{"id":4193,"date":"2013-05-02T14:34:55","date_gmt":"2013-05-02T14:34:55","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.reefrelieffounders.com\/drilling\/?p=4193"},"modified":"2013-06-19T22:00:22","modified_gmt":"2013-06-19T22:00:22","slug":"the-lens-survey-americans-nationwide-willing-to-shell-out-personally-to-save-our-coast","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.reefrelieffounders.com\/drilling\/2013\/05\/02\/the-lens-survey-americans-nationwide-willing-to-shell-out-personally-to-save-our-coast\/","title":{"rendered":"The Lens&#8211;Survey: Americans nationwide willing to shell out personally to save our coast"},"content":{"rendered":"<blockquote class=\"wp-embedded-content\" data-secret=\"67oVYrazxc\"><p><a target=\"_blank\" href=\"https:\/\/thelensnola.org\/2013\/04\/24\/survey-americans-nationwide-willing-to-shell-out-personally-to-save-louisianas-coast\/\">Survey: Americans nationwide willing to shell out personally to save our coast<\/a><\/p><\/blockquote>\n<p><iframe loading=\"lazy\" class=\"wp-embedded-content\" sandbox=\"allow-scripts\" security=\"restricted\" style=\"position: absolute; clip: rect(1px, 1px, 1px, 1px);\" title=\"&#8220;Survey: Americans nationwide willing to shell out personally to save our coast&#8221; &#8212; The Lens\" src=\"https:\/\/thelensnola.org\/2013\/04\/24\/survey-americans-nationwide-willing-to-shell-out-personally-to-save-louisianas-coast\/embed\/#?secret=r6YIrozfkB#?secret=67oVYrazxc\" data-secret=\"67oVYrazxc\" width=\"474\" height=\"267\" frameborder=\"0\" marginwidth=\"0\" marginheight=\"0\" scrolling=\"no\"><\/iframe><\/p>\n<p>By Bob Marshall, Staff writer    April 24, 2013 2:00pm<\/p>\n<p>Question: Would enough American households be willing to make a one-time payment in their tax fillings to raise as much as to $201 billion for Louisiana&#8217;s coastal restoration effort?<\/p>\n<p>Answer:<br \/>\nA) Yes<br \/>\nB) No<br \/>\nC) You gotta be kiddin&#8217;!<\/p>\n<p>The answer, according to a pair of Mississippi State University researchers who conducted a recent survey, is &#8220;A.&#8221;<\/p>\n<p>Which will probably leave most coastal area residents thinking &#8220;C&#8221;.<\/p>\n<p>That&#8217;s how one of the researchers reacted.<\/p>\n<p>&#8220;I was surprised at the high numbers who said they would help, and then how much they would commit personally, &#8221; said Dan Petrolia, an associate professor of agricultural economics at MSU who conducted the survey with colleague Matt Interis &#8211; an attempt to judge the financial commitment Americans would make to Louisiana&#8217;s coastal crisis.<\/p>\n<p>&#8220;I think this shows there is enough awareness out there by enough people. And that&#8217;s very encouraging.&#8221; &#8211; David Muth<\/p>\n<p>A Louisiana native who was raised in Independence, Petrolia said the idea for the survey came to him after seeing a growing number of  &#8220;America&#8217;s Wetland&#8221; bumper stickers. They&#8217;re circulated by the America&#8217;s Wetland Foundation, the Louisiana civic group whose mission is alerting the nation to the state&#8217;s grave coastal emergency.<\/p>\n<p>Does the nation embrace Louisiana as its wetland? &#8220;I wanted to find out if Americans really felt that way,&#8221; Petrolia said. &#8220;It seemed like a pretty straightforward thing to find out.&#8221;<\/p>\n<p>One of the best ways to answer the question was to ask how much of their own money Americans would pay to help save the nation&#8217;s most productive coastal estuary and the storm buffer for a vital economic and cultural infrastructure.<\/p>\n<p>The MSU researchers asked two different types of questions:<br \/>\nThey first asked respondents if they would choose to help pay for the coastal effort, or do nothing.<br \/>\nThe second question was multiple choice. Respondents could choose to contribute to two different habitat projects affecting wildlife, fisheries or storm protection. Or they could choose to do nothing.<br \/>\nIn each case, those choosing to help did so knowing the decision came with a specified charge in their end-of-year tax filings.<\/p>\n<p>The respondents included 3,400 people spread across every state; only 32 were Louisianans.<br \/>\nThe results were good news for the coast:<br \/>\nForty-three percent of those given the help-or-not question choose to help the state. The median amount they agreed to pay was $1,751.<\/p>\n<p>That would translate to $201 billion, if the 43 percent sample held for the roughly 115 million American households counted in the most recent census.<\/p>\n<p>Sixty percent of those given the multiple-choice question chose to help, with the mean contribution from that group coming to $909, the researchers found. If that result held true for the 115 million American households, it would raise $105 billion for the coastal effort.<\/p>\n<p>The state&#8217;s current coastal Master Plan carries a price tag of $50 billion. But the planners reason they could do twice as much with twice the funding.