Tag Archives: Coalition to Restore Coastal Louisiana
The Controversial Plan to Unleash the Mississippi River
“There’s not a son of a bitch in this parish, or within this industry, that doesn’t want coastal restoration,” Acy Cooper, the president of the Louisiana Shrimp Association tells me when I find him repairing his boat in Venice, the southernmost harbor on the Mississippi River. Cooper is a third-generation shrimper; he knows that if the marshland is not saved, that chain will come to an end. The necessary gradient of water will disappear, replaced by salty ocean. So Cooper supports some projects—using dredged mud to build marsh, for instance—but worries that the diversion will make the water near Venice too fresh, pushing shrimp out into the Gulf. The small boats used by many shrimpers can’t travel that far. He compares the diversion to a gun held to his head: “Either let me die slowly and I can adapt, or you just pull the trigger and kill me now. That’s the way I feel about it,” he says. “If you pull the trigger now, I’m dead.” The Army Corps’ draft environmental impact statement, released in spring 2021, confirmed many of Cooper’s worst fears,,, Big article, big read. >click to read< 19:22
More Mississippi River sediment will mean more problems for Louisiana shrimpers
Louisiana’s quintessential shrimper – the independent, weather-beaten man with a small boat that’s seen better days – may be the hardest hit by two sediment diversions planned on the Mississippi River. A new report indicates many shrimpers will need help adapting, possibly in the form of grants, subsidies and job re-training, once the diversions begin funneling fresh water and sediment into Barataria Bay and Breton Sound. The sediment is likely to alter the distribution, abundance and types of shrimp in areas where shrimpers have fished for decades. Most vulnerable will be shrimpers with small, one-boat operations who are middle-aged or older and cannot easily transition to another career, according to the report by the Coalition to Restore Coastal Louisiana, a Baton Rouge-based nonprofit group. click here to read the story 10:08
Diversion! EDF and “Partners” Pay For Full Page Add to Squash Fishing Communities in Louisiana
Andy Nyman, a wetland scientist at LSU, said scientists discussed the need to counter (what they call) misinformation being spread about future sediment diversions. When nonprofit coastal groups offered to pay for the advertising space, Nyman and Mike Carloss, a retired official with the state Department of Wildlife and Fisheries, started working on a draft. The advertisement was paid for by the Restore the Mississippi River Delta Coalition which is made up of the Environmental Defense Fund, National Wildlife Federation, National Audubon Society, Lake Pontchartrain Basin Foundation and the Coalition to Restore Coastal Louisiana. Read the rest here 08:46
