[StBernard] Update From State Representative Kenneth Odinet Sr.

[Westley Annis]

Update From State Representative Kenneth Odinet Sr. 

December 2, 2005


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RE: Senate Bill 95 by Senator Boasso - Levee Board Consolidation

          After having been vilified, ridiculed and chastised in the media
for "obstructing" the passage of Senate Bill 95, I believe it necessary that
I explain my position on this crucial issue.

Senate Bill 95, which was introduced by Sen. Boasso, R-Arabi, would have
transferred power over flood protection in Orleans, Jefferson, St. Tammany
and St. Bernard Parishes from the local levee boards to a newly created,
single state board named the Southeast Louisiana Levee Authority.  After
lengthy debate, the Senate amended the original bill to exempt the West
Jefferson Levee District as well as the part of the Orleans Levee District
that deals with non-flood control matters from the provisions of the act.
The final passage by the Senate occurred late Thursday evening, November
17th.   Meanwhile, the House had already recessed and was scheduled to
reconvene at 5:00 p.m. on Sunday, November 20th.  At that time, with only 48
hours remaining in the session, the House had to consider a motion by Rep.
Roy Quezaire, D-Donaldsonville, to expedite the legislative process to
consider the bill the next morning in the House transportation committee.
Because Senate Bill 95 was controversial and would directly impact my
district, which includes most of St. Bernard and parts of eastern Orleans, I
believed the matter deserved a fair hearing to allow the local governments
and those opposed to the bill the opportunity to be heard.  With little time
remaining, however, that was not possible.  Thus, I objected to the motion,
which resulted in the House 51-38 floor vote that prevented an expeditious
hearing, effectively killing the bill for the session.

The article that appears on the front page of the December 1st edition of
the Times-Picayune, regarding the change in that procedural vote by seven
legislators after the fact, leads the reader to believe that I did not want
the House to consider Senate Bill 95.  Nothing could be further from the
truth.  Remember, it was the Senate that delayed getting the bill over to
the House.  Perhaps the bill's proponents were planning to rush the
controversial measure through the House committee and onto the House floor
without debate, well aware that only two days remained and legislators were
eager to return home.                                        

In any event, I had testified at the earlier Senate committee hearings that
I was opposed to Senate Bill 95 for several reasons, all of which are very
legitimate considering the history of the Orleans Levee Board and its
relationship to the region, particularly St. Bernard.  Allow me to explain.

In 1924, the legislature authorized the Orleans Levee District's Board of
Commissioners to acquire 33,000 acres of land on the east bank of the
Mississippi River about 50 miles south of New Orleans in order to build the
Bohemia Spillway between the River and the Gulf of Mexico.  Approximately
half of this land was public property owned by Plaquemines Parish; the other
half was expropriated from private landowners.  The levee board paid a total
of $389,000 for the land.  In 1928, while the Bohemia Spillway was under
construction, the high water stages in the Mississippi River threatened the
City of New Orleans.  Local New Orleans business leaders and the heads of
several of the city's largest banks made a covenant with the citizens of
lower St. Bernard Parish to allow the levee around their lands to be broken
to prevent flooding in the city in exchange for monetary reparations for the
loss of their property that would result from the flooding.  The levee was
broken, the waters flooded lower St. Bernard, people died and property was
destroyed, but monetary reparations were never paid to the St. Bernard
citizens.

The Bohemia Spillway was completed in 1931 and the expropriated land had
proved to be useful for more than just a spillway, and by the mid-1980s, the
Orleans Levee District was receiving about $5 million a year in mineral
royalties from the land. Between 1929 and 1984 the levee district had
collected approximately $57 million in mineral royalties.  In 1984, the
Louisiana legislature passed Act 233 ordering the Orleans Levee District to
return the expropriated land including mineral royalties to the original
owners and to provide an accounting of all mineral royalties it received
from the affected property.  The Orleans Levee Board stalled the return of
the land, refused to remit the mineral royalties and challenged the
constitutionality of the act.  After years of litigation, both the Louisiana
Supreme Court and the U.S. Fifth Circuit Court of Appeals ruled in favor of
the original landowners.  The Orleans Levee Board was cast in judgment for
millions, with interest accruing from 1984.  Needless to say, twenty-one
years later, that is now a substantial debt.                  

