The federal government has approved the state’s plan to spend one-point-two billion dollars in grant money that will be used to reduce the flood risk for several communities. Director of the Louisiana Office of Community Development, Pat Forbes, says they’ll implement the plan as fast as possible.
“As you can imagine it’s going to take a while to spend 1.2 billion dollars well, which is what we need to do,” said Forbes.
Forbes says they expect the money will become available in the spring and they’ll start using the dollars to improve rain and river gauges and models for every watershed in the state.
“And so once we get that information that’s when we are going to be able to identify the highest and best use of these funds for reducing flood risk,” said Forbes.
Forbes says the Louisiana Watershed Initiative will work with regional steering communities to guide flood mitigation decisions and investments.
“And we are really looking forward to people involved in making decisions to reduce flood risk in their communities,” said Forbes.
