Louisiana Law Blog

by Erich P. Rapp

The New Orleans Times Picayune posted a story to their web site on July 3, 2007 at 7:45 PM stating that the Corps of Engineers has formally recommended to Congress that the Mississippi River - Gulf Outlet ("MR-GO") be closed. MR-GO is a 60 mile long shipping channel running from the Louisiana coast to the Industrial Canal in New Orleans. Construction on MR-GO started in 1958 and was completed in 1968. The canal was designed to be 36 feet deep and 500 feet wide.

by Erich P. Rapp

Throughout the Corps of Engineers’ history of building public works projects, they have sought to protect or enhance property values and economic interests of various groups. Often fixing one problem causes another. Sometimes those new problems are later referred to as “unintended consequences.”  Many times those supposed “unintended consequences” are known in advance. Nevertheless, these economic shifts often occur without warning or compensation to the people imperiled or damaged. This is the power and burden that goes with building large public works projects. It also presents the legal question of when should a property owner whose interests are imperiled or damaged by public works projects be compensated for such an economic shift.

by Erich P. Rapp

Corps of Engineers Releases 100 Year Flood Maps for New Orleans Metro Area

On Wednesday June 20, 2007, the Army Corps of Engineers released its long anticipated 100 year flood maps for various parts of the New Orleans metro area. While the maps depict some improvement over the flood risk that existed before Hurricane Katrina, the risk of catastrophic flooding in the New Orleans metro area remains.

http://blog.nola.com/updates/2007/06/risk.html

http://blog.nola.com/graphics/2007/06/the_risk_of_hurricane_flooding.html

by Erich P. Rapp

On May 30, 2007, United States District Judge Stanwood R Duval dismissed a class action lawsuit by residents of South Louisiana claiming damages from Hurricane Katrina. The court ruled that the plaintiffs had failed to exhaust their administrative remedies with the federal government before filing their Federal Tort Claims Act suit. The lawsuit accused the federal government of negligently designing, constructing, maintaining, inspecting and operating the area's entire navigable waterway system, including the Mississippi River Gulf Outlet, the Gulf Intracoastal Waterway, the Industrial Canal, the London Avenue Canal and the 17th Street Canal.

The court was also critical of the plaintiff's laundry list use of a multitude of federal statutes to support their claims. The judge further suggested that the plaintiffs claims bordered on being sanctionable under Rule 11 of the Federal Rules of Civil Procedure.

The opinion is Berthelot et al. v. BOH Bros. Construction Co. et al., No. 05-CV-04182, 2007 WL 1239132 (E.D. La. 4/27/07).  

by Erich P. Rapp

The new chief of the Army Corps of Engineers, Lt. General Robert Van Antwerp, told a New Orleans audience on Thursday May 31, 2007 that three important reports would be released by the Corps this summer. The first report due in June is a comprehensive study of the vulnerability of low lying areas of coastal Louisiana to future hurricanes. This report will show residents of the low lying area how their homes will do during about 150 hypothetical storms.