Economic Foundation
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Mission StatementEconomic Foundation The mission of Louisiana Economic Foundation (LEF) is to research and provide to business, industry, government policy makers and civic leaders realistic geo-political and strategic economic solutions to problems affecting Louisiana and our national interests. Our History In the aftermath of the devastation of Hurricanes Katrina and Rita, our Founder, David Fa-Kouri, a strategic economic analyst, was called into public service to provide emergency strategic and logistical support to senior government officials in the State of Louisiana. Once the emergency triage aspect was over and the long-term restoration began, we were engaged to supply a series of economic analyses to raise awareness to key decision makers about the vital importance of Louisiana to the nation for maintaining a strong, economic base, and the negative impacts to the rest of the nation and the world if adequate hurricane protections and coastal restoration actions were not implemented. Louisiana’s economic future was forever changed in 2005, when coastal issues became widely known as well the far reaching consequences to not only Louisiana residents but the entire nation. The decision process by which leadership followed was crises management with little or no vision on reality or actual events with heavy attention to special interest. Our director being directly involved in the event at high levels while donating his services was able to observe and work thru the crises and became determined to help guide that future events should have strategic planning with vision if at all possible. Vision is important because 2005 events and beyond political decisions were being made with short term objectives that carried enormous cost. Rather than employing both near term and long term strategic decisions utilizing a vision with objective realizations of what is probable and realistic while being cost effective with the limited one time resources available to affect to highest degree of benefit to the region and its people. At the time following Katrina and Rita, hope of a future was critically needed and thus funding to provide for coastal protection and restoration efforts was a priority. David Fa-Kouri was tasked with creating a blue print necessary for obtaining congressional support for funding. When he was told that there were no funds to support the efforts needed moreover unless the finished work came from a foundation complete with recognized letters of endorsements it simply would not be accepted or read. Subsequently over a 9 month period of effort success was achieved in obtaining hope for coastal protection when congress pass legislation to fund coastal restoration efforts in Louisiana. Since that time Louisiana Economic Foundation efforts has been focused on understanding risk or threats to Louisiana’s economic interest and provide guidance and recommendations to its leadership understand the macro and micro economic consequences both short term and long term. Examples of our 5 year history of work include: coastal issues and challenges, recovery housing, economic challenges, demographic shifts, capital markets decline direct affect on Louisiana citizens ability to have access to credit, commerce and industry as well as predicting future adversity to the region coupled with a mitigation strategy needed to minimize the future consequences all of which affect Louisiana and conversely the Nation. Present Action In response to the Deepwater Horizon oil blow out and concerns about the devastating potential impact of the disaster on Louisiana’s economy, and the subsequent catastrophic consequences to the rest of the nation and the world, we began researching existing technologies for viable solutions to cleaning up the Gulf waters. After an extensive vetting process, we have presented the results of that research to state and federal officials, while working with universities, research institutes, and private corporations with the underlying purpose of getting non-toxic solutions implemented which will bring the Gulf waters back to their pre-spill condition. 800 352 5991 PRIVATE SECTOR: Dan Borne, President, Louisiana Chemical Industry Association ACADEMIA: Dr. William Jenkins, President, Louisiana State University |