Trump’s possible use of funds could affect Bayou Chene project

About $5 million that officials were hoping to get in federal funds for the Bayou Chene flood protection project may be at risk if President Donald Trump taps into post-disaster funds to pay for a border wall.

Most of the nearly $90 million Bayou Chene Flood Control and Diversion Project is expected to be funded through the Gulf of Mexico Energy Security Act. The Bayou Chene structure, a St. Mary Levee District project, includes installing a permanent floodgate in the Amelia area to prevent parts of six parishes from backwater, riverine flooding.

Those funds aren’t anticipated to be tapped under the proposal that Trump was considering. However, the Bayou Chene project could be indirectly affected by the proposal in that additional federal funds may be scarcer for the district to find, St. Mary Levee District Executive Director Tim Matte said Friday.

An article last week in The Advocate mentioned that Trump was considering declaring a national emergency to tap into U.S. Army Corps of Engineers’ post-disaster construction funds and bypass a funding standoff in Congress over the proposed wall at the U.S.-Mexico border.

The projects that could potentially be directly affected in Louisiana include the Comite River Diversion Canal and West Shore Lake Pontchartrain Hurricane Protection Project, the article said. The Advocate ran a follow-up article quoting Louisiana’s U.S. Sens. Bill Cassidy and John Kennedy along with Rep. Garret Graves, R-Baton Rouge, saying that the funds for those two projects were likely safe from being used for other purposes.

In a Friday statement to The Daily Review, U.S. Rep. Clay Higgins, R-Port Barre, expressed a similar view saying, in part, “ the guidance that we’ve received conveys that these funds are protected, but we are continuing to monitor the situation.”

“The crisis on our southern border is very real, and the White House is exploring multiple avenues of funding,” Higgins said. “No plans have been finalized, so saying how a specific project would be impacted is purely speculation based on rumor.”

But if the Comite and West Shore projects don’t get funded from the $1.2 billion in federal funds that were designated for them, they could be funded from a different federal funding source that allocated $1.6 billion in the aftermath of the August 2016 flooding in south Louisiana, Matte said.

Therefore, there would be fewer funds available through the $1.6 billion funding source. St. Mary Levee District officials were trying to get $5 million through that $1.6 billion source to go toward the Bayou Chene project.

The levee district had originally received $5 million from state government to help fund construction of the Bayou Chene structure. However, officials decided to use that state funding to pay for design of the project.

So now the district is looking for another funding source to replace the $5 million needed to assist in constructing the Bayou Chene project, and had hoped to get funds through that $1.6 billion federal source allocated to Louisiana, Matte said.

That source was being considered by the St. Mary Levee District as it looks at flooding along the Bayou Teche.