A new poll has just shown that 62 percent of Louisiana voters favor Louisiana’s Coastal Master Plan – the state’s blueprint for prioritizing large-scale coastal restoration and protection projects – while only 6 percent oppose it.
The poll, conducted in December 2016 by Applied Technology Research Corporation and commissioned by Restore the Mississippi River Delta, comes out as Louisianians are reviewing the state’s recently released 2017 Draft Coastal Master Plan.
The plan recommends a variety of projects to build land and reduce flood risk throughout coastal Louisiana.
“ For the first time in our state’s history, Louisiana has the science, restoration funding, and overwhelming public support to get major coastal restoration projects on the ground quickly ,” said Steve Cochran, campaign director for Restore the Mississippi River Delta .
“ Louisianians are in agreement that our coast is vital and that its disappearance is a crisis of unprecedented proportions. People care about the coast, and they care about being protected from storms and flooding, which we can only do by advancing coastal restoration. ”
Over the coming weeks, the state’s Coastal Protection and Restoration Authority will host public meetings in cities across the coast to raise awareness and solicit feedback on the draft plan, which is legally required to be updated every five years to account for the best available science.