Miss. AG considers suit vs Corps

Mississippi Attorney General Jim Hood announced June 13 that he would, as a last resort, sue the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers over widespread environmental damage and aquatic deaths in the Mississippi Sound, which presumably was caused by the release of Mississippi River water through the Bonnet Carré Spillway, about 12 miles west of New Orleans. The spillway has, for the first time in its 88-year history, been opened twice in a single year for two straight years. Openings in February and May have spewed more than six trillion gallons of river water through the spillway that empties into Lake Pontchartrain and then the Mississippi Sound. The water is polluted with chemical-laden sediment that contributes to an oxygen-deprived dead zone and also reduces salinity to intolerable levels for aquatic life (dolphins, oysters) in the Sound. “I’d rather have a conversation with them,” he said. The AG, Secretary of State Delbert Hosemann, and Joe Spraggins, executive at the Mississippi Department of Marine Resources, will meet June 24 with Maj. General Richard G. Kaiser, commander of the Corps’ Mississippi Valley Division. The Corps commander decides whether to open the spillway because he also heads the Mississippi River Commission, which recommends policy, flood control and other aspects of river work. The spillway remains open, without a firm date for closure. (Source: Sun Herald 06/14/19)