Q&A with Landrieu staffers

Landrieu

The Lens contacted Sen. Mary Landrieu’s office recently to discuss her role in the oil spill response. In an interview with Tom Michaels, the senator’s legislative director, and Aaron Saunders, her communications director, we discussed campaign contributions from BP and from the maker of the dispersants and whether drilling for oil continues to be a worthy domestic prospect for the future.

The Lens: What role has Sen. Landrieu played in the decision of what kind of dispersant to use on the oil?m

Tom Michaels: None. That decision is up to the EPA and the on-scene coordinator.
The Lens: In 2008, dispersant-maker Nalco contributed $3,000 to Sen. Landrieu’s campaign. Given that investment in a Louisiana Congress member, does that compromise the decision to prefer it over other brands.

Aaron Saunders: We don’t do anything with campaigns or contributions out of this office.

Michaels: I’ll just say this — the same as with BP — campaign contributions have absolutely zero effects on the policy agenda of the senator as it relates to the spill or generally. A lot of crap comes up about this issue and it gets under my skin. Sen. Landrieu has been a supporter of the oil and gas industries not because she is in love with oil or because she’s getting campaign contributions but because it employs 13.4 percent of people in Louisiana. . If you want to look at campaign contributions I think you have to look at the whole story. Some of the people who gave money to Sen. Landrieu are trial lawyers who will be suing the pants off many of these companies involved in the spill.

The Lens: Does Sen. Landrieu support offshort drilling as a permanent part of the nation’s energy policy future, or as a temporary bridge to renewable, carbon-neutral sources?

Michaels: She absolutely believes that it’s a bridge to future renewable energy sources. These groups that are calling for us to stop drilling, though, they are immoral and they are doing more at abandoning the environment than the oil companies. Stopping domestic oil production doesn’t do anything to reduce our consumption of oil. This entire country and world consumes oil. If we don’t get it here we will get it from somewhere else. And those other places will have more lax regulatory standards, and will lack the will and resources to deal with their ecosystems.

Saunders: A lot of offshore drilling is for exploration of natural gas and a huge swath of people believe that this can be a bridge to take us away from fossil fuels. The Lens: Do you believe that environmental groups are framing it as a black-and-white issue, where oil is evil and renewable is perfect?

Michaels: Yes, I couldn’t agree with that more, and I think the senator would agree as well. The way she came to be involved with the oil and gas industries, she saw it as a revenue source to fund the revitalization of the coast and wetlands. Throughout that time she has come to learn more about the industry. She respects them as people providing a commodity that people need, but I don’t think she thinks they are heroes, or better or worse than any other company.

Saunders: We are working with the conservation groups. In fact, in the last two weeks we’ve introduced the revenue sharing bill so that a fair share of revenue from the oil and gas industries is diverted back to Louisiana. A whole sweep of conservation groups  endorsed this plan and the sharing of revenue so we are working with these groups, and so it’s not a black and white issue, and those who call it a black and white issue are on the fringe here.

The Lens: Have you considered the irony that for the state’s coastal restoration, you are asking for revenue from the very industries that are right now destroying the coast?

Michaels: I think that is why it should come from them. I I think again you would still have tankers coming up to the LOOP (Louisiana Offshore Oil Port) and to New Orleans and that would also place the wetlands at risk, just as much as offshore drilling would. So the middle ground is that we will continue drilling and also keep tightening the knot on regulation, but accidents will happen again I’m sure. In the meantime, you will pay to invest in the communities that bear the risk and will be most heavily impacted.

Saunders: That is precisely the argument that Senator Landrieu is making. This has definitely been exacerbated by the oil spill, but this is not the result of the oil spill.

Michaels: You take from nature, you have to give back to nature. But this has been a century of mismanagement, of the oil and gas pipelines and everything else. This is an ecological disaster that has been unfolding for a hundred years. This is just the latest squirt of lemon juice into the wound.

Alternative for dispersants to break up oil hampered by politics and bureaucracy

Fewer controversial oil-spill issues exist right now than the use of dispersants.

Specifically, environmentalists, residents and clean-up workers are concerned about BP’s  use of petroleum-based Corexit brand, which is more toxic than many of the alternatives approved by the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency and is only 55 percent effective on the type of oil gushing into the Gulf of Mexico.

Consider the scene a few weeks ago at a town hall meeting in eastern New Orleans where a BP representative said that with the help of the dispersants, “we expect oil that sinks to the bottom will be naturally remediated.”

