[StBernard] MR-GO closure agreement is signed by corps, state

[Westley Annis]

MR-GO closure agreement is signed by corps, state
by Mark Schleifstein, The Times-Picayune 
Friday October 31, 2008, 9:49 PM
Louisiana and the Army Corps of Engineers on Friday finalized the
long-awaited agreement governing the closing of the Mississippi River-Gulf
Outlet, clearing the way for the corps to award a contract to build a rock
barrier across the waterway at Bayou La Loutre in southern St. Bernard
Parish by the beginning of the 2009 hurricane season.

"In partnership with the state of Louisiana, the corps is pleased to be
moving forward on the MR-GO closure, " said Col. Alvin Lee, commander of the
corps' New Orleans District, who signed the agreement Friday afternoon.

"This agreement is extremely important to the effort to bring hurricane
protection to vulnerable areas of St. Bernard and Orleans Parish, " said
Garret Graves, chairman of the Coastal Protection and Restoration Authority,
who negotiated the document and signed it on behalf of the state.

Blocking the flow of water from the Gulf of Mexico through the MR-GO into
wetlands surrounding Lake Borgne has long been a goal of many St. Bernard
and eastern New Orleans residents, who contend that erosion caused by the
channel has left their communities more vulnerable to hurricane storm surge.

"Although our hurricane protection and coastal restoration efforts are in no
way complete, the forward movement of the MR-GO closure is an absolute
necessity in the process of assuring the safety and protection of St.
Bernard, " Parish President Craig Taffaro Jr. said in a statement Friday
morning.

The agreement also was praised by U.S. Sen. David Vitter, R-La., who last
week criticized the corps for not agreeing to concessions requested by the
state, even though the final agreement still did not give the state
everything it wanted.

The state has agreed to buy land on which the closure structure is to be
built, in an effort to speed up the construction process. And because
Congress ordered the closure structure to be built with 100 percent federal
dollars, the state wanted the land acquisition costs to be counted toward
its required 35 percent share of levee construction projects.

While the agreement does not include that language, it does include a clause
saying the state's land acquisition will not act as a precedent for future
agreements between the corps and the state.

The agreement also requires the state to pay for operation and maintenance
of the closure structure when it's completed, which was a requirement
included in the congressional authorization.

The 950-foot-long closure structure will require the use of more than
433,500 tons of rock on the Gulf side of Bayou La Loutre near Hopedale. The
closure will be 12 feet wide at its top and 450 feet wide at the bottom, and
will cover nearly 10 acres of water bottom. The structure will stretch
across the channel from bank to bank, with its top 7 feet above sea level.

The corps also is working on a plan to restore wetlands and other features
that were damaged by the operation of the navigation channel. Ships using
the channel caused it to erode to more than a half-mile wide in some areas.
The channel was dug through ridges that had historically blocked saltwater
from entering what were freshwater wetlands in the 1950s.

The restoration plan could include marsh creation, shoreline protection,
barrier island rebuilding and freshwater diversions from the Mississippi
River.

The corps will hold two public meetings on the plan on Monday at the C.F.
Rowley School, 49 Madison Ave., Chalmette, and Thursday at the Leo Seal
Community Center in Waveland, Miss. Both meetings begin with an open house
at 6 p.m.

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