Latest Mississippi River Delta news: Sept. 26, 2013

All Against BP as Spill Trial Turns to ‘Coverup’
By Paul M. Barrett, Bloomberg Businessweek. Sept. 25, 2013.
“The BP oil-spill-litigation cage match starts up again next week in New Orleans. Thought this multibillion-dollar melee had already run its course? Not by a long shot…” (read more).

Ground Gives Way, and a Louisiana Town Struggles to Find Its Footing
By Michael Wines, The New York Times. Sept. 25, 2013.
“BAYOU CORNE, La. — It was nearly 16 months ago that Dennis P. Landry and his wife, Pat, on a leisurely cruise in their Starcraft pontoon boat, first noticed a froth of bubbles issuing from the depths of Bayou Corne, an idyllic, cypress-draped stream that meanders through swampy southern Louisiana. They figured it was a leaky gas pipeline. So did everyone else…” (read more).

Settlement loophole in tax law could help BP
Opinion by Francisco Enriquez and Phineas Baxandall, The Daily Comet (Thibodaux, La.). Sept. 24, 2013.
“At the top of every Google search for “BP oil spill” is a sponsored link from BP that trumpets how much it has done for Gulf residents since its Deepwater Horizon oil rig exploded in 2010, killing 11 workers and dumping over 200 million gallons of crude into the Gulf of Mexico…” (read more).

Minn. taking lead to reduce Gulf ‘dead zone’
By Amy Wold, The Advocate (Baton Rouge). Sept. 26, 2013.
“For more than a decade, organizations and scientists working toward reducing the size of the annual “dead zone” in the Gulf of Mexico have shared a similar complaint: The dead zone remains largely unchanged and states, left to their own devices, have done little to make significant improvements…” (read more).

3 years later, BP garners criticism and praise
By John DeSantis, Tri-Parish Times (Houma, La.). Sept. 25, 2013.
“A little more than three years ago, the name of an oil industry giant praised for its good corporate citizenship in the Bayou Country became a dirty word…” (read more).

Study: BP spill damaged sea-floor life for miles
By Janet McConnaughey, Associated Press. Sept. 25, 2013.
“The vast 2010 Gulf of Mexico oil spill damaged the tiny animals that live on the sea floor for about 57 square miles around the blown-out BP oil well, with severe damage in about nine square miles of that area, says a researcher from Texas A&M-Corpus Christi…” (read more).

Clock running out on flood authority’s days as a panel immune from political meddling
By Bob Marshall, The Lens (New Orleans). Sept. 24, 2013.
“The political independence of the local levee board — under fire from politicians for its lawsuit against oil and gas companies — could come to an abrupt end next Tuesday…” (read more).

Decades needed for recovery of tiny life on Gulf seabed after BP oil spill, new study says
By Mark Schleifstein, The Times-Picayune (New Orleans). Sept. 24, 2013.
“The damage from oil during the BP Deepwater Horizon disaster to communities of tiny organisms living in and on the soft sediment on the floor of the Gulf of Mexico surrounding BP’s Macondo well will take decades to repair, according to a new scientific study conducted by NOAA, BP and university researchers…” (read more).

N.O. ranks sixth in economic recovery report
By Timothy Boone, The Advocate (Baton Rouge). Sept. 26, 2013.
“New Orleans was ranked sixth in a Brookings Institute report released Wednesday that measures how U.S. metro areas are recovering from the recession. That same report put Baton Rouge near the middle, coming in 56th out of the 100 largest cities…” (read more).