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Regular Session, 2012 ENROLLED
SENATE RESOLUTION NO. 84
BY SENATOR THOMPSON
A RESOLUTION
To urge and request the commissioner of administration and the director of the governor's
office of coastal activities to utilize all available funding when considering the
implementation of the Gulf hypoxia action plan.
WHEREAS, the growth of a large zone of low oxygen, known as hypoxia, off the
coast of Louisiana, has been a concern for a number of years, and poses a significant threat
to the health of Louisiana's productive offshore fishery; and
WHEREAS, Louisiana has been a partner in the cooperative effort by the federal
government and other states in the Mississippi River basin to reduce the nutrient loading that
fuels Gulf hypoxia, including the adopting of the 2008 Action Plan to Reduce Hypoxia in the
Northern Gulf of Mexico; and
WHEREAS, a key element of the plan is the adoption of state nutrient reduction
strategies to reduce nitrogen and phosphorus inputs to the Mississippi River and its
tributaries, and ultimately the Gulf of Mexico; and
WHEREAS, Louisiana's nutrient reduction strategy has articulated voluntary actions
to reduce non-point source nutrient loading in tributary watersheds to the Mississippi and
Atchafalaya rivers, voluntary reductions by facilities in the industrial corridor to the Gulf of
Mexico, and the state's coastal restoration program; and
WHEREAS, the 2012 Comprehensive Master Plan for a Sustainable Coast supports
the efforts of the Department of Agriculture and Forestry and the Department of
Environmental Quality to implement the state's nutrient reduction strategy under the Gulf
hypoxia action plan; and
WHEREAS, the likelihood of cuts in the budgets of federal programs will
significantly reduce and possibly eliminate traditional funding sources for these programs,
as well as funding for the implementation of the Gulf hypoxia action plan; and SR NO. 84 ENROLLED
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WHEREAS, Louisiana is expected to receive substantial funds resulting from the
2010 BP oil disaster, including Clean Water Act penalties, natural resource damage
assessment monies, and criminal and civil suit settlements to apply to the restoration of the
Gulf of Mexico waters and coastal ecosystems; and
WHEREAS, reduction of the Gulf of Mexico's hypoxia zone is a necessary step in
restoring the health of the Gulf of Mexico, as well as long-standing goals of the state of
Louisiana.
THEREFORE, BE IT RESOLVED that the Senate of the Legislature of Louisiana
does hereby request the commissioner of administration and the director of the governor's
office of coastal activities to utilize all available funding when considering the
implementation of the Gulf hypoxia action plan involving agricultural practices, wetlands,
conservation and restoration, and watershed management in the tributary basins of the
Mississippi and Atchafalaya rivers, such as those of the Boeuf, Ouachita, Tensas and Black
rivers.
BE IT FURTHER RESOLVED that a copy of this Resolution be transmitted to the
commissioner of administration and the director of the governor's office of coastal activities.
PRESIDENT OF THE SENATE