WWII also provided impetus for what was to become the region's dominant industry - offshore oil and gas development. Southern Louisiana has been attractive to business and industry because of access to the Mississippi River, globally important ports, an extensive pipeline network, and the oil and gas production just off the coast. Louisiana ranks third within the U.S. in terms of both crude oil production and petrol production and refinement. It ranks second in terms of producing petrochemicals and natural gas.

The presence of the oil and gas industry, and the revenues associated with it, influenced the structure of the Louisiana economy. From the 1950s to the 1980s, the oil industry expanded, perfecting its offshore platform construction and benefiting from the return of World War II soldiers eager to find work and accustomed to working under harsh conditions. The drilling companies that emerged as major employers in the area included Gulf, Humble, Shell, and Texaco. Their presence prompted a boom in economic activity and the establishment of numerous related companies devoted to commercial oilfield diving, platform construction and tugboat driving, among others. At the same time, state coffers became increasingly dependent on petroleum revenues.

Since the 1980s, the oil and gas industries have been subject to a series of downturns affecting price and demand. As a result, workers' confidence that the oil and gas industry is a reliable source of money and jobs in the southern Louisiana has waned. The influx of workers that the offshore oil industry attracted from neighboring states in the early twentieth century contrasts with the current trend of outmigration of Louisianans looking for employment and education opportunities, as well as a higher quality of life. The downturns have also led to several critical analyses of the state's economy and efforts to diversify the economy and strengthen alternative economic sectors.

Historically, the commercial fishing business helped to balance south Louisiana's economy and served as a buffer against cycles in the oil industry. Federal regulation, foreign imports, and overfishing have impacted this traditional economic activity.

Louisiana's approach to economic development has come at a significant cost. Linked to natural resource extraction, manufacturing plants that offered relatively higher paying jobs, especially in rural areas of the state, were attracted to low land costs and lower wage rates. Though the jobs looked good compared to existing employment opportunities, the companies that owned the plants maintained their headquarters, research units, and highest paying positions elsewhere so that much of the wealth generated by natural resource extractive industries and manufacturing facilities ended up outside the state. To make matter worse, Louisiana's Industrial Tax Exemption Program has historically provided the greatest subsidies to corporations that create few new jobs. The Louisiana Environmental Action Network reports that in 1995 the Louisiana Department of Economic Development found that only 10 percent of the state's corporate tax breaks generated permanent jobs. Annually, approximately $350 million that would have been invested in local schools, roads, and other services had been funneled into industrial tax exemptions. In 1995, for example, the exemptions removed $169 million from school programs.

In the 21st century, manufacturing employment and payrolls, which account for almost 10 percent of the jobs in the state, are dominated by oil and gas and related industries and transportation equipment. : Chemical and allied products and petroleum refining account for almost 24 percent of manufacturing employment and 35.3 percent of payroll (compared to 6.1 and 8.1 percent, respectively, for the nation as a whole). Transportation equipment (primarily shipbuilding) accounts for an additional 14 percent. Payroll from mining-related activities accounts for 4.7 percent of total payroll in the state, a figure that is eight times the national average. Petroleum products, petrochemical manufacturing, and oil and gas mining output together account for 19.4 percent of Louisiana's total gross state product; in comparison, nationally the three account for 3.1 percent of gross national product (GNP). Source: Louisiana: Vision 2020 - 2003 Update. Services account for almost 30 percent of jobs in Louisiana, and while some of these service jobs are high paying jobs in manufacturing and professional services, one third of them are lower paying jobs associated with food and accommodation industries.

