[StBernard] St. Bernard council joins lawsuit to force closure of MRGO

[Westley Annis]

St. Bernard council joins lawsuit to force closure of MRGO

Channel believed to 'funnel' storm surges into parish

By JOE GYAN JR.
New Orleans bureau
Published: Aug 31, 2006

CHALMETTE - St. Bernard Parish Council members said Wednesday they joined a
federal lawsuit that seeks to force the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers to
close the 48-year-old Mississippi River Gulf Outlet because the survival of
the flood-ravaged parish depends on it.

"This is the time for us to end it," Councilman Mark Madary said of the
decades-long struggle to close the MRGO, what many in St. Bernard call a
"hurricane highway" that exacerbated Hurricane Katrina's flooding.

"St. Bernard Parish continues to be in an embattled position," Councilman
Craig Taffaro Jr. added during a news conference at the council's temporary
trailer facilities. "St. Bernard Parish will not lie down. We will fight for
our survival."

The council on Tuesday, the anniversary of Katrina, joined the second of two
federal suits that have been filed against the corps regarding the MRGO.

The first suit, filed in April by several New Orleans area residents who
lost their homes and one who lost a business in the flooding, seeks an
unspecified amount of damages. The second suit - the one the St. Bernard
council joined as plaintiffs - was filed in June by several residents,
including Madary and New Orleans City Councilwoman Cynthia Willard-Lewis,
and seeks a court injunction that would force the corps to close the
deep-draft navigation channel that runs along the eastern edge of the
parish.

New Orleans lawyer Jonathan Andry, who represents the council in the suit,
said the corps was aware of the "catastrophic" consequences that a storm
surge coming through the MRGO could have on St. Bernard.

"The corps did nothing," he said. "It happened in Katrina. It happened in
Betsy. It will happen again."

Andry called the flooding that swamped St. Bernard "a catastrophe that
should not have happened."

"Enough's enough," he said.

The corps said it does not comment on ongoing legal matters.

St. Bernard Parish President Henry "Junior" Rodriguez, who attended
Wednesday's news conference, said the parish proposes closing the MRGO at
the Bayou La Loutre ridge.

"Closure needs to be defined as total closure. We have 67,500 reasons," he
said of the parish's pre-Katrina population, a population that now stands at
fewer than 16,000 residents.

Rodriguez said Katrina's flooding destroyed more than 22,000 homes and 4,000
businesses in the parish and killed 129 residents. Six parish residents are
missing.

"Those are the reasons," he said. "Total closure, gentlemen, is what this is
all about."

Andry said every home in St. Bernard remains vulnerable.

"We can't wait for the corps because we've been waiting for the corps since
1958," he said. "We can't keep waiting and waiting when there's a bomb in
everybody's back yard."

Andry said the corps is scheduled to deliver a report on the MRGO to
Congress in early December.

"They're going to let Congress figure it out. But the time has passed for
that," he said.

Rodriguez said closing the MRGO should be a "simple" decision based on
common sense.

"After you get past the local government, common sense doesn't prevail," he
said.

Andry likened the funnel effect created by the convergence of the MRGO,
Intracoastal Waterway and Industrial Canal to "putting water in a power
nozzle." He added that the lives of the more than 16,000 St. Bernard
residents that have been destroyed outweigh the "economics" of the MRGO.

Rodriguez, who noted that only 16 deep-draft vessels were using the MRGO
monthly before Katrina hit, said he opposes placing a gated structure on the
channel and allowing it to remain open for shallow-draft boats.

Story originally published in The Advocate

  
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