WP,pg1: Money Flowed to Questionable (Louisiana) Projects

[DeepModem Mom]

Money Flowed to Questionable Projects
State Leads in Army Corps Spending, but Millions Had Nothing to Do With Floods

By Michael Grunwald
Washington Post Staff Writer
Thursday, September 8, 2005; Page A01


Before Hurricane Katrina breached a levee on the New Orleans Industrial Canal, the Army Corps of Engineers had already launched a $748 million construction project at that very location. But the project had nothing to do with flood control. The Corps was building a huge new lock for the canal, an effort to accommodate steadily increasing barge traffic.

Except that barge traffic on the canal has been steadily decreasing.

In Katrina's wake, Louisiana politicians and other critics have complained about paltry funding for the Army Corps in general and Louisiana projects in particular. But over the five years of President Bush's administration, Louisiana has received far more money for Corps civil works projects than any other state, about $1.9 billion; California was a distant second with less than $1.4 billion, even though its population is more than seven times as large.

Much of that Louisiana money was spent to try to keep low-lying New Orleans dry. But hundreds of millions of dollars have gone to unrelated water projects demanded by the state's congressional delegation and approved by the Corps, often after economic analyses that turned out to be inaccurate. Despite a series of independent investigations criticizing Army Corps construction projects as wasteful pork-barrel spending, Louisiana's representatives have kept bringing home the bacon.

For example, after a $194 million deepening project for the Port of Iberia flunked a Corps cost-benefit analysis, Sen. Mary Landrieu (D-La.) tucked language into an emergency Iraq spending bill ordering the agency to redo its calculations. The Corps also spends tens of millions of dollars a year dredging little-used waterways such as the Mississippi River Gulf Outlet, the Atchafalaya River and the Red River -- now known as the J. Bennett Johnston Waterway, in honor of the project's congressional godfather -- for barge traffic that is less than forecast....


http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2005/09/07/AR2005090702462.html?sub=AR

[ET Awful]

1. Further down in the same article

Louisiana's politicians have requested much more money for New Orleans hurricane protection than the Bush administration has proposed or Congress has provided. In the last budget bill, Louisiana's delegation requested $27.1 million for shoring up levees around Lake Pontchartrain, the full amount the Corps had declared as its "project capability." Bush suggested $3.9 million, and Congress agreed to spend $5.7 million.

Administration officials also dramatically scaled back a long-term project to restore Louisiana's disappearing coastal marshes, which once provided a measure of natural hurricane protection for New Orleans. They ordered the Corps to stop work on a $14 billion plan, and devise a $2 billion plan instead.

[DeepModem Mom]

2. It's there, ET -- thanks for highlighting this info!

Of course they do add:

"But overall, the Bush administration's funding requests for the key New Orleans flood-control projects for the past five years were slightly higher than the Clinton administration's for its past five years."

[ET Awful]

3. Of course they conveniently leave out how much the Clinton

administration was ASKED FOR.

[rocktivity]

9. And you have to allow for inflation, too.

"Slightly higher" could work out to less than what the same amount of money could buy eight years ago.

Since Louisana Governor Blanco has her booty covered on requesting aid from Bush (as well as evidence that suggests that Bush tried to set her up), they have to find another way her to make her "it!" in the "blame game."

:headbang:
rocknation

[barbaraann]

4. Pure Propaganda:

For example:
"Louisiana has received far more money for Corps civil works projects than any other state..."

So, it's outrageous that Louisiana, with it's levees, huge energy industry facilities and extensive and endangered wetlands receives more ACOE funds than Kansas or New Hampshire? Wow! That is just unfair beyond belief!

[lakeguy]

5. heeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeere comes this spin!

[EC]

6. Does anyone know or could someone find out who's pet

projects these were? (the ones that took money away from the levee) The drudging for oil tankers would seem to be Republican pork...

[EFerrari]

7. Exactly. This is a hit piece. n/t

[underpants]

8. $8.8 Billion

Where is the $8.8 Billion completely missing in Iraq? Where is the daily update on that?