Several efforts to address Louisiana's economic woes have been undertaken in recent decades. The Louisiana Economic Development Council (LAEDC) was created by the Legislature in the First Extraordinary Session of 1996 (Act No. 20 H.B. No. 26). Originally a part of the Department of Economic Development, in 2001 the Council was placed under the Office of the Governor. Members of the Council include the Governor, Secretary of Economic Development and 17 other members representing business (manufacturing, mining, construction, banking, venture capital, and tourism), economic development (with representatives from the five largest urban areas and a rural area), and education. The Council developed Vision 2020 - a comprehensive approach to education, economy, and quality of life - established benchmarks in order to monitor how the state is progressing toward its goals, and prepares an annual report to the Governor, Legislature, and people of the state. A key feature of Vision 2020 is the identification and support of cluster development for eight existing and seven emerging clusters. The eight clusters of traditional industries included: oil, gas and energy technologies; petrochemicals; shipbuilding and other durable goods; tourism; transportation; health care; agriculture and food products; and wood, lumber, and paper. Emerging clusters, for which Louisiana has a small but growing base of firms and/or a strong university research base in a high growth industry, include: information technologies, life sciences, environmental technologies, food technologies, advanced materials, micro- & nano-technologies, and entertainment.

"Selling the South" was a popular activity among Southern civic leaders at the end of the Civil War when cities cast about for Northern and foreign investors to help rebuild their stricken economies. Though these investments returned some dividends, mainly to locals in an economic and political position to benefit from them, outside investment often did not raise economic standards or educational levels appreciably, and a good deal of the profits drained out of the region.

Part of the reason for the relatively low rate of return on outside investment was due to what civic leaders "sold" to entrepreneurs. Among other incentives, they advertised cheap labor, low taxes, and minimum regulations. By the 1930s, the Boards of Trade - and their successors, the Chambers of Commerce - had efficiently organized recruitment committees and prepared sales pitches for potential investors. During this decade, industrial recruitment became an organized state activity for the first time, though the "selling" points remained pretty much the same.

Subsidies to railroads and industrial expansion date back to the 19th century but the early efforts were not state sanctioned and did not involve the use of municipal bonds to finance plant construction. Governor Hugh Lawson White of Mississippi is often cited as having changed the rules of the game and inaugurated the south's modern era of industrialization with his 1936 effort to help his Depression-ravaged state and plan to "Balance Agriculture with Industry" (BAWI): a program of state and local subsidization of industry.

Income Inequality
Despite the presence of the offshore oil and gas industry and the critical role in U.S. commerce played by New Orleans for several hundred years, the state hovers at the bottom of the fifty states in most major social indicators. According to the U.S. Department of Commerce, Bureau of Economic Analysis, in 2001 Louisiana ranked 45th among the states with per capita personal income of $24,535, compared to $30,472 for the nation. According to the March 2002 Current Population Survey in 2001, 16.2 percent of Louisiana's citizens were living below the poverty level. In 2003 U.S. Census Bureau report, based on a three-year average for 2000-2002, Louisiana ranked fourth in the U.S. for the percentage of people in poverty (17.0%), following only Arkansas, New Mexico, and Mississippi. Forty-seven percent of Louisiana's families with children qualify as low income, compared to a national average of 34 percent. In overall health indicators, Louisiana ranked last among the 50 states in 2002 and 49th in 2003.

The brunt of income, education and health care inequality within the state is shouldered by Louisiana's ethnic and racial minorities, especially African-Americans. Thirty-three percent of African-American households in Louisiana live below the poverty line, compared with eight percent of white Louisiana households and 21 percent of African-American households nationally. Roughly 15 percent of Asian-American and Hispanic households in Louisiana live below the poverty-line. The relation between income disparity and race is further intensified in New Orleans. A quarter of New Orleans households live below the poverty line; 90 percent of those households are African-American. The Louisiana Department of Economic Development publishes economic indicators by parish.]

Education
Economic indicators are closely linked to education. In southern Louisiana, for many generations in groups such as the Acadians and the Isleños, schooling was not perceived as necessary, and few southern Louisiana residents participated in formal education beyond the elementary grades. The penchant toward practical knowledge and its transmission via mentoring, coupled with a general trust of outsiders, led many parents to keep their children out of schools. Into the 1960s, segregation and lack of schools prevented blacks and Native Americans from receiving a secondary education. Compared to both Louisiana white residents and U.S. blacks, for example, fewer African-Americans in Louisiana have continued education beyond high school. Though initially the presence of relatively high-paying jobs that did not require any formal education contributed to high dropout rates, by the 1970s the growing labor needs of the oil and gas industry hastened the push for schooling and, with it, changes in local language and culture. Still, the early oil and gas industry did not remedy low levels of educational attainment among local residents.

