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BBC MUNDO RADIO
That sum -- $75 million -- is the federally mandated cap for oil-spill clean-up expenditure. BP has promised to address the long-term needs of everyone affected by the spill, especially commercial fishermen. The potential expense involved is incalculable, far beyond $75 million, and many people in south Louisiana do not believe such whatever-it-takes pronouncements of full responsibility.
At a press conference Monday in Galliano, La., Sen. Mary Landrieu (D-La.) assured the public: "If you made $50,000 last year and you can't work this year, BP is going to write you a check for $50,000. If your business made a million dollars last year and you can't make that million dollars this year, BP is going to make your business whole.
There is no question . . . who will pay these bills to the individuals, to businesses, to the parishes, state government and to [the] federal government. Those bills will be paid in full."Serious doubts remain, however, spurred in part by BP's current legal maneuvering to have all spill-related cases litigated in Houston, instead of Louisiana.
Also in attendance at the press conference were Secretary of the Interior Ken Salazar, Homeland Security Secretary Janet Napolitano, Gov. Bobby Jindal of Louisiana, and Sens. David Vitter (R-La.), Sheldon Whitehouse (D-R.I.), Dick Durbin (D-Ill.) and Lisa Murkowski (R-Alaska). The presence of these out-of-state solons is an apt indicator of growing national concern.
Jindal, disgusted with the lack of progress and organization, said, "In Terrebonne Parish, [where] oil is moving through their waters, boom and workers sat for days waiting for their orders to be deployed." Jindal went on to state that on May 3, he asked the federal government for supplies including "3 million feet of absorbent boom and 5 million feet of hard boom."
To date, only 815,569 feet of hard boom has arrived, and 135,320 feet of that hasn't been deployed, he said.
In addition to such practicalities, Jindal noted a more heart-wrenching problem. "On Cat Island . . . I saw pelicans that were oiled so bad they couldn't fly," he said. "The brown pelican, our state bird, was only recently removed from the endangered species." Jindal also noted that the affected Louisiana coastline is longer "than the coastline of Maryland and Delaware combined."
Tired of waiting for action, on Sunday officials of Jefferson Parish (parishes are Louisiana's equivalent of counties) commandeered some 35 idle boats and put crews to work laying boom and skimming oil. "We're going to use our emergency powers, " said a parish official, Deano Bonano.
Jindal echoed such sentiments. "We know we've got to take action," he said. "We've got to have to take matters in our own hands if were going to win this fight to protect our coast." Jindal once again called for quick issuance of permits to build the protective sand berm, linked with the reinforcement of existing barrier islands. "The sand boom at Fourchon is actively holding back oil," he said.
If federal permits are not issued, Louisiana officials seem prepared to start work without them. State Attorney General Buddy Caldwell has informed Robert van Antwerp, head of the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers, of his opinion that "the federal government does not have the legal authority to deny a state the right to conduct such emergency response actions or to prevent or mitigate natural resource damages to its territory and the property of its citizens."
All who spoke at the press conference laid heavy blame on BP and pledged to hold it accountable for unlimited financial responsibility.
But a different perspective – as posted in a video clip on BP's Web site – was expressed by commercial fisherman Mike Voisin, a founding member of the Louisiana Seafood Promotion and Marketing Board : "We're concerned that our brand has taken a big hit . . . BP has stepped up to the table and they have put significant dollars into a fund to help us overcome that. I think they've responded aggressively, appropriately and on point. I personally am saddened that BP is getting a black eye from this, because they have been a good player in terms of the environment here in south Louisiana; they're part of who we we are. The oil and gas community, the seafood community, we work hand and glove out there. Half of my family is in the oil and gas business, half is in the seafood business . . . We'll work together to overcome this, as communities always do."
The prevailing sense in south Louisiana, however, is that locals are doing all the meaningful work with little help from BP and the federal government. And every wasted second heightens the catastrophic losses. Pointing to the oil that is now fouling Barataria Bay, charter boat captain Theophile Bourgeois summed it up in one sentence: "This is the grim reaper."
