Officials: Shutdown has minor impact locally

Effects of the federal government shutdown are minimal in the Tri-City area, officials said Monday morning.

The federal government shut down at midnight Friday after last minute negotiations crumbled in the Senate, and Democrats blocked a stopgap extension to fund the government for four weeks until a longer term plan could be passed.

A vote was set to take place Monday to determine whether to end the federal government shutdown.

Even if the federal government shutdown continued past Monday, officials say it should have minimal effects on the Morgan City area.

U.S. Coast Guard operations in Morgan City will continue to perform “essential services” during the shutdown, said Petty Officer 3rd Class Lexie Preston, a spokeswoman for the Coast Guard’s Eighth District in New Orleans.

Those essential services include search and rescue, port security and homeland security, law enforcement, and environmental response, Preston said.

“The main missions are still going to be covered. It’s the non-essential stuff that we’re looking at the cutbacks on,” Preston said.

Port of Morgan City Executive Director Raymond “Mac” Wade said the shutdown shouldn’t affect the dredging currently going on in the Atchafalaya River because, in December 2017, the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers put additional dredging funds for 2018 in the port’s account.

If the Corps hadn’t taken that measure, the shutdown would have halted dredging work in the Atchafalaya River, Wade said.

The only effects on the Port of Morgan City that the shutdown may have are negotiations between the Corps and Brice Civil Constructors, the contractor that is preparing to get an agitation dredge in the Atchafalaya River Bar Channel to dredge the fluid mud that accumulates in the Bar Channel, Wade said.

Clarence Robinson, executive director for the Morgan City and Berwick housing authorities, said the shutdown won’t affect the housing authorities’ operations because the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development requires the authorities to have four to six months of operating funds in reserve.

The Associated Press contributed to this report.