The statement was met with laughter, except for one man who made a beeline to the microphone to ask sternly whether BP expected them to believe that the oil would clear up by “letting nature take its course.” When the BP rep responded yes, more laughter ensued.

But on this point, BP is right. A natural biodegradation of oil occurs in the ocean, and dispersants help that. Microbes in the ocean feast on oil, particularly its hydrocarbons. The dispersants carve that feast into tinier portions so that those microbes can feast faster.

But it remains an open question whether BP chose the best dispersant manufacturer – not merely the most convenient or influential – and whether the federal government was realistic or serious when it ordered BP to find an alternative.

The dispersant Corexit EC9527A is being used underwater while its sister Corexit 9500 was being used on the surface; BP has discontinued surface spraying of the chemical at EPA’s request. A key chemical in the underwater compound, 2-butoxyethanol, is toxic, but not nearly as toxic as the oil itself. Studies show that the chemical causes reproductive disorders and birth defects in animals, but there’s no research for humans. If inhaled, it may cause nausea, headaches, eyes and nose irritation for those exposed at mild levels.

Last week, workers involved in oil clean-up where dispersants have been used were hospitalized, complaining of dizziness and nausea. The Coast Guard subsequently pulled 125 boats from the area.

But the company hasn’t stopped using Corexit – it has used 800,000 gallons so far – even while BP and EPA are continuing scientific reviews to find alternatives.

BP spokesman Graham MacEwen said the company committed to Corexit because officials “believe it to be the lowest toxicity brand within the quantities that we need. However EPA has asked us to look at other options and we continue to do that.”

EPA at first endorsed using Corexit, but then backed off on May 20, giving BP 24 hours to identify a less toxic alternative, and another 48 hours for the company to begin using it. But the switch never happened.

BP said in response that no suitable alternative existed, which is not true. Dispersit, produced by the New York-based U.S. Polychemical Corporation, is a non-petroleum based solvent that is far less toxic and is more effective [b2] on this type of oil, according to EPA data. Another alternative, Sea Brat #4, was sitting in Houston – 100,000 gallons of it.

Alabaster Corp. makes Sea Brat, and CEO Charles Sheffield said BP didn’t pick it up until late last week – about two weeks after EPA ordered an alternative.

“At the time they got the directive, the material was stocked in our yard waiting for them to take it, and they didn’t,” Sheffield said.

MacEwen said he wasn’t aware of and couldn’t comment on the specifics involving Sea Brat.

The reason these alternatives, as well as at least four others – Nokomis 3-F4, Nokomis 3-AA, Mare Clean 200 and Neos AB3000 – weren’t picked, said BP in its response to EPA, is because the company officials felt they didn’t have enough time to obtain the information necessary for scientific analysis of those other brands. They also responded that the other companies couldn’t match the amount of Corexit that they already had stockpiled. Some of the other companies’ officials said they could have deployed more of their product if they had more lead time.

Which leads to the question: Did any of the alternatives ever really have a shot at being used by BP?

EPA seems not to have had an “or else” in mind if BP did not honor their request. EPA said in a public statement that BP’s response is “insufficient” and told The Lens that it is “not satisfied that BP has done an extensive enough analysis.”

Despite having three branches of enforcement, EPA referred questions about possible  punishment to the Justice Department.

Sheffield said he thinks that BP has only ever wanted to use Corexit because Nalco’s board of directors include a former BP executive.

While the Sea Brat #4 was one of the five identified by BP as best meeting the criteria from EPA’s directive, BP stated it had problems with it because a trace amount of one of its ingredients might degrade into nonylphenol, which is an endocrine disruptor. Still, that didn’t stop BP from ordering a supply of it.

U.S. Polychemical, which makes the Dispersit product, also felt constrained by time.

“BP contacted me a few weeks ago inquiring about our product but then never placed an order,” said Bruce Gephardt, CEO of U.S. Polychemical. “Then (on May 20), right after the edict from EPA, they asked how fast they can get large quantities for the Gulf. Then on Friday I was told, ‘Everything’s on hold, we’ll get back to you.’”

Richard Fredricks, president of Maritime Solutions, which helps market U.S. Polychemical, said it would have been difficult for any company to get bulk dispersant together in the time EPA allowed.

“EPA only gave BP 72 hours to start using a new product, but I don’t know of any dispersant manufacturer who keeps a stockpile of materials on hand that could be produced in three days,” Fredricks said.

