114 community leaders ask the Corps to make a win-win decision for a threatened swamp

More than 100 business, parish and community leaders mobilized over the past few weeks, signing their entities onto a request for the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers to contribute to the state’s River Reintroduction into Maurepas Swamp project to balance what will be lost in the construction of the West Shore Lake Pontchartrain levee.

The widely-supported Maurepas Swamp project aims to deliver sediment and fresh water from the Mississippi River to 45,000 acres existing wetlands and forests in the East Maurepas swamp, which is rapidly declining. The small diversion is expected to nourish around one-third of the swamp and reduce loss of habitat over the next several decades.