Parish president: State will pay for Morgan City flood protection upgrade

FRANKLIN — Help is on the way for flood control in Morgan City, St. Mary Parish Council members learned Wednesday.
In other business, two measures that appeared unlikely to cause controversy — renaming a Sorrel Park for a recently deceased volunteer and a resolution supporting Louisiana shrimp — were sources of debate Wednesday.
Flood money
Parish President Sam Jones told the council that Gov. Jeff Landry has allowed coastal protection and restoration funds to be used to upgrade some of the pumps that protect Morgan City from flooding inside the levee system.
The move comes after Hurricane Francine dumped heavy rain on the city Sept. 11. The official rainfall total was about 10 inches, with anecdotal reports of 20 inches or more in isolated areas, all in about half a day.
Francine caused water damage in an estimated 350 Morgan City homes.
Consolidated Gravity Drainage District 2A has a series of pump stations that are designed to move water out of the city during heavy rain.
The pump upgrade will cost $4.5 million-$6 million, Jones said. GIS Engineering LLC of Baton Rouge, a company specializing in coastal restoration work, has been hired for the work.
Sorrel park
Councilman the Rev. Craig Mathews of Jeanerette introduced an ordinance renaming Sorrel Community Park in honor of Laddy Jean Butlers, a longtime park volunteer who died Oct. 14.
A public hearing and passage vote were due at Wednesday’s meeting. The hearing brought divided opinions into the picture.
Some speakers objected to renaming the park after a single person when others had served on the park board and donated their time.
“I don’t think it would be right to name the park after just one person,” Latarsha Charles told the council. “As I said, this has already divided the community.”
Others spoke in favor of the name change, citing Butlers’ long service, even mowing the park’s grass when she was fighting cancer.
Mathews said he was surprised at the reaction to the proposed ordinance. At his urging, the council tabled the ordinance until a public forum considers the name change.
Shrimp
Councilman Rodney Olander of Franklin, a commercial fisherman for more than 40 years, introduced a resolution asking the Louisiana Shrimp & Petroleum Festival organizers to offer only Louisiana shrimp at the festival.
Olander is also a member of the Louisiana Shrimp Task Force, which asked Sea D Consulting to evaluate shrimp at the 2024 festival in Morgan City. Sea D is a food safety company that has a technique for tracing the origin of shrimp.
The test made national news when four of the five shrimp vendors evaluated were found to be serving imported, farm-raised shrimp, probably from Ecuador or India. All five vendors said they were serving Gulf of Mexico shrimp, Sea D said.
The festival board later issued a statement saying it will require vendors to follow a law prohibiting the labeling of foreign shrimp as domestic. The law takes effect in January.
The resolution “tells everyone that the St. Mary Parish Council supports our local shrimpers,” Olander said.
But Councilman Dean Adams of Morgan City felt the resolution unfairly singles out the Shrimp & Petroleum Festival.
Other objections centered on the possible difficulty of acquiring enough wild-caught Gulf shrimp to fill the needs of vendors and customers.
“I don’t want to tell people what to buy,” said Councilman Les Rulf of Patterson.
Olander expressed surprise at the opposition to the motion.
“I go to Washington every year to fight for the industry,” Olander said. “We’re losing the industry.”
The council passed the resolution 9-2, with Adams and Rulf voting no.