Furthermore, as a result of the Orleans levee breaches during Hurricane
Katrina, individual and class action lawsuits certainly will be filed
against the Orleans Levee District.  If the levee district is cast in
judgment in any of those suits, conceivably the debt could amount to
billions of dollars.  In the event Senate Bill 95 had become law, it was
possible that the Lake 

Borgne Levee District in St. Bernard Parish as well the East Jefferson Levee
District would have had to assume a portion of the Orleans Levee District's
debt.  This fact was and is not clear from a reading of the Senate passed
legislation and that seriously concerns me.  I cannot speak for Jefferson
Parish, but St. Bernard Parish tax payers cannot bear that burden and
shouldn't have to.  Unlike Jefferson and St. Tammany, St. Bernard was
completely destroyed by Katrina, and any tax revenue it collects in the
future must be used to rebuild the parish, not help reduce the debt of the
Orleans Levee District.  This brings me to my second point.

The catastrophic flooding that killed hundreds of people and obliterated St.
Bernard, eastern New Orleans and the Lower 9th Ward was caused by the flood
waters that surged through the Mississippi River Gulf Outlet (MR-GO) during
Katrina in addition to the flood waters from the industrial canal levee
breach.  In 1956, New Orleans business leaders and the federal government
claimed the proposed 76-mile shipping channel, a shortcut between the city
and the Gulf of Mexico, would be an economic boon to St. Bernard and New
Orleans.  As soon as the channel was dug, saltwater from the Gulf entered
into and eventually killed thousands of acres of marshland, destroying St.
Bernard's fur industry and a significant portion of its oyster industry.
Long-term it destroyed the natural storm buffer once provided by that
marshland and caused an estimated loss of $200 to $350 million to the
commercial and recreational fishing industries.

Shortly after the MR-GO was completed in 1965, Hurricane Betsy hit, wreaking
havoc on St. Bernard and the Lower Ninth Ward.  Sen. Boasso may not recall
that horrible event 40 years ago, as he was a young child, however I
remember it well.  At the time, my wife and I had seven children under the
age of nine and she was eight months pregnant.  When the levees breached and
the flood waters began to rise, I put them in a small boat and walked in
chest-deep water well over a mile, pulling them to safety.  It was one of
the most harrowing experiences of my life.  From that day on, years before I
ran for political office, I became a vocal opponent of the MR-GO.  Despite
the property damage and loss of life during Hurricane Betsy in St. Bernard
and the Lower Ninth Ward as well as opposition from the citizens and
environmental groups, the business leaders in the New Orleans area continued
to maintain that the channel was necessary for the regional economy.  With
the support of the federal government, the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers
continued to dredge and maintain the channel.  As the channel enlarged over
the next forty years, experts warned of the potential disaster.  Yet, in the
interest of business, the warnings went unheeded.  Then Katrina struck.

During the recent special session, the Business Council of New Orleans and
the River Region, a group of top executives from various local corporations,
lobbied heavily for the passage of Senate Bill 95.  They even took out
full-page newspaper ads calling for levee reform.  Notably, however, several
of these same executives recently expressed their opposition to the closing
of the MR-GO.  They claimed that the permanent closing of the channel would
result in the loss of business for the Port of New Orleans and force several
companies along the Industrial Canal to relocate.  Some members of our
congressional delegation even agree with them.  

Admittedly, like Sen. Boasso, whose own business relies on the Port, these
business executives may have a valid reason for keeping the MR-GO open.  If
a measure like Senate Bill 95 ever passes and the new single regional levee
board has the support of business, when confronted with the issue of closing
the MR-GO, whose interests do you think will prevail?  Will the board
protect regional business or the human lives in St. Bernard, the Lower Ninth
Ward and eastern Orleans?  If past history is any indication, the City's
business interests will certainly win.  However, in my opinion, it is never
a choice, the protection of human life must always come first, and I will do
everything in my power to insure that it does.

Don't get me wrong.  I realize the necessary and vital role that business
plays in the comeback of the New Orleans region.  I also have a personal
interest in wanting to successfully rebuild the City.  Three of my daughters
reside in New Orleans, two of whom lost their Lakeview homes; one is now
living in Florida and the other in Baton Rouge.  Nonetheless, regionally
speaking, it is undisputed that the residents of both the Lower Ninth Ward
and St. Bernard Parish have always been shortchanged when it comes to
receiving public services and the attention of business and governmental
leaders.  St. Bernard is no longer the rural, sparsely populated parish that
it once was and the Lower Ninth Ward will no longer tolerate being treated
as the City's stepchild just because it is geographically severed from the
rest of New Orleans.  The thousands of residents who live east of the
Industrial Canal and have been displaced as a result of Katrina demand that
their voices be heard and their lives safeguarded.  A large percentage of
them are my constituents from House District 103.  As long as I am serving
in the legislature, I will continue to vote in their best interests. 

