Nov
01
2021
Suppose your home has just been diagnosed with every Louisiana property owner’s greatest fear: termites!
The contractor says the living room and kitchen must be gutted and rebuilt. While the bottom line on the estimate for repairs is staggering, you...
Oct
18
2021
Readers dismissing the importance of reducing fossil fuel emissions to secure a future for Louisiana’s coastal communities usually have three concerns.
Today let’s take them one at a time.
1) What about China?
Some who oppose reducing U.S. fossil fuel use to...
Oct
04
2021
Every Louisiana politician—but especially members of the state’s GOP congressional delegation like Steve Scalise—should start each day by repeating this statement often credited to the great painter and ornithologist John James Audubon:
“A true conservationist is a man who knows...
Sep
20
2021
Hurricane Ida had me thinking about steps Louisiana and other coastal communities should take now that it is clear climate change has pushed us into an era of more big storms.
And I couldn’t shake the idea of polders.
No, not...
Sep
03
2021
I think I’ve discovered a way to get Louisiana politicians to stop denying the truth that the only way to prevent the Gulf of Mexico from swallowing much of the state’s bottom third within the next four decades is...
Aug
15
2021
One of the first things a journalist learns covering science is this: Words are to science what numbers are to math. A researcher using the wrong word (or even misspelling it) in published conclusions is analogous to a mathematician...
Aug
02
2021
It wasn’t a surprise that a local group recently came out in opposition to the Mid-Barataria River Sediment Diversion. Nor was its reasoning: It believes the diversion would unnecessarily harm commercial interests, specifically oyster growers and shrimpers.
But the group’s...
Jul
18
2021
Has anyone in Louisiana been able to get a home mortgage without first proving their financial worth and then purchasing flood insurance?
Of course not. That’s because lenders need to make sure you could meet the debt — especially if the...
Jun
28
2021
How does the tragic collapse of a beachfront condo in Florida impact Louisiana’s coastal survival plan?
It increases the already stiff competition the state faces in its desperate search for funding that plan.
Let me explain.
The dust was still rising from...
Jun
21
2021
Twelve years ago Louisiana finally accepted the truth about the mortal damage it had done to its vital bottom third and embarked on a 50-year, $50 billion master plan for coastal survival. That plan has evolved into one of...