Even the 24-hour deadline EPA imposed upon BP to simply identify another product appears to have been too short to meet. When BP began doing its analysis of the other brands, it hit the same blockade that many in the public have encountered: acquiring the confidential information about the composition of the different formulas. Scientists, journalists and concerned citizens have been asking in vain for this information from Nalco and the other companies for five weeks.

Fredricks said that U.S. Polychemical has given that information to BP and EPA, but only late last week, and only after requiring that neither would divulge proprietary information.

Fredricks is disappointed with the lack of time, but encouraged that the federal government is considering options to Corexit.

“I think BP and EPA are doing the right thing,” Fredricks said. “Would it have been better if they did this five years ago? Of course. But I’m glad they are doing it now.”

The company that makes Corexit, Nalco, which is based in Naperville, Il., is heavily invested in Louisiana both politically and economically.

Nalco, which manufactures its Corexit in Sugar Land, Texas, has a political action committee, and has contributed to congressional campaigns in Louisiana. Alabaster and U.S. Polychemical do not have PACs and don’t contribute to campaigns.

“We have no political connections, zero,” Gephardt said.

Nalco contributed $3,000 to U.S. Sen. Mary Landrieu’s 2008 campaign, more than it gave any other candidate that year.

Landrieu’s legislative director, Tom Michaels, and spokesman Aaron Saunders, said the senator has not been involved in any decisions over what dispersant to use, and that despite the Nalco campaign contribution they wouldn’t say Landrieu knows anything about Nalco.  Michaels said that Nalco requested a meeting with him and the senator, but it never happened.

Nalco’s campaign donations reach back further than 2008. In 2000, Nalco contributed to the campaigns of then U.S. Reps. Richard Baker, a Republican, $500; Chris John, a Democrat, $500, and Billy Tauzin, a Republican, $1,000.  In 2002, they gave $1,000 again to Tauzin. In 2004, they gave $500 to Rep. Jim McCrery, a Republican; another $1,000 to Tauzin; and $1,000 to his son Billy Tauzin III. Nalco gave nothing in 2006.

Besides not having the advantage of being a political player, Alabaster and U.S. Polychemical are both privately held. Meanwhile, Nalco is publicly traded, with stockholders to satisfy. Nalco’s lobbyists have been beefing up in recent weeks, with their chief lobbyist meeting with Congress members to win brand loyalty from them.

Also, some members of Nalco’s board of directors are former oil corporation executives. Director Rodney F. Chase, worked at BP for 38 years; Daniel S. Sanders, worked 43 years for Exxon-Mobil, the company that first manufactured Corexit.

Nalco also has a significant presence in Louisiana, namely in St. John the Baptist Parish, where they have a chemical plant for water treatment and dredged material treatment products. In November, the parish hired Nalco to review the failures of a water quality system in LaPlace. In 2008, Nalco won the controversial approval of the parish’s Planning and Zoning commission for an 80-acre extension of their facility in Garyville.

A spokesman for St. John the Baptist did not return calls for comment.

“The original thinking to use Corexit might have had merit,” Fredricks said, “but in light of more modern more friendly dispersant, it in fact now might be a mistake to exclusively focus on one old brand of dispersant. Early on that might have made sense in terms of standardization but now with all the additional testing, it makes more sense to go with a more marine environment-friendly option.

Despite AG’s position, Corps says no decision made on creating dredged islands

Reports saying that the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers has approved an environmental permit needed to create sand barrier islands are false, Corps Public Affairs Chief for New Orleans Ken Holder.

“It is correct to say it is still under review,” Holder said in an email to The Lens. Holder said there is nothing else the Corps is reporting at this time.

This afternoon, WBRZ Channel 2 News in Baton Rouge reported that Attorney General Buddy Caldwell said the Corps “approved Louisiana’s plan for using sand booms to protect sensitive marsh lands from the oil leak in the Gulf of Mexico.”

Plaquemines Parish President Billy Nungesser said on Saturday that a Corps official said the plan would be rejected. This was immediately disputed by the Corps, which said no decision had been made.

Meanwhile, Gov. Bobby Jindal and a state delegation of Congress members and legislators have been calling for the Corps to hurry with a decision on whether or not to begin dredging to build the barriers. At a news conference on the Louisiana coast today, Interior Secretary Ken Salazar added his voice to that chorus.

Boats moored by the BP oil spill, a long-threatened community of black fishers fears for its future

Headed down La. 39 on the east bank of Plaquemines Parish, a few miles down after the Belle Chasse Ferry, drivers pass a tall, white picket fence on the left with a sign that reads “Welcome White Ditch” in a circle around an outline of the state  with a pelican inside. A few yards ahead, to the right are two rusting red pipes connected to the Mississippi River which dip below the highway and then surface on the left to flush river water into a fenced-off canal that leads to acres of marsh and bayou.

