NOLA District To Host Open Houses For Tangipahoa Parish Flood Risk Options
The New Orleans Engineer District will host a pair of pre-scoping open houses this month to gather public input for its “Tangipahoa Parish, Louisiana Feasibility Study.” The meetings are set to take place February 15 at the Hammond Police Union Hall in Hammond and February 16 at the First Baptist Church in Kentwood. Both meetings will be streamed on the district’s Facebook page, “USACE NOLA.”
Tangipahoa Parish is located north of Lake Maurepas and Lake Pontchartrain in southeast Louisiana. The parish is home to the communities of Ponchatoula, Hammond, Robert, Kentwood and Tickfaw, and it reaches to the border of Mississippi. Because of its proximity to the lakes and with the Tangipahoa River running along the parish’s western border, Tangipahoa has suffered repeated flooding from tropical storms, high river stages and heavy rainfall. Declared disasters affecting the parish occurred as recently as Hurricane Ida in 2021, multiple tropical storms in 2020 and multiple rainfall events in 2016. The rain-related flooding in 2016 impacted 12,700 homes, 1,500 businesses and 17,000 workers, according to the Corps.
The Corps is proposing a study to identify and evaluate flood risk management options for the parish, with the goal of reducing the severity of flood damages caused by heavy rainfall, riverine flooding and inundation from tropical systems. The feasibility study was authorized in an April 2022 letter from then-Director of Civil Works Col. Alvin Lee. The study is being conducted with full funding from the Corps through investigation funds from the Disaster Relief Supplemental Appropriation Act of 2022 (DRSA).
Besides in-person comments, interested parties may submit written comments to the Corps by mail at: U.S. Army Corps of Engineers, St. Louis District, Attn: Brandon Schneider, Project Manager, 1222 Spruce Street, Room 4.100, St. Louis, MO 63103-2833.
Questions may also be sent by email to tangipahoafs@usace.army.mil.
To learn more about the study, go to mvn.usace.army.mil and search for “Tangipahoa Parish Feasibility Study.”
