Officials to U.S. Corps: Use sediment for coastal restoration
October 18, 2006Opening this Friday, Oct. 27
October 22, 2006Initial projections call for a possible 22-foot high levee
By DOUG CHERAMIE II
Although work has been ongoing on the initial three-mile segment of the Morganza-to-the-Gulf hurricane protection project in the Pointe aux Chienes area near Island Road, design and engineering work has stalled on the other segments of the Morganza project pending flood elevation studies from the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers.
The Corps has been in the midst of determining levee elevation levels based on a 100-year flood event.
The current Morganza design called for a levee height of 14- to 15 feet on the southern end of the system.
However, Terrebonne Levee and Conservation District Executive Director Jerome Zeringue recently acknowledged that the new preliminary figures for levee heights from the Corps call for the Morganza project to be built to a height of 22 feet at its highest point.
“That figure is significantly higher than the current design and it may come down a few feet,” said Zeringue, who also noted that he does expect the final number to still be above the current design level. “Any height change in the project will call for some reengineering and design work to make sure that the work performed will be sound, but I don’t anticipate it will slow down the work significantly.”
Much of the design work for the future segments of Morganza are at or near the 40 percent design stage so they can likely be amended to incorporate the new levee heights without much disruption in the process.
However, Zeringue noted that regardless of the final levee height, any addition will cause the cost of the project to rise significantly.
“As you go up, costs rise exponentially,” he said. “The cost is not necessarily in correlation to the height. It’s usually much more.”
Terrebonne Parish voters recently rejected a one-cent sales tax proposition that would have been used to upgrade the parish’s drainage levees to provide the parish some measure of protection until the Morganza system is complete.
However, the Morganza project is the beneficiary of a quarter-cent sales tax that Terrebonne voters narrowly passed a few years ago.
Money from the quarter-cent goes specifically for work on the levee protection project.
The project is also included in water resources legislation currently stalled on Capitol Hill. Should the legislation be approved before Congress adjourns for the year, the project would receive federal authorization, which would allow the project to receive federal funds for its construction. Until now, the project has been funded with local and state monies and federal funds specifically designated for non-authorized projects.
Zeringue expects the final heights from the Corps to be released near year’s end. However, whatever that number will be, it will call for a levee higher than the one currently proposed, which in turn will raise its price tag.
