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Federal officials want to know whether Louisiana remains committed to a nearly $3 billion planned coastal restoration project that litigation has stalled.
Federal officials warned in a Friday letter to the head of Louisiana’s Coastal Protection and Restoration Authority that they expected the state to return federal funds allocated for the project if the state decides not to move forward with it. Without providing a deadline for response, federal officials requested a “clear statement” from the state that it plans to follow through on the project as designed.
The Mid-Barataria Sediment Diversion project is Louisiana’s flagship coastal restoration project in response to a rapidly vanishing coastline caused by subsidence, erosion and sea-level rise propelled by climate change. The project would channel 75,000 cubic feet of sediment per second from the Mississippi River into the nearby Barataria Basin in Plaquemines Parish to create between 20 to 40 square miles of new land over five decades.
But soon after the project broke ground in August 2023, Plaquemines authorities sued the state agency overseeing the project, the CPRA, alleging a flawed permitting process as they raised concerns over the project’s impact on local communities. And in January, local oyster companies and an environmental group sued federal agencies permitting the project on the grounds it will affect water quality, negatively impact commercial fisheries and harm bottlenose dolphins. The project has been largely halted as negotiations drag on.
The letter from federal officials was signed by representatives from the Environmental Protection Agency, the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration, the Department of the Interior, and the Department of Agriculture.
Those four agencies are trustees overseeing federal funds obtained in a settlement following the 2010 Deepwater Horizon oil spill in the Gulf Coast. Louisiana is also part of a trustee group of affected states drawing on the funds.
The CPRA reported $519.3 million has been spent on the project out of the $2.92 billion set aside for its construction, according to a presentation at an Oct. 11 state Senate hearing. This includes $378 million budgeted for mitigation and stewardship programs for impacted communities and industries.
In their letter, federal officials said that Louisiana returned funds would be used for “future restoration activities” but did not specify if they would remain earmarked for projects in Louisiana.