This is the White’s Ditch Siphon. But to some in the area, it is a division marker. From this point south are  predominantly African-American communities such as Phoenix, Davant and Pointe a la Hache. The communities north of this mark are mostly white.

But also what lies south of this point are communities that for decades kept themselves alive through oyster harvesting and shrimp trawling. The history of this small, historically black community of fishermen and women stretches back to the early 20th century. That legacy continues today, though somewhat diluted over the past 40 years as some younger residents traded a living on the water for jobs in the energy industry. What’s left of that proud maritime heritage, though, is being threatened by the catastrophic BP oil disaster, which could choke the life out of the bays and shores on which the communities depend.

Ironically, one approach to keeping the oil away could itself finish off the black fishing community here.

State officials have opened Mississippi River diversions, such as the White’s Ditch Siphon, hoping that a strong outward flow of water will keep the oil out of the bayou and marsh where it could persist for decades, and ruin the already brittle wetlands . But emptying that much fresh water into the oyster beds throws off the delicate salinity balance the bivalves need to survive.

When the White’s Ditch Siphon was installed in 1963, it destroyed most of the oyster beds owned by African Americans, said Byron Encalade, president of the Louisiana Oysterman Association. Encalade says he had close to 1,500 acres of oyster beds before the White Ditch intrusion and now has about 200 acres. At peak, blacks owned almost 10,000 acres collectively, but now maybe 1,500, he said.

The state might open another diversion in the Bohemia Spillway, a couple of miles south of White’s Ditch. If reopened now, it would throw another flow of freshwater into the brackish habitat Encalade’s oystermen depend on. That will hurt, says Neal Beshel, who runs the marina office at Point a la Hache. “You need a little fresh water introduced out there, but if you get too much out there it’ll hurt the oysters,” he said. “I’m against it.”

Encalade was more direct: “That will wipe us out.Our community will not have any black-owned oyster leases left. It will finish us off.”

Despite this threat to their livelihoods, African Americans here say they are being overlooked by BP as the oil giant looks to hire locals for cleanup work.

At the Pointe a la Hache boat harbor, behind the marina’s office, five African-American men gather over a pile of crabs, picking them up, sizing them and tossing them in boxes.  All of them attended the BP “Vessels of Opportunity” job training held in their community, but none of them got work from it. One of them, Orin Bentley, sweating profusely under a straw hat and pulling crabs with thick hands scarred like hacked wood, said they likely won’t either.

“They ain’t calling us back,” Bentley said. “They ain’t hiring nobody from East Bank. We losing everything – losing our business, losing our money and losing our minds.”

There are no hard numbers on the demographics of the people hired by BP. A look at the legal form for participants in Vessels of Opportunity program shows inquiries into the make, model, vessel capacity, and fuel capacity of the boat being used, but no questions about the  race, gender or even date of birth of the trainee. Patrick Kelley, a data collector for the U.S. Coast Guard, said that while the petrochemical giant has no other method to track those employed, they have developed an informal approach to demographics: checking the spelling of the names on the agreements. Using that method, he estimates that about 200 Vietnamese or Cambodian fishers have gotten jobs, about a third of a total of about 600 hires, he said. This number represents less than18 percent of the total 3,200 people who have attended trainings and received certification to work in the cleanup.

Activists and advocates  say that without this information, government has no way of ensuring that BP is hiring fairly. Last week, Rev. Tyrone Edwards, an African-American activist out of Phoenix, a small black town near Pointe a La Hache, brought that message to Capitol Hill. Traveling with the Equity and Inclusion Campaign and Oxfam America, Edwards met with California Democrat Congresswoman Maxine Waters about making sure that blacks and other minorities are not left out of cleanup employment opportunities. Waters is expected to hold hearings about this issue this week.

“We know who’s been absent from the table was black fishermen,” Edwards said. “Not only were the black ones not there, but you had all the guys owning large vessels, and the large vendors who were at the table. So I said we’ve got to be more involved in this process. Right now BP needs to be saying, ‘We are paying you this money because your water bottoms are closed.’ They have the responsibility to pay us while we are not working, especially the fishermen on the east bank”

Rev. Edwards isn’t himself a fisher, but has a long history of advocating on their behalf, dating back to 1979 when he helped form The Fishermen and Concerned Citizens of Plaquemines Parish. He led that organization in a successful fight to overturn a law banning the use of a small hand dredges, often used by small commercial black fishers. They also fought for better wages and better work protection for black crewmembers, while also helping black fishers with boat ownership.