<\/p>\n<p>Petrolia stressed that he was not claiming the survey sample would necessarily hold true for all American households.<\/p>\n<p>But since 93 percent of the respondents had never visited or lived in New Orleans, the level of support should be encouraging to Louisiana, the researcher said.<\/p>\n<p>Garret Graves, head of Louisiana&#8217;s Coastal Protection and Restoration Authority, declined to comment on the survey.<\/p>\n<p>David Muth, state director of the National Wildlife Federation&#8217;s Coastal Louisiana Campaign, called the results a welcome surprise.<\/p>\n<p>&#8220;I think it&#8217;s encouraging that Americans are willing to pay anything, frankly,&#8221; Muth said. &#8220;That&#8217;s because when you attach a dollar value to a question like that it sort of puts the (issue) on a whole new plain. I think this shows there is enough awareness out there by enough people. And that&#8217;s very encouraging.&#8221;<\/p>\n<p>In other findings from the survey:<br \/>\n        * Respondents ranked fisheries production as their first concern followed by storm surge protection and wildlife habitat.<br \/>\n        * Respondents who had made lifestyle changes for environmental reasons were more likely to support restoration.<br \/>\n        * Those who identified themselves as liberal tended to be more supportive than those who identified themselves as conservative.<br \/>\n        * Past or present Louisiana residents tended to be more supportive.<br \/>\nThe Northern Gulf Institute and the MSU Agricultural and Forestry Experiment Station funded the study.<\/p>\n<p>Help us report this story     Report an error<br \/>\nThe Lens&#8217; donors and partners may be mentioned or have a stake in the stories we cover.<br \/>\nABOUT BOB MARSHALL<br \/>\nMore from this author<br \/>\nBob Marshall covers environmental issues for The Lens, with a special focus on coastal restoration and wetlands. While at The Times-Picayune, his work chronicling the people, stories and issues of Louisiana&#8217;s wetlands was recognized with two Pulitzer Prizes and other awards. In 2012 Marshall was a member of the inaugural class inducted into the Loyola University School of Communications Den of Distinction. He can be reached at (504) 232-5013.<\/p>\n<p>Special thanks to Richard Charter<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Survey: Americans nationwide willing to shell out personally to save our coast By Bob Marshall, Staff writer April 24, 2013 2:00pm Question: Would enough American households be willing to make a one-time payment in their tax fillings to raise as much as to $201 billion for Louisiana&#8217;s coastal restoration effort? Answer: A) Yes B) No &hellip; <a href=\"https:\/\/www.reefrelieffounders.com\/drilling\/2013\/05\/02\/the-lens-survey-americans-nationwide-willing-to-shell-out-personally-to-save-our-coast\/\" class=\"more-link\">Continue reading <span class=\"screen-reader-text\">The Lens&#8211;Survey: Americans nationwide willing to shell out personally to save our coast<\/span> <span class=\"meta-nav\">&rarr;<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":"","_links_to":"","_links_to_target":""},"categories":[8,3,13,15,14,5,10],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-4193","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-clean-energy","category-climate-change","category-energy-policy","category-national-ocean-politics","category-national-resource-management","category-ocean-pollution","category-sustainable-energy"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.reefrelieffounders.com\/drilling\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4193","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.reefrelieffounders.com\/drilling\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.reefrelieffounders.com\/drilling\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.reefrelieffounders.com\/drilling\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.reefrelieffounders.com\/drilling\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=4193"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/www.reefrelieffounders.com\/drilling\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4193\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":4333,"href":"https:\/\/www.reefrelieffounders.com\/drilling\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4193\/revisions\/4333"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.reefrelieffounders.com\/drilling\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=4193"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.reefrelieffounders.com\/drilling\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=4193"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.reefrelieffounders.com\/drilling\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=4193"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}