According to the U.S. Census 2000, Louisiana has among the lowest levels of educational attainment in the nation; 25 percent of all adults age 25 and over lack a high school education (they didn't graduate or receive some kind of equivalency). Of those adults, 20 percent of white adults, 37 percent of African American adults, 30 percent of Hispanic adults, and 33 percent of Asian American adults age 25 and above lack a high school education. Rural residents show lower rates of high school completion; 32.6 percent of rural Louisiana adults and 22.7 percent of urban adults have not completed high school (see Louisiana State Facts for more).

Efforts to address educational disparities are coupled with economic goals in the state's Louisiana: Vision 2020 program. State policies encourage all students to go to college, and college preparatory curricula have been emphasized in K-12 schools, resulting in a rise in school graduation rates. The Louisiana Tuition Opportunity Program for Students (TOPS) is a comprehensive program of state scholarships the guarantees funding for college for students who meet minimum standards.

"Louisiana is number one in unemployment and last in education. One reason why is because of the industry we have down here. It used to be so easy. Take myself. I dropped out of school at 16 years old and went to work on a supply boat. In two weeks I was told I would be the engineer. People on the boat helped me learn. By 19, I was the captain of a 100 ton vessel, only because that was all I could get for the age I was [the size of ship for which you can get a license depends on a mariner's age and sea time]. By 21, I was the captain of a 500 ton vessel, for anything above 100 tons up to 500. By 23, I was the captain of a 1,600 ton. To get the licenses, I had to take tests. Nothing that I learned in a school made me a captain. I got hands on training. That's what it goes back to, as far as people's ability, and education is in the background¼ Years ago people were running boats down here. They hunted, fished, trapped. The guys already knew how to run the boats. The oil companies said, "How about bringing me some supplies out to the rig?" and on like that. That went on for awhile. Then the Coast Guard decided they had to be licensed."
Offshore Supply Boat Captain from Lafourche Parish

"The negative effect of the oil industry was that young men could go out and get jobs. Their interest in education was minimal. We had a tremendous drop out rate. Kids would get out and go to work. They also worked in agriculture and shrimping and fishing. Not just oil. It was a community type attitude that caused this problem. We operate now with 45 to 55 percent of the people without a high school diploma. That is double what it should be for this area."
Black Educator from Terrebonne Parish

Environmental Problems
Early attempts to address environmental problems in Louisiana focused on natural resource issues. Though the first conservation law in Louisiana was passed in 1857, it was not until the end of the century, when intensive exploitation of Louisiana's forests, fishes, minerals, and furbearers was underway, that significant attention was paid to ecological concerns. Early in the 20th century, efforts were made to conserve game; two examples are a 1902 commission to manage and protect oysters and a 1908 commission to manage game birds and fish.

By the 20th century, the most pressing environmental problems include large-scale coastal erosion and contamination from industrial facilities and processes. Though astute observers have been trying to call attention to the problems of coastal land loss since at least the 1920s, it was not until the 1980s that they began to get widespread attention. In a 1925 presentation to the Ecological Society of America, Percy Viosca, Jr. of Louisiana's Department of Conservation argued that the draining and reclaiming of marshes was a major factor in the decline of the state's native wildlife. Citing flood protection and the digging of canals as two major causes of changes in the state's wetlands, Viosca argued that "the scenic effects throughout the country [the wetlands] have served and still serve as inspiration to the poet, philosopher and artist, and the legend and romance of the swamp and marsh country is still being written." Despite these concerns, little action was taken to protect the wetlands; this was partly due to the wetlands being an area into which few people ventured. During the 1970s, when national attention to environmental issues was at its peak, both the fisheries and the oil and gas industry were booming in southern Louisiana. In 1971, due to growing awareness that the biological and economic productivity of the Louisiana coastal zone was being imperiled by fragmented management, improper development, and lack of research, the governor established the Louisiana Advisory Commission on Coastal and Marine Resources. In 1976, the definition of coastal zone impacts in Louisiana was broadened to include both onshore and offshore impacts of outer continental shelf activity. By that time thousands of platforms had been installed and 120 rotary drilling rigs were operating in the Gulf of Mexico.

