North Louisiana Interfaith hopes to open four Community Lighthouses in the Shreveport area.
These lighthouses are solar microgrids in neighborhood centers to provide cooling and heating stations, a backup water supply, oxygen tank exchanges, electric battery recharging stations, and light medical equipment to residents during disasters.
The interfaith plan, which is adopted after the Community Lighthouse Project of the Together New Orleans is to first open these centers in Morning Star Baptist Church and the Highland Center.
Interfaith made a request to the Caddo Commission for $500 thousand as seed money. This request was referred to the Long Range Planning Committee.
This committee attempted to meet on Fri. April 28, but could not because a quorum of members were not present. The committee will most likely meet this week.
Many questions need to be answered by Interfaith before this project, which has admirable goals, is funded by the Commission.
These include, but are not limited to, the following:
1. How will the $500 thousand be split between the two proposed centers
2. If the needed funding is not obtained from other sources to open one or both of these centers, will the funds be returned to the Parish
3. Which facility is to be constructed and opened first
4. What will be the qualifications for citizens to utilize the centers
5. Are the centers to be open to the public at all times or just during a "disaster" and how is that term defined
6. What priorities will be given to persons wanting to utilize the centers
7. What will be the staffing of the centers, hours of operation, and who will pay for staffing and other services provided by the centers including maintenance of the centers and the microgrid system, etc.,
8. What will be the electrical storage capacity of each microgrid system and assuming an extended cloudy no sunshine period of time, will it be sufficient to handle an event like snowmageddon
9. Will the microgrid system electricity be utilized only by the center, and if so, only during a disaster or otherwise
10. Will there be a supervisory committee for each center and will the Commission have representation on the same
11. Who will be the owner of the solar microgrids, electric storage batteries and other equipment part of the solar microgrid system
There are probably other salient questions that should be addressed. Hopefully this list gives the Long Range Planning Committee and interested citizens starting points for discussion.
The proposed projects have great merit, and could provide much needed services during disasters which affect electricity and water outages.
As always, the devil is in the details, and rightly so when a large expenditure of public dollars is requested.