"Five thousand years ago, much of southern Louisiana did not exist. A hundred years from now, it is unclear how much of it will remain. The region, it is often observed, is losing land at the rate of a football field every thirty- eight minutes. Alternatively, it is said, the area is shrinking by a large desktop's worth of ground every second, or a tennis court's worth every thirteen seconds, or twenty- five square miles a year." from "Watermark" by Elizabeth Kolbert The New Yorker, February 20, 2006

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ed by U.S. Commerce Secretary Carlos Guitierrez and Federal Coordinator for Gulf Coast Rebuilding Donald Powell, the Commerce Department in early May took a delegation of approximately 30 corporate executives on a Gulf Coast business investment mission to Louisiana and Mississippi. Among their goals was 1) to make sure they saw with their own eyes the scale of recovery the region still faces, and 2) to goad investment while reassuring executives that efforts to tweak and extend the recently enacted federal Gulf Opportunity Zone ("GO Zone") incentives and others were under way.
   According to Site Selection interviews with executives who made the trip, Goal No. 1 was achieved in spades.
   "It was my first trip there since the storms," says John H. Little, director, DuPont Capital Asset Productivity, since March and a 24- year company veteran. "I'd seen it on TV, but until you see it in person you don't grasp the gravity of the situation. I was pleased to see the Secretary take this initiative – he said President Bush was the one who came to him. People were truly interested."
   Little and others are bothered by the fact that "the country has moved on, and the city definitely hasn't. I really think the rest of the nation thinks, 'That happened last year.' New Orleans itself has done a remarkable job of getting back on its feet. Twenty thousand of the 25,000 hotel rooms are back open. Restaurants are open. I've encouraged folks that book different meetings to consider New Orleans, and I've contacted a couple of our trade organizations that we're a part of and asked them to look at New Orleans."
   Little says he's glad to see the city's mayoral election

The U.S. Army Corps of Engineers lifted a 75- ton Gate Jacket Structure into place in April for the interim Flood Gate closer structures at the 17th St. Canal in New Orleans. FEMA was building the interim flood gate by June 1st under its Public Assistance program until a better Flood Gate and Levee system can be completed to better protect New Orleans residents and property. Marvin Nauman/FEMA photo

completed too, as there was a sense of "let's see who the mayor's going to be before we go too far" in any particular direction with recovery.
   Visitors and mayors aren't the only ones returning to their roles in the Big Easy. Company headquarters are too, helped in part by state incentives as well as the federal variety. One example is offshore oil and gas service boat company Tidewater, Inc., which returned 85 employees to its New Orleans offices after they had evacuated to Houston last year. Helping them make it back was a state incentives package of corporate franchise, income and sales tax rebates and reductions approved by the state's Joint Legislative Committee on the Budget in March 2006, which put the firm's tax base on an even keel with its Houston setup.
   The Commerce Dept. trip came at a time when "offshore" is in the news for its literal meaning and not its figurative one.
   Congress in May narrowly rejected a lifting of the ban on natural gas exploration on the Outer Continental Shelf, as Gov. Kathleen Blanco pursued negotiated and legal means to snare offshore oil drilling revenue, which the federal Minerals Management Service does not split with coastal states as it does with oil revenues from interior states.
   The connection? Scientists say the marshes and bayous that would provide the most natural and effective protection for the Gulf Coast have been severely compromised by decades of oil exploration activity. In fact, the price tag currently attached to restoration of that marshland is US$16 billion.
   Meanwhile, Louisiana's advantage of proximity to those natural gas and oil assets is somewhat offset by its reliance on natural gas for so much of its electric power generation, at a time when natural gas prices are nearly triple what they were in 2002: "That's a big issue in Louisiana," says Little. If further natural gas exploration in the Outer Continental Shelf in the Gulf is eventually allowed by Congress, does Little see an immediate inherent advantage in Louisiana to having DuPont facilities in close proximity along the Gulf Coast?
   "I think what you'll see is it will help the overall price, based on the NYMEX, so if there's more gas available, the NYMEX price will drop – that should help that area in terms of raw materials as well as utilities," he says. "For transport costs, where Louisiana is with proximity to the ports, that should be to their advantage."
   At least one oil company is doing its part to boost Louisiana's coffers: According to Fitch Ratings, Marathon Oil is "in the middle of front- end engineering on the proposed 180,000 bpd [barrel- per- day] expansion of the Garyville, Louisiana refinery. The initial estimated cost for the project is $2.2 billion with a late 2009 start- up."