Corps to Vitter: We'll do our job

Following up to the dust-up between the Corps and, well, rational thought regarding the closure of the MRGO...

Today, this appeared in the Times-Picayune:

Corps agrees to alter MR-GO work plans

Basically, the Corps has decided to honor the letter and spirit of the law when it comes to what was stated in the 4th Katrina supplemental bill regarding funding for the MRGO. For more detailed information on that language, please see the comments attached to my previous post on this topic.

Here's the relevant quote from the article:

"The Army Corps of Engineers has agreed to scrap plans to use most of $75 million added to the agency's New Orleans maintenance budget last year to place rocks and concrete mats on the banks of the Mississippi River-Gulf Outlet to prevent erosion, U.S. Sen. David Vitter, R-La., said Tuesday.

Instead, some of the money will be redirected to where Vitter says he intended it to be spent: designing ways to plug the channel to block storm surge from the Gulf of Mexico, corps Deputy Director of Civil Works Steven Stockton confirmed."

It's remarkable that it takes two laws from Congress (the second a clarification of the first due to the obstinancy of the Corps) and a Senatorial meeting with the highest echelons of the Corps to get them moving on what should be obvious: the problems caused by the MRGO need to be addressed immediately for the safety and well being of thousands of citizens of the United States.