The popular environmentalism that took hold across the United States during the 1970s seemed alien to much of southern Louisiana's population. The oil industry was booming and offering thousands of people employment, and the environmental consequences of dredging pipeline canals were largely accepted as an externality of the business. Trappers were angered by the decrease in fur demand related to environmental campaigning, and commercial fishermen opposed efforts to impose environmental regulations in the Gulf. In the 1980s, however, when wetlands loss was newly connected to increased hurricane threat, and to the loss of important estuary functions regulating marine wildlife, things began to change.

Coastal Land Loss
Coastal residents and some scientists began reporting marsh deterioration and shoreline erosion at least 80 years ago. However, habitat preservation sentiments in the public were abruptly replaced by the urgency of flood control after the Mississippi River flood of 1927. Floodwaters displaced over 600,000 people across seven states, and New Orleans was saved only by dynamiting levees downstream. The 1928 Federal Flood Control Act authorized more money for levee construction than had been spent throughout the nation's history. The goal of the Act was to protect people and property from the worst-case water level by constructing levees and shifting water in low-lying areas of the Atchafalaya River and delta. Twelve years later, reorganization within Louisiana's government created the Department of Public Works - to construct and maintain levees, spillways, and canal systems; drain wetlands; and provide engineering services - and the Stream Control Commission - to handle water pollution problems. By 1950, the Mississippi was leveed along virtually its entire length -- approximately half of the sediment reaches the Gulf today that did prior to 1950. In 1956, the Federal Water Pollution Control Act brought concerns about flood protection and management together with wetlands management by requiring the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers to consider the effects of its actions on fish and wildlife. This link was furthered by the passage of the National Environmental Protection Act, which required that appropriate consideration be given to environmental values; one of the first lawsuits filed after passage involved the Corps (Zabel v Tabb, 430 F.2d 199 (5th Cir. 1970). The first comprehensive assessment of coastal erosion in Louisiana occurred in 1971.Renewed efforts to draw attention to the severity of the problem in the 1970s include Sherwood Gagliano and Johannes van Beek's estimates of the rate of land loss as 16.5 square miles per year. more. By the late 1970s, resources were newly devoted to scientific research of the issue at scales never before seen. The Louisiana Universities Marine Consortium (LUMCON) was formed in 1979 to coordinate and stimulate Louisiana's activities in marine research and education.In 1980, Karen Wicker published evidence that the deltaic plain lost 39 square miles per year between 1955 and 1978. In 1981, Gagliano, Wicker, and Klaus Meyer-Arendt concluded that the rate of wetland loss had been increasing geometrically for a century.

Still, many residents and community leaders remained complacent until Hurricane Juan devastated Terrebonne Parish in 1985. Described by residents as a "wake up call," Hurricane Juan was the eighth costliest hurricane to strike the U.S. mainlan in the city of Houma. [A resolution prepared for the Louisiana Catholic Conference in 1987 reminded Louisiana Catholics of the importance of protecting wetlands, and the importance of church involvement. Catholics, Methodists and members of the Louisiana Interchurch Conference, an ad hoc coalition of churches, established the Louisiana Coastal Wetlands Interfaith Stewardship Initiative.

"People saw we got millions of acres of marsh out there that isn't worth anything. So, why shouldn't we dredge as many canals as necessary to get to the oil reserves or gas reserves that we think are there. And there was really no regulations to prevent them from doing this. There were no penalties to speak of to prevent them from doing it. And, like I said, unless they dug a canal through Lake Charles to disrupt the lives of a lot of people, well, nobody really cared. And there weren't many people that were really familiar with it. Because there were so many places to fish in coastal Louisiana, and hunt, and trap, and swim, or boating, or whatever you intended to do, that if they dug a canal across your favorite hole, so what? You had ten more within a ten mile area. So nobody just really cared. But to me, one of the most important things was the disruption of the natural water flow through the coastal marsh area. You know, almost all of these canals are in some way connected North to South, even though they may have been dug East to West. There were cuts in them. There were old bayous that passed through them. They went through natural lakes or whatever, so once you dug a deeper channel here, and the current started running through that channel, then each tidal cycle that current tended to change the natural water flow in this area. And you got thousands and thousands of areas that were impacted directly. And now, we see that you have millions of acres that were impacted indirectly.
Biologist with the Louisiana Department of Wildlife and Fisheries from 1963 to 1997, January 14, 2002

