[StBernard] Newt Gingrich and John Barry: Why New Orleans Needs Saving

[Westley Annis]

Why New Orleans Needs Saving

The City's Natural Vulnerability Is Also Its Greatest Strength 

By Newt Gingrich, John M. Barry 

Time
Publication Date: March 6, 2006 

Shortly after Hurricane Katrina devastated New Orleans, Speaker of the House
Dennis Hastert wondered aloud whether the Federal Government should help
rebuild a city much of which lies below sea level. The most tough-minded
answer to that question demonstrates that rebuilding and protecting New
Orleans is in the national interest. Reason: The very same geological forces
that created that port are what make it vulnerable to Category 5 hurricanes
and also what make it indispensable. 

One such force is the Mississippi River. Once, the Gulf of Mexico extended
north to Cape Girardeau, Mo., but the river gradually deposited enough
sediment into a receding sea to create tens of thousands of square miles of
land stretching south to the present mouth of the river. Long after New
Orleans was first settled, the entire region remained above sea level and
safe from hurricanes. Engineers prevented river floods by building levees
and kept shipping channels open by constructing jetties two miles out into
the ocean so that the river dropped its sediment into deep water. Before the
jetties were built, 100 ships at a time often waited days for deep enough
water to pass over sandbars blocking the Mississippi's mouth. The levees and
jetties stopped sediment from feeding the deltas; the land sank, and coastal
Louisiana shrank. Similarly, other great ports on deltaic rivers, like
Rotterdam, are also below sea level; the airport serving Amsterdam is 20 ft.
below sea level, lower than any part of New Orleans.

If engineering the Mississippi made New Orleans vulnerable, it also created
enormous value. New Orleans is the busiest port in the U.S.; 20% of all U.S.
exports, and 60% of our grain exports, pass through it. Offshore Louisiana
oil and gas wells supply 20% of domestic oil production. But to service that
industry, canals and pipelines were dug through the land, greatly
accelerating the washing away of coastal Louisiana. The state's land loss
now totals 1,900 sq. mi. That land once protected the entire region from
hurricanes by acting as a sponge to soak up storm surges. If nothing is
done, in the foreseeable future an additional 700 sq. mi. will disappear,
putting at risk port facilities and all the energy-producing infrastructure
in the Gulf.

There is no debate about the reality of that land loss and its impact. On
that the energy industry and environmentalists agree. There is also no doubt
about the solution. Chip Groat, a former director of the U.S. Geological
Survey, says, "This land loss can be managed, and New Orleans can be
protected, even with projected sea-level rise." Category 5 hurricane
protection for the region, including coastal restoration, storm-surge
barriers and improved levees, would cost about $40 billion--over 30 years.
Compare that with the cost to the economy of less international
competitiveness (the result of increased freight charges stemming from loss
of the efficiencies of the port of New Orleans), higher energy prices and
more vulnerable energy supplies. Compare that with the cost of rebuilding
the energy and port infrastructure elsewhere. Compare that with the fact
that in the past two years, we have spent more to rebuild Iraq's wetlands
than Louisiana's. National interest requires this restoration. Our energy
needs alone require it. Yet the White House proposes spending only $100
million for coastal restoration.

Washington also has a moral burden. It was the Federal Government's
responsibility to build levees that worked, and its failure to do so
ultimately led to New Orleans' being flooded. The White House recognized
that responsibility when it proposed an additional $4.2 billion for housing
in New Orleans, but the first priority remains flood control. Without it,
individuals will hesitate to rebuild, and lenders will decline to invest.

How should flood control be paid for? States get 50% of the tax revenues
paid to the Federal Government from oil and gas produced on federally owned
land. States justify that by arguing that the energy production puts strains
on their infrastructure and environment. Louisiana gets no share of the tax
revenue from the oil and gas production on the outer continental shelf. Yet
that production puts an infinitely greater burden on it than energy
production from other federal territory puts on any other state. If we treat
Louisiana the same as other states and give it the same share of tax revenue
that other states receive, it will need no other help from the government to
protect itself. Every day's delay makes it harder to rebuild the city. It is
time to act. It is well past time.

Newt Gingrich is a senior fellow at AEI. John M. Barry is the author of
Rising Tide and the Great Influenza.