Last week, Governor John Bel Edwards was successful in getting the federal government to reduce Louisiana’s share of the disaster recovery costs from 25% to 10%. He’s headed back to D.C. on Wednesday. This time he’ll be asking for more money.
Initially, Louisiana was looking for $2 billion in support from the federal government. That’s grown to $2.8 billion.
“The single biggest part in terms of the money involved and probably the importance of our ability to recover quickly and fully from this is the community development block grant program,” says Edwards.
Those grants will address both the August flooding in Southeast Louisiana and the March flooding in North Louisiana.
Edwards says this extra money will be used to shore up public infrastructure, like the Comite River Diversion.
"Rather than doing what was done after Katrina, where we focused on elevating businesses and elevating homes - how about we do flood control projects and flood plains that reduce the base flood elevation and obviate the need to raise structures,” he says.
Edwards believes using the money for public projects will help garner the support needed in Washington.
“That way they can have the peace of mind of knowing that the investment they make in Louisiana will pay off in the long run by reducing the likelihood that we have this type of flooding going forward,” he says.
Edwards will be in D.C. Wednesday and Thursday and is expected to meet with Speaker of the House Paul Ryan. Congress will need to act quickly, since they recess at the end of the month and won't be back until after the November 8th elections.
“If you just turn on the news you see how difficult it is for Congress to do anything these days," says Edwards. "We are trying to get an appropriation made to aid us in our recovery efforts just several weeks after the flood itself. And so there’s a lot that could happen, I’m actually optimistic that it is going to happen.”