In 1987 the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency and Louisiana Geological Survey convened the Louisiana Wetland Protection Panel to study coastal erosion; the panel issued Saving Louisiana's Coastal Wetlands: The Need for a Long-Term Plan of Action. The report concluded: "The wetlands of coastal Louisiana are being converted to open water at a rate of fifty square miles per year, largely as a result of maintaining shipping lanes, the dredging of canals, flood control levees, and the withdrawal of oil and gas. If current trends continue, an ecosystem that supports the nation's oldest bilingual culture, 25 percent of the nation's fishing industry, and North America's largest fur-producing area, will be mostly lost in the next century. This process could be further accelerated if sea level rises one or more feet as a result of the projected global warming from the greenhouse effect." The report noted that the problem of coastal land loss had been recognized for 20 years and a variety of solutions put forward but that a comprehensive solution was lacking. The report also observed that, though additional scientific research would be needed along the way, sufficient information was available to commence the development of a plan for saving Louisiana's wetlands. The panel called upon the Federal Emergency Management Agency's Flood Insurance Administration, the Fish and Wildlife Service, the National Park Service, the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration, the Environmental Protection Agency, the Army Corps of Engineers, the State of Louisiana, coastal parishes, the U.S. Congress, the Louisiana Legislature, and the private sector to join forces to address the loss of Louisiana's wetlands.] Also in 1987, Congress established the National Estuary Program (NEP) through section 320 of the Clean Water Act. The NEP is administered by the Environmental Protection Agency; its goal is to protect estuaries' public water supply, shellfish, fish and wildlife populations, and recreational opportunities for estuary residents. Louisiana's Barataria and Terrebonne basins were nominated for participation in the NEP on October 16, 1989. In his nomination letter, the Governor of Louisiana stated, "Louisiana faces a pivotal battle in the Barataria-Terrebonne Estuarine Complex if we are to do our part in winning the national war to stem the net loss of wetlands..." The Barataria-Terrebonne National Estuary Program was established on September 13, 1990 through a cooperative agreement between the EPA and the State of Louisiana and created a coalition of government, private, and commercial interests. The goals of the BTNEP were delineated in 1992 by a management conference and provide the basis for all action plans found in the Comprehensive Conservation Management Plan.

Goals of the Barataria-Terrebonne National Estuary Program are to:

• Preserve and restore wetlands and barrier islands
• Realistically support diverse, natural biological communities
• Develop and meet water quality standards that adequately protect estuarine resources and human health
• Promote environmentally responsible economic activities that sustain estuarine resources
• Generate national recognition and support
• Implement comprehensive education and awareness on and awareness programs that enhance public involvement and maintain cultural heritage
• Create an accessible, comprehensive database with interpreted information for the public
• Create clear, fair, practical, and enforceable regulations
• Develop and maintain multi-level, long-term, comprehensive watershed planning
• Be compatible with natural processes
• Forge common-ground solutions to estuarine problems
• Formulate indicators of estuarine ecosystem health and balance estuary use

In 1998 officials convened unprecedented federal, state and local task forces to address the issue in an initiative called Coast 2050 as a direct response to a perceived need for a coordinated set of objectives among the many different administrative sectors managing coastal activities. The Coast 2050 process worked to define regional wetlands conservation and restoration objectives, and several - though notably not all - interagency sectors were asked to align their objectives to reflect Coast 2050 findings and conclusions.

