Bayou Lafourche dredging outlined
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DONALDSONVILLE — State officials and project engineers laid out for public view Tuesday data regarding the planned dredging of the upper reaches of Bayou Lafourche.
During a town hall meeting held by the Bayou Lafourche Freshwater District at Donaldsonville High School, officials detailed the plan to dredge 6.2 miles of the bayou from Donaldsonville to Belle Rose to address water flow concerns.
The $20 million project is also an effort to eliminate saltwater intrusion into the bayou, while also helping to stop blackwater inversion, which occurred in the aftermath of Hurricane Gustav.
District officials have said dredging and removal of around 700,000 cubic yards of soil would bring more fresh water down the bayou to help decrease stagnation.
Michelle Robert, project manager with engineering firm CH2MHill, said the project would increase the bayou’s depth and allow 350 cubic feet per second of Mississippi River water — the full capacity of the current pumping station in Donaldsonville — into the bayou.
After Hurricane Gustav, the bayou — which supplies drinking water for 300,000 people — became polluted. To address the emergency situation, the district obtained a permit from the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers to dredge the bayou.
The project would affect property owners along the bayou in Ascension and Assumption parishes and could mean the loss or relocation of private structures sitting on state-owned land.
Hugh Caffery, chairman of the district’s board of commissioners, said that the project received final approval in May and is being advertised for bid.
“If a bid is received in accordance to the current project schedule, dredging could begin by late August,” Caffrey said. The Governor’s Office of Coastal Restoration has thrown its support behind the program, as have both Ascension and Assumption Parish governments.
During Tuesday’s meeting, landowner Janice Falcon asked why residents were allowed to place bulkheads and other structures on state land.
David Peterson, an assistant attorney general working on the project, said the landowners were granted permission by the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers to erect the structures, but not ownership of the land where they were built.
The state Attorney General’s Office asserts that damage to all improvements by residents along the bayou on state-owned land will not be replaced and residents will not be reimbursed for their losses.
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