Mitch Landrieu: “I wish to read part of the Governor's letter: As proposed in the House bill, the State of Louisiana would be faced with…”

“I wish to read part of the Governor's letter: As proposed in the House bill, the State of Louisiana would be faced with a $1.8 billion cost share over the next three years for hurricane protection. This would result in a 4000 percent increase [not 4, not 40, not 400] over the state's pre-Katrina contribution toward hurricane protection efforts. I know it is not the intention of the chairman of the House Appropriations Committee or the Speaker of the House or the majority and minority leaders in the House to make Louisiana pay 4,000 percent more than we were paying before the storm, when we are in an economic situation that is far more challenging than we were before the city and many of our parishes went under water and 1 million people were displaced in the southern part of our State, but that is exactly what they did. I am going to leave here, along with my colleagues, but I am going to come back and find a way, with the goodwill on the floor of this Senate, working with Republicans and Democrats, to come to some reasonable terms for the people of Louisiana so we can pay a reasonable share and have a longer period to pay it back.”