Coalition To Restore Coastal Louisiana

Mr. Edgar Veillon was the recipient of the 2010 Lifetime Achievement Award.  Mr. Veillon has been an advocate for coastal restoration for over fifty years.  His passion for the coast began as a sportsman in the Louisiana coastal marshes in the 1950’s.  His dedication and passion have grown over the years and resulted in his participation in many coastal protection organizations, in addition to lending his time and expertise to local and state governments. Among his many accomplishments, Mr. Veillon is a Life Member and past president of the Jefferson Rod and Gun Club, a founder and charter member of the Coalition to Restore Coastal Louisiana where he continues to serve on the Executive Committee, a Life Member and past president of the Louisiana Wildlife Federation, a member of the board of directors of the Lake Pontchartrain Basin Foundation, and a long standing member of the National Wildlife Federation.  Additionally, Mr. Veillon has long been affiliated with Save the Atchafalaya Basin, Inc., the Atchafalaya Information Bureau, Ducks Unlimited and the National Rifle Association.  Mr. Veillon is truly a remarkable conservationist, selfless steward and gracious servant of charitable and conservation organizations.

Mr. Sherrill Sagrera received the Coalition’s 2010 Distinguished Achievement Award.   Mr. Sagrera, a landowner in southern Vermilion Parish, began working with the Natural Resources Conservation Service (NRCS) in the early 1990’s to protect emergent marsh at Cheniere au Tigre.  He worked tirelessly to get a Coastal Wetlands Planning, Protection and Restoration Act (CWPPRA) project funded at Cheniere au Tigre to protect thousands of acres of wetlands.  Due to his continued persistence, a hurricane protection plan has been developed for Vermilion Parish.  Mr. Sagrera was recently selected to serve as the Vice Chairman of the newly formed Vermilion parish Coastal Protection and Restoration Committee.  He also serves as Vice Chairman of the Vermilion Soil and Water Conservation District and as chairman of the Louisiana Association of Conservation Districts’ Coastal Resources Committee. He is an active member of the Acadiana Resource Conservation and Development Council and the Executive Committee of the Coalition to Restore Coastal Louisiana.

Coastal Stewardship Award Winners

Ms. Anna Evangeline Normand, a junior at Louisiana State University, used her passion for coastal restoration to create the Louisiana Marsh University, an education initiative targeting university students.  Modeled after the 4-H program Marsh Maneuvers, Louisiana Marsh University is a three-day event that includes classroom sessions, presentations and a restoration planting along the beach of Grand Isle.  Working with a small budget, Anna coordinated speakers, sponsors and housing and food for students from across the state and country. Through Louisiana Marsh University, Anna gave students an opportunity to learn and experience the coast in a very real and impactful way.

Dr. Barry Kohl is a retired geologist who, upon retirement, dedicated his life to environmental problems in south Louisiana.  Dr. Kohl has led the efforts to address mercury contamination in local soils, canals, bayous and rivers.  He has challenged the current standards on the types of sampling and analyses conducted for routine environmental assessments. He worked with the Louisiana Pontchartrain Basin Foundation to establish new protocols for soil sampling which have since been adopted by the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers.  Dr. Kohl is a long-standing volunteer with the Sierra Club’s Delta Chapter and has served in a multitude of capacities on the chapter’s executive committee. He is founding and acting president of the Louisiana Audubon Council and serves as an avid mentor, volunteer and expert to many other community and environmental groups.

Ms. Dianne Lindstedt is the marine education coordinator for the Louisiana Office of Sea Grant Development. Through her work in education, namely Ocean Commotion and Native Fish in the Classroom, Ms. Lindstedt works to make abstract wetland topics tangible, real and concrete in the minds of students.  Each year through Ocean Commotion she organizes volunteers and arranges with local schools for more than 2,000 elementary and middle school students to visit LSU and learn about the value and function of our coastal environment.  She annually organizes the wetlands education tent at Baton Rouge Earth Day, an event that attracts more than 40,000 people. She currently participates in the Gulf of Mexico Alliance Environmental Education Network (GOMA), the Governor’s Environmental Education Commission, the Southern Association of Marine Educators (SAME), the Gulf Coast Ocean Observing System (GCOOS), the Baton Rouge Earth Day planning committee and the Barataria Terrebonne National Estuary Program’s (BTNEP) Education Action Plan Team.

Mr. O’Neil Malbrough currently serves as Central Gulf District Manager for the Shaw Environmental and Infrastructure Group where he focuses his work on projects specifically designed to combat Louisiana’s coastal erosion problems.  After Hurricane Katrina, Mr. Malbrough was a key team member involved in the compilation of the State’s Comprehensive Master Plan for a Sustainable Coast.  He was instrumental in the development of the Coast Builders Coalition, a non-profit association formed to bring together leaders from the private and public sectors to provide leadership and best practices in the implementation of a comprehensive restoration and protection system for south Louisiana. Mr. Malbrough champions the use of dedicated dredging of the Mississippi River sediment to restore Louisiana’s coast.  Working with Jefferson Parish he developed a project to pump sediment from the Mississippi River to restore marsh in the vicinity of Bayou Dupont.  That project was approved for funding by CWPPRA and moved to construction this year.

Mr. Gary Fine, retired from the Natural Resources Conservation Service (NRCS), continues to play an active role in the coastal wetland protection and restoration community. While with NRCS, Mr. Fine worked to advance effective plant science technology to address critical wetland conservation needs and actively promoted the use of plant materials to solve specific coastal wetland conservation problems. Currently, Mr. Fine works with the coastal soil and water conservation districts on all of the Office of Coastal Protection and Restoration (OCPR) and NRCS/SWCD marsh re-vegetation program projects on the southeast side of the state.  He worked with the City of New Orleans’ Office of Environmental Affairs to find cost effective methods to prevent further erosion of our coastline. He is also the native plants farm manager at Nicholls State University for the Louisiana Native Plant Initiative, where he has been instrumental in the development of native plant material for restoration of Louisiana’s coastal habitats.

Ms. Elizabeth Goodman Welborn will be receiving a 2010 Friend of the Coalition Award.  Ms. Welborn founded For the Bayou, a San Francisco, CA based non-profit that hosts events across the Bay Area that showcase Louisiana musicians, chefs and artists.  Proceeds from these events are given directly back to groups in Louisiana to help fund coastal restoration efforts such as marsh plantings and other projects.

CRCL was pleased to welcome James Carville, America's best-known political consultant, as the keynote speaker at the 2010 Stewardship Awards Banquet. A Louisiana native, Mr. Carville returned home in 2008 and has been a strong voice for coastal protection and restoration on a national scale. Mr. Carville’s experience includes a long list of electoral successes, a knack for steering overlooked campaigns to unexpected landslide victories and for re-making political underdogs into upset winners.

  James Carville is an author, actor, producer, talk-show host, speaker and restaurateur. Most recently, Carville is hosting Sirius XM radio's "60/20 Sports" show with Luke Russert, and is a frequent political commentator and contributor on CNN. He also serves as a Professor of Practice at Tulane University in New Orleans, where he lives with his wife Mary Matalin and their two daughters.

• USGS
• Cenac Foundation
• Geosyntec Consultants
• Ellen Ball
• McGlinchey Stafford

• Baton Rouge Printing
• Tayor Engineering
• Wilco Marsh
• LaPlace Consulting Services
• TetraTech