These days, Rev. Edwards heads the Zion Travelers Cooperative Center, which has led post-Katrina rebuilding efforts in southeast Plaquemines — much of which was flattened by storm surges. He’s also been working with Plaquemines Parish president Billy Nungesser on a plan to have BP come accommodate some of the overlooked fishers. Nungesser says that so far BP has agreed to set up a place on the east bank where fishers can receive assistance with the claims process or sign up for hazardous materials clean-up training if needed.

It will be a “place where I can put some of my people there becasue I think [BP is] bullshitting them,” said Nungesser. “They are not helping them express their true losses. Some of those fisherman in east bank aren’t educated and some are intimidated but they are hardworking people. So we need something so that when they come in it won’t feel like them against BP.”

One local person who’s future is in jeopardy is a man who doesn’t fish himself, but has been making a living off selling large Gulf shrimp off the back of his truck in New Orleans. Keilen Williams, the 34-year-old “New Orleans Shrimp Man”, comes from four generations of oystermen and shrimpers. He once shrimped, but now calls himself an “advocate for shrimpers,” much in the way that Encalade is an advocate for oystermen.

“I’m connected to so many fishers that I didn’t have to fish no more,” Williams said. “They need a voice. They needed me to get this together, this black representation for them because we feel like we are losing our heritage.”

Williams has been writing to city council members and talking with local media, such as WBOK morning show host Gerod Stevens, about how black fishers in southeast Plaquemines have not received the protection and assistance other communities have.  This is important to New Orleanians in particular because much of the oysters and shrimp they eat at restaurants come from black fishers in Pointe a La Hache.

Every day, the Pointe a la Hache marina is paid a visit by Rodney Fox, owner of R&A Oyster Co., who collects thousands of coffebean sacks of oysters – each containing 100 to 150 oysters in them – from black, and increasingly Mexican, oystermen. Fox purchases them for about $25 a sack, and then sells them to restaurants and markets throughout the state and country.

Williams is trying to duplicate the same success in New Orleans. When not advocating, Williams is working to establish a fresh seafood and vegetable market in the city. There, he would sell shrimp, oysters and fish at low prices thanks to his relationships with the black fishers in Plaquemines. Already, he’s registered with the state as “New Orleans Shrimpman LLC” and pursued grants from the city to help get the business off the ground.

All of that is put on hold now, though, due to the oil spill.

“Consumers will be skeptical about buying shrimp now,” Williams said. “They opened shrimp season early, when they weren’t the size they were supposed to be yet.”

In previous years, Williams was able to earn about $100,000 a year selling shrimp from Pointe a la Hache in New Orleans, tax returns show. He was hoping this year to ink contracts with big-time suppliers such as Costco and Wal-Mart. That would have tripled his income, he says, but instead it feels more like a distant dream with every passing day of oil and riverwater seeping into the marsh and boats remaining tied up.

“This is all I know, water and seafood,” Williams said. “It feels like I’m losing my heritage. If I don’t do this — black people already have been stripped of their identity. This will finish us.”

photos by Shawn Escoffery

Nungesser says Corps has rejected state’s plea for dredged oil barriers

Nungesser

The U.S. Army Corps of Engineers will not allow land barriers to be built to protect the state’s coastline, Plaquemines Parish Billy Nungesser told The Lens today.

“They turned it down,” Nungesser said. “They denied the plan to do the barrier islands, so I don’t know, so we’ll have to come up with something else. We’re going to plan B, but I don’t know what plan B is.”

The project was heavily pushed by Gov. Bobby Jindal, who has said it’s the best way to protect the coastline.

Nungesser said he was given the bad news late Friday by Corps Col. Alvin Lee, who likewise advocated for the barriers. The new land masses, similar to levees, would collect oil before it reached fragile coastal wetlands.

Contacted Saturday, though, Lee said his agency is still evaluating the request and has not denied the necessary permit, though the approval of the entire plan is outside of his authority. The Corps is charged with evaluating such permit requests, which calls for bringing in massive amounts of dredged material from up to 100 miles away, to ensure they comply with the federal Clean Water Act.

