[StBernard] Single tax district eyed for 3 parishes in east bank levee system

[Westley Annis]

Single tax district eyed for 3 parishes in east bank levee system

By Mark Schleifstein, NOLA.com | The Times-Picayune 
on October 19, 2016 at 5:06 PM, updated October 19, 2016 at 5:07 PM 

Although the New Orleans area's east bank levee system is overseen by a
single agency, it depends on separate property taxes in three parishes for
money to maintain the levees. Now, however, a number of levee officials are
calling for a unified taxing district encompassing the east banks of
Jefferson and Orleans parishes and the Lake Borgne Basin Levee Districts in
St. Bernard Parish.

They say flood protection depends on support from all three areas, and that
two parishes should not suffer because voters in the third refuse higher
property taxes. Further, they say the overall system benefits all three
parishes.

"Water doesn't know these jurisdictional boundaries," said St. Bernard
President Guy McInnis, a member of the Louisiana Coastal Protection and
Restoration Authority. "If one section of this system fails, all of them
fail. The funding should be east to west and north to south across the
entire system." McInnis and other members of the authority voiced their
concern Wednesday (Oct. 19) at a meeting of the authority in Jean Lafitte.

It was the Legislature that approved a combination of constitutional
amendments and laws setting up the Southeast Louisiana Flood Protection
Authority-East. But lawmakers left in place a requirement that portions of
the new levee system inside three existing levee districts be funded only by
separate property taxes in the three parishes.

That strategy is not working, McInnis said. Voters in St. Bernard Parish
have twice turned down property tax increases to pay the additional costs of
maintaining and operating new floodwalls and levees in St. Bernard. Tax
opponents there said New Orleans residents should pay a portion of the
costs, because the St. Bernard infrastructure also protects New Orleans East
and the Lower 9th Ward of New Orleans.

The lack of revenue has also raised concern that the St. Bernard drainage
system will not have enough revenue to operate properly. And future
maintenance problems with the levee system could threaten its federal
certification, which could eventually result in property owners behind the
levees becoming ineligible for federal flood insurance.

McInnis said he's talked to New Orleans area members of the Legislature, and
they're in agreement that it's time for a regional system to pay for the
east bank levee system.

He found support Wednesday from Windell Curole, another Coastal Protection
and Restoration Authority board member who is the executive director of the
South Lafourche Levee District. Curole compared the present system to a ship
with different revenue streams supporting its bow and stern.

"If you don't maintain the stern, the whole boat sinks," Curole said. He
said the authority-wide funding proposal is supported by the Coastal
Louisiana Levee Consortium, an organization of local levee districts.

Also supporting the proposal were Joe Hassinger, the president of the east
bank levee authority, and Bob Turner, the authority's executive director.
"State law now says that money collected in one parish cannot be spent in
another," Hassinger said. "That limits our ability to operate truly as a
regional system."
David Peterson, an attorney with the Governor's Office of Coastal
Activities, said the proposed changes would likely require changes in both
the Constitution and state law.

Both the east bank and west bank levee authorities were set up after
Hurricane Katrina, and the taxing rules under which they operate differ
significantly from individual levee districts established before them.
Indeed, several of those districts include more than one parish and are
allowed to levy a 5-mill tax on all property in all their parishes, with
larger amounts requiring referedums.

The Southeast Louisiana Flood Protection Authority-West has had similar
problems with individual parishes turning down recent tax increases to pay
for their own post-Katrina maintenance and operation costs. But no
representatives of the West Bank authority appeared before the coastal
authority on Wednesday.
The coastal authority chairman, Johnny Bradberry, said he will have the
authority's staff review the issue and report recommendations in November.