When coastal protections can cause harm to the coast | The Times-Picayune
If cats were raiding your hen house, would you bring in foxes to chase them away? Environmental groups supporting Louisiana’s fight for coastal survival find themselves in a similar squeeze today.
They know some environmental regulations are obstacles to saving portions of the coast. But they’re afraid the most willing partners for regulatory reform — President Donald Trump and the GOP — would turn the opportunity into a non-stop feeding frenzy.
Louisiana has a master plan to restore its coast but the permitting process for projects is going slowly. (Todd Masson)
Some background.
Since the late 1960s the nation has passed a long list of laws to clean up our air, land and water, and to protect fish and wildlife. Few would deny those laws were necessary. Baby Boomers can recall the layers of smog that hung in our air, the beaches closed to swimming, the fish declared unsafe to eat, the declining populations of pelicans and eagles, the diminishing acres of public spaces. The clean-up was a bipartisan effort, and the bills were signed by a Republican president, Richard Nixon.
This ushered in the age of federal environmental permits. If a company or individual wants to do anything that would affect resources protected by those laws, they first have to obtain a permit from the managing agency showing they would cause no harm — or could repair any they did.
In cases where a project affects a number of protected resources the permittee needs approval from a number of different agencies. It can be a years-long process, but it has kept humans and natural resources cleaner and safer.
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