Flood-Control Canal-Widening Completed in Southern Louisiana

A project to help reduce flooding in much of northern Terrebonne Parish in Louisiana is finished.

Officials expected to pay more than $1 million to clean and widen a major drainage canal in Gray. The job came in about $98,000 under budget, they said.

The parish is now working to get land use rights for similar work on the rest of the CCC drainage ditch, Parish Capital Projects Administrator Jeanne Bray told The Courier. It runs from Gray to the Intracoastal Canal at the parish line in Thibodaux.

Parish Councilwoman Beryl Amedee, who represents the district including most of Gray and parts of the Schriever area, said the effects were clear.

“Just in my neighborhood alone houses that used to flood regularly — I mean they used to keep sandbags on hand — have not flooded with the last several rain events,” she said.

The work won’t eliminate flooding from major storms, Amedee said, but she hopes homes will stay dry during average summer thunderstorms.

Amedee said she is disheartened by the amount of trash people have dumped into the canal, contributing to the need for such large-scale cleanup projects.

“If you just read about it in the paper, you think, ‘Oh poor people.’ But when it’s your house with ankle-deep water or worse, and you realize that your house may not have flooded if somebody had not thrown tires or sofas in the waterway, then you really get angry,” she said.