the state owns nearly a third of projects approved by Congress, the congressman said, it received only 5.5% of the Corps’ $6.7 billion budget in 2021.
Louisiana projects can be expensive. For example, the federal agency dragged its feet in funding the $3 billion Morganza-to-the-Gulf hurricane protection system around Terrebonne and Lafourche parishes, despite its authorization, due to the cost initially estimated at $10 billion. This project just received its first $12.5 million in construction funds as part of Budget 2021.
“I’m not saying it has to be exactly one-third, but it has to be more so that we can move these projects forward faster,” Graves said.
He hopes the wording of the bill will help tip the balance in Louisiana’s favor by making coastal restoration a core component of the Corp’s mission, giving it more leverage when districts, divisions and headquarters of the agency will determine its annual work plan.
“One of the things this bill does is it explicitly states in law that this will be a priority for the US Army Corps of Engineers,” he said. “It won’t play second or third fiddle to other types of projects.”
The bill would require the federal government to cover the full cost of a plan to restore the area surrounding the Mississippi River Gulf Outlet, the now-closed infamous channel that channeled Hurricane Katrina’s storm surge to the New Orleans and the houses of Saint-Bernard. The federal government would also pay for an extensive study of the lower Mississippi that was delayed after the Army Corps asked seven states along the Mississippi, including Louisiana, to negotiate their cost-sharing, which, according to state officials and legislators, would be long and drawn out. time-consuming affair.
It would also provide more flexibility in how the state pays for its share of improvements to the massive levees built around New Orleans, St. Bernard and Jefferson parishes after Hurricane Katrina.
“It breaks the deadlock on many legal and regulatory hurdles that have delayed the restoration of many of our coastal areas,” Graves said.
Several environmental groups have welcomed the legislation, including the Restore the Mississippi River Delta Coalition made up of the Environmental Defense Fund, the National Wildlife Federation, the National Audubon Society, the Coalition to Restore Coastal Louisiana and the Pontchartrain Conservancy.
“The provisions of the SHORRE Act will allow Louisiana to continue to advance critical storm protection and ecosystem restoration priorities for our vulnerable coastal communities and wildlife, while enabling others across the countries to do the same,” said Simone Maloz, director of the coalition.
The bill also calls for the federal government to pay a higher percentage of the cost associated with non-structural or environmental restoration projects, lowering the local cost share from 35% to 20%. That local share would drop even lower to 10% or less if the project benefits “an economically disadvantaged community,” according to the bill.
It would “help bring those people to the table to make sure they weren’t left behind just because they couldn’t afford cost sharing,” Graves said. He noted that in these cases, it might be possible for the state to help share the costs with the corps.
Co-sponsored by Delaware Sen. Tom Carper and Rep. Lisa Blunt Rochester, the legislation targets coastal communities across the country dealing with worsening shoreline erosion, not just in Louisiana.
Although much of the country is bordered by water, Graves anticipates opposition from inland states due to cost-sharing changes and believes amendments are inevitable. But he estimated the bill would go through his subcommittee on water resources and the environment by May and pass a vote in the House by the end of the year, eventually making it into the this year’s water resources and development law.
“There’s a reason Arkansas doesn’t evacuate when hurricanes come — they have a buffer. It’s called Louisiana. Our buffer has eroded,” Graves said. “And so it’s critical that we get something between our communities and these huge hurricanes.”
