St. Tammany Parish president slams funding imbalance

St. Tammany Parish President Kevin Davis is none too pleased about the amount of funding the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers has spent improving drainage and levees in South Louisiana. That’s because the Northshore apparently hasn’t received a penny. Davis and the St. Tammany Parish Council have sent a letter to their congressional delegation, complaining that St. Tammany has yet to have any projects approved for the Southeast Louisiana Urban Flood Control Project. “Four years after Katrina the Southshore has received over $14.45 billion for projects relative to those residents’ safety,” Davis writes. “The Northshore received $0.00 funding during that same period.” Davis says the parish just learned that their latest SELA project would need an additional 18 months of study because Congress added new review requirements on the Corps projects. “I just do not understand that while the federal government can appropriate over $14 billion to keep Southshore residents in their homes and increase their safety, the plan for St. Tammany is to force St. Tammany residents to move from their homes to somewhere else,” Davis writes. “How could this happen? These funds were appropriated during a Republican administration and majority Congress. Now we have a Democrat administration and majority Congress, and nothing has changed. Neither President has visited St. Tammany and, I bet, neither was even invited to do so.” It isn’t that Davis wants the Southshore to lose its appropriations. He just wants the Northshore to get its fair share, too. “If this were a football game, the score would be: Southshore 14 billion; Northshore 0,” Davis writes. “The question at hand is whether this is the final score. If it is not, then we are late in the fourth quarter. This is a deplorable record, and one I will certainly consider as we head into 2010.”