Nungesser and Jindal want  a 90-mile sand barrier to block oil from infiltrating the marsh east of the Mississippi River. Some of that oil already has encroached wetlands in the Pass a Loutre area. The barrier island would prevent a deeper saturation level of oil as it becomes harder to contain.

“I’ve been lied to about pumping this sediment for the islands,” Nungesser said. “Not once has even so many environmentalists agreed on something – not one has stood up and said, ‘Don’t do this barrier island, the risk is too great.’ I think BP got to them.”

Lee said the entire decision is out of his hands.

“I’m the permit decision-maker,” Lee said. “If you’re asking about regulatory-permit authority under the Clean Water Act, we have not denied that permit. I don’t have any comment on any other denial or permits for this plan. We have nothing to do with whether the entire plan will be approved.”

Corp spokeswoman Amanda Jones said that the barrier island is “not a Corps project,” but a state project.

She said the agency is evaluating the plan under its emergency permit procedures. The state plan already has been greatly modified based on Corps comment. The Corps is now evaluating that modified plan, she said.

She doesn’t know why Nungesser said the Corp rejected the plan.

“We’ve been saying all along that it’s under evaluation, and no decision has been made,” she said. “I’m not sure why anyone has said otherwise.”

Landrieu’s environmental office on hold during oil spill

With an environmental disaster imminent off the Louisiana coast, the New Orleans government’s web page on “Coastal Restoration”  is blank – as is the seat for the mayor’s director of Office of Environmental Affairs.

While it’s noted on the city’s home page that the site is being redesigned, the page for Coastal Restoration is tabula rasa while other pages under the Office of Environmental Affair’s site –  ”Brownfields Program,” “Climate Protection,” “Home Energy Efficiency” – all have content.

As for the empty director’s seat,  a spokesman for Mayor Mitch Landrieu said in an e-mailed statement that it’s up in the air.

“The administration is in the process of evaluating the responsibilities of the Office of Environmental Affairs and its role in the new deputy mayor structure,” spokesman Ryan Berni wrote.

Meanwhile, environmental advocates say the oil spill has produced, in some areas of the region, high levels of hydrogen sulfide, the evidence of which can be smelled throughout New Orleans and the region. The Louisiana Bucket Brigade has an interactive map that cites dozens of complaints from residents about foul, nauseating stenches. Bucket Brigade Director Anne Rolfes said the city can and should be doing something about it.

“The city could be doing some air monitoring of their own,” Rolfes said. “The mayor has a lot of power, but what you usually see is local officials abdicating their power, saying, ‘It’s not my job. It’s EPA’s.’ ”

The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency has been involved in monitoring air quality since the spill, but it is relying on fixed monitors placed in just six areas – three in St. Bernard Parish and three in the southern tip of Plaquemines Parish, near Venice.

If the city lacks monitoring systems, or a response in general to the environmental threat, it’s because its Office of Environmental Affairs not only lacks a director, but also a budget. The office, which opened in 1994 and does not fall under the city charter, operates mostly to review policy, but it has no policy-creation or enforcement authority.

Under its former director, Wynecta Fisher, who’s now on leave, the office was involved in matters such as reviewing permits for development  in or near wetlands. But, as Fisher told a group last month, the office “hasn’t had a budget since the storm,” and that the mayor can decide whether to keep or change the office.

Berni said deputy mayor Lt. Col. Jerry Sneed is leading the Office of Emergency Preparedness in developing an “oil encroachment plan” to protect Lake Pontchartrain, in conjunction with adjoining parishes.

The St. Tammany Parish website has a message from Parish President Kevin Davis that says the plan is 95 percent complete.

Effectiveness of BP training may be lost in translation

Creative Commons License photo credit: yummyporky

A special oil-spill class set up by BP Tuesday to train Vietnamese fishers in their native language went poorly, with translators giving up just minutes into the four-hour session, and bilingual audience members struggling to fill the gap, one observer said.

Those attending got the necessary certification and are qualified to be called into service by BP, but it’s not clear how many in the class of 200 people comprehended the oil-cleanup and safety information presented.

One BP official admitted that the interpreters spoke a different dialect than the audience, and another said the company still intends to provide information to non-English speakers, though he didn’t elaborate.

About 20 minutes into the class, the Vietnamese interpreting was stopped and the training continued in English, said Lauren Butz, who works for the Mary Queen of Vietnam Community Development Corportation, which helped organize the event. Some of the bilingual fishers volunteered to translate questions as they arose but “they seemed frustrated,” she said.

The training session is required before the sailors can add their names to a BP list of available workers. Hundreds have attended several such classes across the region, but BP has said it needs only small percentage of those who qualified.

