Louisiana’s flood protection systems weathered five named storms this year and appear to be doing ok. Matt Doyle has the story.
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A UNO Survey shows Governor Edwards has a 56-percent job approval rating. Brooke Thorington has more
cut 2 (30) “I’m Brooke Thorington”
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The Coastal Protection and Restoration Authority believes the state’s flood protection systems are in good shape after tested by a record hurricane season.
CPRA Chief of Engineering Rudy Simoneaux says one problem area was the Burrito Levee in Grand Isle that breached during Zeta. He says it will need some repairs.
The Burrito Levee is a seven-mile, 13-foot tall structure of dry clay covered in tarp protecting the city that faces the Gulf. Despite the breach, most Grand Isle homes are reportedly ok due to being highly elevated on stilts.
Simoneaux says this week they’re aiming to get down into lower Terrebonne Parish near Cocodrie where the storm made landfall for further inspections.
Simoneaux says a lot of the projects out in southwest Louisiana did pretty well despite being hammered by Laura and Delta.
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Amendment 7 on the statewide ballot would protect unclaimed property money in a new trust fund. Public Affairs Research Council President Robert Travis Scott says each year if new collections entrusted to the Treasurer exceed what’s collected by rightful owners, the difference goes into the state’s general fund.
Scott says in the past the Treasurer’s Office on average would locate approximately 25-thousand owners annually, but now Treasure John Schroder with new technology and more staff is locating 250-thousand owners a year. So there is less excess to go to the general fund.
Unclaimed property consists of for example your grandmother purchased you a CD and the bank couldn’t find you, it’s then turned over to the state…
Proponents of the Amendment say it protects money that belongs to the people. Opponents say the program has existed for close to 50 years and has never had more claims than collections in a year.
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A UNO Research Center survey indicates a 56-percent job approval rating for Governor John Bel Edwards. The random poll of 755 respondents asked participants to rate his job performance and also questioned about COVID-19. Research Center Director, Professor Ed Chervenak…
Chervenak says 67-percent of respondents feel COVID is a serious problem and that is proportionate with Edwards job approval rating.
Cut 10 (11) “overwhelmingly disapprove”
A gender gap is present in the job approval ratings of the Democratic governor. Half of the males surveyed favored the governor’s job performance while 61-percent of females approved. Chervenak says nationally women tend to vote democrat.
Cut 11 (09) “…Republican State.”
The survey was conducted on October 22
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Power should be back on for most Zeta-impacted customers by Wednesday but could be out for pockets of customers in the lower southeast parishes until Saturday according to Entergy.
Entergy CEO Phillip May says the lower portions of Plaquemines, St. Bernard, Jefferson, and Lafourche Parishes took a real beating.
The election is Tuesday and May says for polling stations that don’t have power by then, they will provide “power pods” that can power the station for the day.
But May says the priority right now is restoring electricity to those polling stations and getting them back on the grid.
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