Coastal land loss has long been attributed primarily to levee and flood management efforts and canals dredging. Though local residents have long recognized links between the industry and coastal erosion, government acknowledgement of links to the oil and gas industry have been slow in coming. Recent research indicates that wetland conversion in Louisiana reached its peak between 1950 and the late 1970s, when coastal marshes disappeared at an average rate of 30-40 square miles per year, and that at least 30 percent of this loss is directly attributable to oil, gas and shipping canal dredging. Studies of historical interior wetland loss in the region south of Houma and west of Bayou Lafourche, for example, attribute most of the loss to rapid subsidence, mostly between the late 1960s and the late 1970s. The highest subsidence rates in Lafourche and Terrebonne Parishes coincide with oil and gas fields and reactivated faults.

"They tear up bayous and bayous and bayous and they've introduced freshwater where saltwater used to be dominant, and they introduce saltwater where freshwater used to be. Since they dug the deepwater channel come to Houma, the oil companies progressed and prospered from it, but all the local fishermen, they suffer because of all the erosion from the land, and these oil companies just cuttin' more and more. If you go up in a helicopter, or airplane, and just fly over, you'd be surprised at how very little land there is between the Gulf and where you're sitting now."
Resident of Isle de Jean Charles, Louisiana, 2002

"It destroyed the land and the wildlife and it made living hard to survive because there's no more trapping; the land's gone for the furs that we used to catch year round. And whenever they have a leak of one of the wells that they've got, there goes the shrimp and the crab and the fish. They've gotten pretty good over the years, but before it would happen at least twice a year. Now it's like maybe once every three years we'll have a problem 'cause they store all the different chemicals in the barges that they leave out there and salt water causes it to erode and it will eventually get a leak. But they'll leave a well that's dead, they just cap it off and then somebody will hit it with a boat or something 'cause it's under the water. Then that causes a problem. They leave all the dead pipes out there, which looks like spaghetti in the grass. But other than that you know they just don't seem to care sometimes about what they do. The major companies came in and just dug canals where there were no canals and just put these big old rigs and then they'd work for a couple of months and they would bring outside people. They didn't employ any of the local people. You see they were not only taking from the land. You know, if they would have employed the local people it would have helped, but they didn't. They brought people from Texas and Alabama and all over - the same as they do now."
Resident of Grand Bayou in Plaquemines Parish, February 25, 2003

The complex relationship between the oil and gas industry and southern Louisiana communities has complicated local response to coastal land loss. In the fishing off season, many people find work offshore or in supporting industries. Oil development brought money for infrastructure, roads, schools, and jobs. Coastal communities entered into an interdependence with the industry that challenges the differentiation of community "stakeholder" interests.

"I think one of the big mistakes was they allowed them to go ahead and dig these canals. And I think that most of the erosion today that we have in South Louisiana is caused by the oil field. The oil industry came in here and cut canals all over. It just kept on washing out. I really think if they had done like- I know that some places I've been - You don't cut canals. You go ahead and make a board road. That's what I was talking about. If you could make roads, you would have land instead of having a lake today. I blame the oil field for a lot of that. They came here and done some good and did help some people. But the offshore done a lot of damage that could have been avoided. They gave people jobs and everything else. I mean I am thankful that I was able to work in the oil field. You know? But I can see the damage that was done. The damage that cannot be repaired."
Oilfield foreman from Chauvin, Louisiana, July 20, 2001]

"The oilfield service got bases in the lower part of the bayou here to service the oilfields that created a few jobs here, put the local people to work. And 'course that peaked and then we started comin' down again. When the oil companies drilled in here, inshore, out in the marshes, built all these canals where they had to dig into the water, dig into the ground make what you call a slip, you know, locate a rig at a certain place, then they like sort of helped salt water intrude. There are slips all over the coastal marshes. The thing is, once they build 'em and get the oil out and there's nothin' left, they don't go back and close the slips. Like go to the waterways everywhere and there's erosion, salt water intrusion. This big navigation channel that they built right here, down the road, it was supposed to be big enough for small size ship to navigate. Actually, they didn't build it that big. But it was big enough that it was like a big old artery now, goin' to the Gulf. Back to Houma, Louisiana. And that has contributed a lot to flood problems and saltwater intrusion and a whole lot of stuff. The bayou by my house is very, very close to bein' flooded now. It is getting worse all the time. A good south wind here, there is water all over the highway. Now, where before when I was younger, that didn't happen. But I'll tell you, one of the thing they don't realize, they lettin' the coast lose, coastline and marshland and they're not doin' anything about it. And the oilfield is on its way out. There's only so much oil and gas in the ground, it took millions of years to get in there. Once it's gone, it's not comin' back. Whereas the marshlands require the necessary assistance for fishin' and shrimpin' and seafood. And once you have that in place, it supports itself, you don't have to do anything."
Pumper from south Terrebonne Parish, Louisiana, July 24, 2003