Mary Queen of Vietnam Church pastor, the Rev. Vien Nguyen, requested the training at a community forum Friday. The community group was told Monday afternoon that the class was set for Tuesday, which organizers said was barely enough time to contact the fishers, who are spread throughout the area.

The Community Development Corporation is now requesting that BP pay the fishers for their time in training, but it doesn’t appear that BP will be entertaining that request. The company has not paid any other of the trainees, which it euphemistically refers to as “volunteers,” even though they are paid contract workers.
“We did not set this up to pay people to attend the trainings,” BP representative Hugh Depland said in an interview this morning. “I woud be happy to bring that into the conversation around how we are going to recruit and deploy people, but we have made it very clear that people who want to volunteer can do so and can take the training, but that there will be many more people wanting to have their boats involved than we can hire.”

Depland said that BP’s claims process will provide a month’s pay of $5,000 for those fishers not hired in the clean up.

There have been complaints that the claims phone operators  do not speak Vietnamese. BP spokeswoman Melanie Ostopowich said that issue has been addressed.

“If someone calls in and requests a Vietnamese adjuster, we’ll take their information down and have one of our adjusters call them back,” she said.

She didn’t know precisely how many Vietnamese speakers are on staff, but she said there were several.

Uneasy living in Lafitte

Chaz Bizani and Tess Bourdreux share their concerns during a tour of the waters around Lafitte.

Last week, The Lens traveled to Lafitte in Jefferson Parish to talk with fishers whose livelihoods may be severely hampered, if not suspended by the BP oil spill. On that day, May 4, the oil hadn’t invaded lakes and estuaries that far in from the Gulf, nor had shrimping, crab-catching and fishing been closed down yet in this area. We spoke to Chaz Bizani and his girlfriend Tess Boudreaux, a crabber and shrimper respectively, who shared with us how the oil would affect their catch, and also the unproductive experience they had at a training session held by BP in their community for fishers who wanted to help with the oil containment. As of May 9, their concerns of losing their ability to fish became a reality when Louisiana Department of Wildlife and Fisheries began shutting down fishing activities, due to oil infiltration. Here’s what Bizani and Boudreaux had to say:

The Lens: So at the fishers recruiter meeting you attended, what did BP reps say they would provide for protection?

Bizani: Rubber suits and gloves, but they didn’t say anything about respirators. You sweat and that stuff gets in your pores. For me, I have small children. My youngest son is 2-years-old. I might want to have more kids. I don’t want to be dead in 10 years because I made a couple thousand dollars. I just want to do what I love. That’s why everybody’s here. They talked about going out in the boat for a few months, but if they shut us down for five years what are we going to do? I broke my rotator cuff and I can’t get a normal job because I can’t pass no physical. I can’t touch the ground. I’m in therapy now.

The Lens: Why do you believe it will be five years before you can fish again?

Bizani: Because that’s what they said. It could be four to five months before they stop the leak they said. The seafood won’t be able to be eaten for five years.

The Lens: So have you signed any contracts to work with them?

Bizani: I haven’t signed a contract or agreed to anything yet because I don’t think any of them know what to do. It’s just so much panic right now. We may just wait and get unemployment because that’s what they told us to do, get some food stamps, and have them pay our light bills, because that’s what they said. I’m not going out there to lose my boat and then be held responsible, because that’s my life. I’ve worked from that boat all my life.

The Lens: What happens if your boat encounters oil?

Bizani: Well, on the boat you have to cover your shrimp with ice so that [the shrimp] won’t get tainted with the oil. But in my boat I have crabs in boxes that sit on the floor, so if it gets all over the floor then the whole boat is tainted. What am I supposed to do?

The Lens: Did they mention helping you clean your boats?

Bizani: Nothing was mentioned about that. You maintain your own boat. See, if I get that crude oil on my engine it will burn the engine up. They want you to have your own insurance on your boat and all of that. The motor is our main concern. A boat ain’t a boat without a motor. My boat is worth $20,000. My motor is $10,000. It’s $25,000 to $40,000 for some engines. I once paid $13,000 for a used motor that I lost in [Hurricane Katrina].

The Lens: Do you carry liability on your boat?

Bizani: No, because it’s usually just me and my friends. You can’t just bring a random person on the boat. Really there’s no way you can get hurt, but stuff happens. I can’t afford to pay liability. Since Katrina, you really can’t afford anything. Before Katrina, I had excellent credit. Right now I can’t get nothing. I can’t get a loan.