Any legislator will tell you that it is easy to vote in favor of a piece of
legislation that is labeled as "reform" if it has the backing of the media
and has no direct impact on one's district.  Perhaps that explains how
Senate Bill 95 passed unanimously in the Senate.  If the true intent of Sen.
Boasso's bill was to create a regional levee board and to take politics out
of the levee system, the Senate passed version of the bill did not achieve
that end, as the West Jefferson Levee District was exempt from the Act and
the Orleans Levee Board still retained control of the New Orleans Lakefront
Airport and its real estate developments. 

In its editorial on November 26th, the Times-Picayune stereotyped all levee
board members as "second-rate political cronies."   How dare it make such a
blanket statement?  Not all elected and appointed public servants are
corrupt and self-serving.  The newspaper does a grave disservice to the
State of Louisiana and its people by perpetuating the image that its public
officials are all deal makers, backwards and corrupt.  Such statements
merely give the members of congress and the powers that be in Washington,
D.C., further reason to delay or deny Louisiana and the Gulf Coast the
financial aid that is so desperately needed. 

Moreover, unlike the Orleans Levee Board, the Lake Borgne Levee District in
St. Bernard has been managed beyond reproach, and patronage and cronyism
does not exist.  Yes, 
Randy Odinet, my nephew, presently serves on the Lake Borgne Levee District.
I appointed him to the board in 2000.  The position is not a part-time or
full-time job and has no salary or benefits.  Board members get paid $75
only when they meet, which averages about once a month.  Many will attest
that Randy is an honest, hardworking, family man.  He had previously served
one four-year term (1988-1992) on the former St. Bernard Parish Police Jury
but decided not to seek a second term.  During his time in office there was
never the slightest hint of impropriety on his part.  Due to his experience
as police juror, Randy was very familiar the operations of the Lake Borgne
Levee District, which is why I asked him to serve on the board.  As
Hurricane Katrina approached, rather than evacuate with his family to
Houston, Randy chose to stay in St. Bernard to assist the levee district
personnel.  When the flood waters topped the levees and inundated the
parish, Randy was one of the first persons to board a boat to start rescuing
people from the rooftops and flooded streets.  Eventually, after saving
hundreds of people over several days, Randy was able to leave St. Bernard by
riding a barge up the Mississippi River to Baton Rouge.  However, prior to
doing so, he gave the keys to his own pick-up truck to parish officials and
told them to use the vehicle for as long as they needed that he would
maintain the insurance on it.  My nephew is not a second-hand political
crony.  In my opinion, he went above and beyond the call of duty.  If the
newspaper wanted to vilify me, an elected official, it was free to do so,
but smearing Randy Odinet's good reputation merely for the purpose printing
a juicy story was poor journalism and totally unnecessary.  

To those who have called, written, and e-mailed me, demanding that I
apologize for my procedural vote on Sen. Bill 95, I hope the foregoing
explanation clarifies my position because you will never get an apology from
me for the way I voted.  Twice in my lifetime I have lost every material
possession that I ever owned, first in Hurricane Betsy and recently in
Hurricane Katrina, but I have never lost my faith in God, my dignity or my
integrity.  I fall asleep at night with a very clear conscience, knowing
that I am doing the best that I can to represent my constituents and to
protect their interests.  Most important, I survived Katrina along with my
wife, children, grandchildren and other loved ones.  Many others were not so
fortunate.

Finally, I want the people to know that I did vote for Senate Bills 27 and
71, which the Governor supported, relative to the creation of a new state
authority to oversee a state plan for coastal restoration and flood control,
while a newly reformed fund will become a depositary for federal revenue
generated by offshore oil and gas activity that might be allocated to the
state for levee and wetlands programs.  I believe the passage of these two
bills will alleviate the federal government's concerns.

                      
                                                          
Sincerely,

Kenneth L. Odinet, Sr.
House District 103
127 Hwy. 22 East-S7
985-845-1205 
(Temporary Location)