Efforts to bring national attention to problems of coastal land loss have had limited success. President Bush promised "no net loss" of wetlands, a policy launched by his father's administration and bolstered by President Clinton, but he reversed his approach in 2003, unleashing the developers. The U.S. Army Corps of Engineers and the Environmental Protection Agency followed suit by announcing that wetands protecton had to be linked to interstate commerce.

Contamination
Louisiana ranks second only to Texas in terms of hazardous industrial waste generated. Biologist Florence Robinson, A former biology professor from Southern University and a Heinz Foundation awardee for her research which correlated toxic pollution in Louisiana to the state's demographic profile, noted that on a per-capita basis, the Bayou State produces the most hazardous wastes in the country, especially in areas with over 50 percent African-American residents. In the 1970s, when much of the U.S. was establishing environmental protection laws and policies, Louisiana's Governor Edwin Edwards was actively promoting the use of south Louisiana's bayous for hazardous waste disposal. The Office of Environmental Quality was established in 1980 under a new governor, but Edwards abolished it when he was reelected in 1984. At that time he resumed efforts to attract both industry and waste disposal facilities to the state.

In 1980, advanced by citizens of Vermillion Parish who were concerned about the oilfield pollution affecting them, the first statewide rules governing commercial oilfield waste disposal facilities were passed (Statewide Order No. 29-B). The regulations were tightened in 1983. Effective January 15, 1997, federal regulations prohibit the discharge of any waste in the coastal zone of the Gulf of Mexico (generally including inland waters and transition zone onshore areas). A tremendous volume of oilfield waste is generated in Louisiana and offshore in the Gulf of Mexico, and state policies on the management of oilfield wastes have been inadequate. Under the Louisiana rules, oilfield waste that cannot be treated for discharge or disposed of at the well where it was generated must be transported to a permitted disposal facility; the Louisiana rules identified the wastes as nonhazardous to facilitate disposal.

Widespread environmental pollution in Louisiana led to an active and organized grassroots movement. African American communities became involved when tenant organizations linked housing and environmental pollution issues. In late 1980, in what has become celebrated as one of the early grassroots environmental justice efforts, residents of Alden, Louisiana began organizing in opposition to the Rollins Environmental Services hazardous waste landfill, at the time the fourth largest facility in the nation. In 1981, local residents filed a class action lawsuit against the company; the suit was settled out of court in November 1987. In the mid-1980s, grassroots and mainstream environmental organizations joined together to oppose Rollins' application to burn PCBs. In another example, in 1989, the Gulf Coast Tenants Organization organized the first Great Louisiana Toxics March through what had become known as "Cancer Alley," the 85 mile industrial corridor of petrochemical plants that follows the Mississippi River between Baton Rouge and New Orleans. Then, in 1992, the Southern Organizing Committee, one of several regional and specialized coalitions that formed to address environmental justice issues, organized the Southern Community Labor Conference for Environmental Justice in New Orleans. However, despite its central place in the debate about waste, pollution, and environmental justice issues and success in getting the Air Toxic and Solid Waste Bills through the state legislature, Louisiana has made only minor adjustments in policy that would affect the oil and gas industry. Rather, Governor Edwin Edwards' explicit actions in the 1970s to open "Louisiana to massive chemical waste dumping by disposal firms and oil companies" began a pattern in which state policies thwart the efforts of environmental justice leaders. Even after Louisiana passed legislation on environmental racism and established an Office of Environmental Justice following Clinton's executive order, critics claim that neither federal nor state actions helped residents in Cancer Alley. From 1988 to 1992, Governor Buddy Roemer established new environmental policies and programs, such as the state "environmental scorecard" that was designed to link tax benefits to pollution, but many of these were abolished when Edwin Edwards was again elected in 1991.