The Lens: How will your boating supplies be handled?

Boudreaux: They said you have to buy your own supplies. Your own life jackets, and your flares. The only thing they supply you with is the gloves, and the jumpsuits and some kind of oil to put on your skin.

The Lens: How many people in Lafitte would you estimate do commercial fishing?

Boudreaux: I’d say about 80 percent of the city makes their living off the water

The Lens: When are your normal crab and shrimp seasons?

Bizani: I don’t have a season, I’m all-year round.

Boudreaux: For shrimp, it’s six months out of the year. For those six months we go until July and then they stop for a few weeks before opening it back up in December. After December you have to go out in the Gulf to go trawl.

Bizani: But they have boundaries out in the Gulf, and if you go too far they’ll take your nets and your catch.

The Lens: So will the criminal background checks keep fishers from work?

Bizani: Yes, they background check, drug test, and all of that. The company doing it is Advanced Industrial Services in Texas. Why it’s in Texas I don’t know. This is also through the [Louisiana] Workforce Commission. I filled out an application with them first before I got the BP contract. But I said I’m not signing anything because I don’t know what to look for now. I’ve already gotten the raw end of the deal before. I didn’t read the fine print. In school, I couldn’t comprehend what I read so I have to get [Boudreaux] to read it for me. I need someone to read it for me so I can understand. When I read, I just read words. I have to keep going over it.

The Lens: Is there tension among the fishers over the background checks and drug tests?

Bizani: Yeah, everybody is getting tense. We don’t want a lot of money just enough to get by — a certain amount of salary. If they need us to all go in, we go in and go take care of it. We already know where to go. This is our water. Instead of bringing the Coast Guard in from New York, who can’t get a boat off a trailer — one fisherman had to help get a boat off a trailer for five Coast Guard men. They’re lost and they don’t know where they are around here.

One guy came up to me, and he said, ‘Where am I at?’ I said, ‘Excuse me?’ He said, ‘Where am I at?’ I said, ‘You have GPS.’ He said, ‘Yeah, but it doesn’t have the name of where I’m at.’ I said, ‘Sir, you are in The Pen.’ He goes, ‘Well can you show me out?’ I said, ‘Look, there’s Lafitte right there. Do you see the bridge? Go that way.’ I watched him go off and let him go.

With new app, oil spill can cast its shadow over any city

If it’s a bit difficult getting your brain around how large the BP oil spill is, try this application out for size. Using Google Earth and maps from the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration, Paul Rademacher, an engineering manager for Google, has devised a website where you can have the shape of the spill projected over a map of any city.

For New Orleans, the spill would cover all of the city, then stretch as far north as the top border of St. Tammany parish. From east to west, it would stretch from as far away as the Mississippi-Alabama border to deep into Lafourche and St. James parishes.

For you East Coast folks, the oil would blanket New York City and reach to Jersey City and Newark. For Washington, D.C., it would cover the greater Maryland-Virginia area. And going tropical, it would cover most of Hawaii’s Big Island.

If you’re reading this, you already missed BP job training

BP was holding a training session, similar to this one last week in Boothville, in eastern New Orleans Tuesday specifically for Vietnamese fishers.

Today, the City of New Orleans announced a special oil spill job training session put on by BP in eastern New Orleans that will be held, well, today.

On Friday, BP representative Hugh Depland arranged for a training session catering to the Vietnamese community, to be held at the Mary Queen of Vietnam church, at the request of the church’s pastor, the Rev. Vien Nguyen. The time, place and date would be announced later, Depland said.That announcement, at least from the city, came only hours before the 2 p.m. session held at the Mary Queen of Vietnam School. Members of the community got a bit more notice. Word reached the Mary Queen of Vietnam Community Development Corporation Monday about 4 p.m., said John Nguyen, a community organizer in the area. Still, he said, that was barely enough notice for many of the far-flung fisherman who made the trek in Friday.

On Friday, Depland told the gathering, “I don’t care where you live or where you fish out of, we will provide you training,” and the city’s announcement also states that “all interested parties are encouraged to attend.”

But with such short notice many might have missed out. The city also announced two more sessions Wednesdayin Slidell..

The city makes clear in its announcement that the training sessions may not actually lead to jobs.

“It is important to remember that the completion of this course and a signed contractual agreement does not guarantee your vessel will be used in oil spill operations,” reads the media advisory.

Depland told the Vietnamese community Friday that BP has “a lot more people volunteering for work than they have jobs.”