Edith "Dotsy" Fauntleroy Smith
June 3, 2009Enell Bradley Brown
June 5, 2009Hurricane protection plans at the Franklin Canal below Willow Street will inch further along, thanks to the St. Mary Parish Council who agreed Thursday to a $500,000 advance for the project.
The parish council is acting as a conduit for what is actually an award from the state Office of Coastal Protection and Restoration to the St. Mary Parish Levee District. Parish Chief Administrative Officer Henry “Bo” LaGrange said the state is expected to pay the parish within six months.
Initial plans for the project call for a 12-foot sheet pile levee from the canal northward to the Yokley levee. The second phase of the plans includes the materials needed to close a 20- to 30-foot navigational opening the levee will have created, consisting of a set of gates that will connect both sides of the waterway, with a swing barge at the bottom.
Estimates on the project total $1.9 million. So far, the levee district has about $1 million in its coffers.
The project is now at somewhat of a standstill, waiting on the U.S. Corps of Engineers who wants to conduct a soil boring analysis of the Franklin Canal area to determine whether sheet piling will be sturdy enough to keep away rising storm surge waters.
However, Franklin Mayor Raymond Harris has previously said he has plans to drop sheet pilings at the area should a storm head toward St. Mary Parish this hurricane season.
Last September, the lack of flood protection at the Franklin Canal caused more than 1,000 homes in St. Mary Parish to take in water from Hurricane Ike’s surge along the St. Mary Parish coast.
The impacted area stretched east to Garden City.
Questioned after Thursday’s parish council meeting, LaGrange said he had doubts about whether some or all of the initial plans would be completed before the end of this summer.
“But I believe that with the advance from the council, the levee district can bring engineers immediately on board to move the project further,” LaGrange said.
Earlier this year, engineer Glenn Miller provided the Franklin City Council with plans for a 7-foot levee and floodgate to be positioned at the base of the Franklin Canal that could later be incorporated into a permanent structure.
In other business Thursday, LaGrange said the Amelia Belle Casino has made its third annual payment to the St. Mary Parish Council of $1.5 million, part of a 10-year agreement.
Parish Director of Finance Paul Governale said items earmarked for the payment include funds for the sheriff and district attorney to defray the costs for additional law enforcement and case work; $185,000 to the five municipalities within the parish to be distributed by population; and $5,000 each to the parish’s 11 fire departments for operations and maintenance.
“The rest will be up to the council,” Governale said.
Also, in other fiscal matters Thursday, the council approved the transfer of $5,000 in three-tenths sales tax funds from Wards 1, 2, 3, 4, 7 and 10 to Recreation District 5 for summer programs at the request of Councilman Craig Mathews of Four Corners.