The Louisiana Coalition for Tax Justice, a coalition of groups ranging from environmental justice organizations to labor unions, spent three years doing an analysis of Louisiana's industrial tax exemptions and began challenging the status quo. Though the environmental scorecard was dropped, but it succeeded in pressuring some companies to clean up and stimulated new investments in pollution prevention equipment. Nevertheless, Louisiana ranked last in a 1994 review of economic and environmental conditions and first in a 1998 analysis of per capita government subsidies to industry.

The cost of lax environmental laws and enforcement can be seen in emissions data. According to 1995 Toxics Release Inventory data, where New Jersey 's manufacturing sector produced an average of 11 pounds of pollution per job and Texas's manufacturing sector produced 213 pounds, Louisiana's produced 981 pounds; the difference was attributed to the level of environmental enforcement in each area. The Toxic Release Inventory is a compendium of information on the type of volume of toxic substances released by manufacturing facilities and required under the 1986 Emergency Planning and Community Right to Know Act. Recent efforts to minimize pollution, combined with plant closures, have led to reduced emissions in some parishes.

For more information:

Austin, DE
1999 Environmental Justice in the United States: Case Studies in Southern Alabama and Louisiana. Paper presented at the Carnegie Council on Ethics and International Affairs' Workshop on Public Philosophy, Environment, and Social Justice, New York, NY October.

Austin, Diane, Bob Carriker, Tom McGuire, Joseph Pratt, Tyler Priest, Allan G. Pulsipher
2004 History of the Offshore Oil and Gas Industry in Southern Louisiana. Interim Report. Volume I: Papers on the Evolving Offshore Industry. Report prepared for the U.S. Dept. of the Interior, Minerals Management Service, Gulf of Mexico OCS Region, New Orleans, LA. OCS Study MMS 2004-049

Bartlett, Donald L., and James B. Steele
1998. Paying a price for polluters. Time, Vol. 59; November 23, 1998, 72-80.

Becnel, Thomas A.
1980 Labor, Church, and the Sugar Establishment, 1887-1976. Baton Rouge: Louisiana State University Press.

Berry, Jason
1984. The poisoning of Louisiana. Southern Exposure 12 (2):16-23.

Burns, P.F., and M.O. Thomas
2004 Governors and the development regime in New Orleans. Urban Affairs Review 39(6): 791-812 JUL 2004

Cobb, James C.
1982 The selling of the South: the southern crusade for industrial development, 1936-1980. Baton Rouge: Louisiana State University Press.

Bourne, Joel K., Jr.
2004 Gone With the Water. National Geographic Magazine. October.

Butler, Joseph T., Jr.
1973 Prisoner of war labor in the sugar cane fields of Lafourche Parish, Louisiana: 1943-1944. Louisiana History 14:283-296.

Colten, Craig E., ed.
2001 Transforming New Orleans and Its Environs: Centuries of Change. Pittsburgh: University of Pittsburgh Press.

Gagliano, S. M., and van Beek, J. L.
1970 Geologic and Geomorphic Aspects of Deltaic Processes, Mississippi Delta System. Hydrologic and Geologic Studies of Coastal Louisiana, Rept. 1, Coastal Resources Program, Center for Wetland Resources, Louisiana State University, Baton Rouge.

Hall, Bob
1994. Gold & green. Southern Exposure 22 (3):48-52.

Institute for Women's Policy Research (IWPR)
2000 The Status of Women in Louisiana: Highlights. Fact Sheet. Excerpt from The Status of Women in the States 2000.

Louisiana Coalition for Tax Justice
1989 The Great Louisiana Tax Giveaway

Louisiana Environmental Action Network
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