Upkeep of canal falls to T’bonne

A representative with the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers announced before the Terrebonne Parish Natural Resources and Coastal Restoration Committee last Monday a study and plans to shore-up a seven-mile stretch of the Houma Navigational Canal, between Bayou Prevost and Falgout Canal, at a cost of $7.2 million, of which the parish would be responsible to pay more than $2.5 million, 35 percent, of the project.

Corps Project Manager Marti Lucore said the work, which would involve placing rock along the HNC banks to reduce erosion, is one step in assisting coastal restoration.

“The Houma Navigation Canal, as you are all aware, was built back in the early [19]60s [as a direct link between the Intracoastal Waterway and the Gulf of Mexico]. Since the early 60s it has been dealing with a lot of saltwater intrusion and deterioration of marshes in general,” Lucore said. “What we are doing with this study is looking at opportunities to reduce the erosion of the adjacent marshes.”

Lucore said effort to fight off saltwater intrusion and erosion is not a matter of rebuilding wetlands, but reducing further deterioration and shoreline damage.

Funding for the project would be secured with 65 percent coming from federal coffers and the remainder being taken from combined reapportionment of 2011 Terrebonne budget funds and included in the 2012 parish budget, according to Parish Manager Al Levron.

“We have an ongoing obligation to maintain [the HNC],” Levron said. “We think this is a good partnership.”

Lucore said such a shoring project would not inhibit water traffic or reduce passage levels including the depth or width of the HNC.

Councilman Kevin Voisin (R-District 6) expressed disappointment that corps studies, in this case costing more than $300,000, tend to stall immediate action when locals know what need is involved with given projects.

“That’s the phase we are finishing up right now,” Lucore said as she explained federal requirements of procedural analysis before a project is approved and implemented.

“We [would] spend more money studying what we need to do than we would buying land [right of access] to do it,” Voisin said. “It just doesn’t make any sense. I would hope the corps would learn from what just happened over at Bayou Chene with the flooding thing. Just issue the permit and just let we Cajuns do what we have to do. That flood [anticipated in May and early June] didn’t happen and it wasn’t from some $300,000 study to see what we needed to do. We all knew what we needed to do. This council and St. Mary Parish and Lafourche. For once with the corps out of the way for us to do it. And my God there was no flood. It is disappointing to me that we spend more money on a study to see what we should do, if we think it is important or not. Why has every person in this parish demanded that we needed to do something about this for 10 years when we all know we need this?”

“The purpose of the project [at this stage] is to have the council become aware of the project [for] when we come back later with a funding request,” Levron said.

The council accepted Lucore’s presentation simply as a status report with no action taken at this time.

An erosion prevention price tag of more than $2.5 million for work on the Houma Navigational Canal will fall on Terrebonne Parish under a shared plan with the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers. COURTESY PHOTO