[StBernard] Louisiana Sen. Landrieu Announces Month-Long Tour

[Westley Annis]

WASHINGTON –  U.S. Senator Mary L. Landrieu, D-La., today announced a series of events commemorating the first anniversaries of Hurricanes Katrina and Rita, beginning with a “Hope and Recovery Tour” of coastal Louisiana parishes August 24 through 29 and finishing with a multi-state coastal issues summit in southwest Louisiana on September 23 and 24. She said the events will not only commemorate “the lives and loss taken from us by the two most destructive hurricanes in American history, but will also look to the future and focus attention on critical issues affecting the state’s coastline, economic development and hurricane protection.”

On August 24, Sen. Landrieu will visit St. Bernard Parish with Senate Minority Leader Harry Reid of Nevada. Together, the senators will view firsthand the state of recovery in the parish and discuss the Senate’s priorities for addressing the continuing need along the Gulf Coast. Later that day, Sen. Landrieu and Education Secretary Margaret Spellings will participate in education-related events in the New Orleans area.

Sen. Landrieu’s “Hope and Recovery Tour” will then continue through much of coastal southwest Louisiana, with visits to Cameron, Calcasieu and Vermillion parishes, among others, before returning to southeast Louisiana on August 29, the first anniversary of Katrina. The month-long hurricane commemoration will culminate with a multi-state coastal summit on September 23 and 24, the first anniversary of Hurricane Rita. The coastal summit will examine environmental, economic and hurricane protection issues affecting the entire Gulf Coast, and will be held in Cameron Parish and Lake Charles, La.

“While commemorating the anniversaries of Katrina and Rita, I want to bring a message of hope and recovery to the people of coastal Louisiana from Cameron to Chalmette, Lake Charles to Grand Isle, Lafitte to Slidell, Houma to New Orleans,” Sen. Landrieu said. “I want to exchange ideas about how we look to the future and move our state forward. 

“The ‘Hope and Recovery Tour’ will focus on the promise of hope and how we can rebuild safer and better communities. It will also focus on the hard realities of recovery. We’ve made great progress in recent months getting Congress to approve massive federal assistance for Louisiana. But the recovery is only just beginning in many parts of the affected area and will remain incomplete as long as tens of thousands of Louisianians can’t come back to their homes, and our businesses, schools and hospitals can’t re-open.

“The people of our state will never forget the devastation wrought by the two worst hurricanes in American history. America must always remember what happens when the power of uncontrolled water and wind devastates communities. America must always remember the importance of preparedness and the need for strong levees and comprehensive flood protection. America must always remember that the entire nation, its national security and its economic strength, is at risk as long as any part of America’s Energy Coast is exposed to threat of destruction.”

Sen. Landrieu said a central part of her month-long series of events “will be to shine the national spotlight that will come from the one-year anniversaries of Katrina and Rita on the promise of hope for Louisiana’s future as well as the challenges of recovery. This is a message that the entire nation will benefit from as we enter the peak of the 2006 hurricane season.”

(source: Landrieu press release)