Who gets the money, then?

Jeff Landry took another step today toward throwing the state's biggest coastal restoration project into the trash.

Gov. Jeff Landry's administration has ordered a 90-day pause on work on Louisiana's biggest-ever coastal project, the controversial Mid-Barataria Sediment Diversion, arguing the state cannot afford the more than $3 billion plan and stressing that it must be smaller in scale.

The decision, confirmed by the state's coastal officials, halts nearly all work related to the project, which has been planned and studied for years and broke ground in August 2023 on the west bank of Plaquemines Parish near Ironton. Funds related to the 2010 BP oil spill are intended to pay for it, but state coastal officials say rising costs mean Louisiana will be on the hook for hundreds of millions of dollars, if not more.

The story goes on to say that there are contingency funds available through NOAA (which *probably* still exists?) to cover some increases in costs, although not increases in costs that directly result from the Governor sabotaging the project with delays.  There's also the possibility of another $744 million from Chevron if that judgment holds up on appeal. But if Landry isn't interested in spending the BP money on the coastal projects it was intended for, then it's unlikely he will apply that appropriately either.  

Which raises the question, what does the Governor intend to do with this money, if anything? It's also possible he's holding those funds and these projects for hostage pending another go at his tax reforms that just failed at the ballot box.  But who knows.