During the 2008 presidential campaign, Barack Obama promised to "direct revenues from offshore oil and gas drilling to increased coastal hurricane protection." That promise came in the wake of Hurricanes Katrina and Rita; then, earlier this year, the Gulf Coast region was hit by Hurricane Isaac.

As we mentioned last time we checked this promise, a 2006 law -- the Gulf of Mexico Energy Security Act -- is poised to send more drilling revenues to coastal states, to be used for protecting coastlines. The problem for those states is that the bulk of the money doesn't reach them until 2017, and efforts to speed up that effective date have continued to fall short.

Lawmakers from coastal states, particularly Louisiana, have tried numerous times to accelerate that timetable, arguing that states with onshore drilling revenues get a better deal than they do. Under the 2006 offshore bill, Louisiana, Texas, Mississippi and Alabama will collectively secure 37.5 percent of offshore oil and gas revenues beginning in 2017, capped at $500 million per year. By contrast, onshore energy producing states have historically received 50 percent of revenues and have not had a cap.

The money the states will ultimately get is still just a "small portion” of the roughly $6 billion the federal government gets annually from oil-and-gas revenues off the Louisiana coast, Landrieu told the Baton Rouge Advocate in arguing for a more generous share.

The House passed an amendment sponsored by Rep. Jeff Landry, R-La., that would increase the cap from $500 million per year to $750 million per year. But the bill went nowhere in the Senate. (Landry lost a post-Election Day runoff to fellow Rep. Charles Boustany and will not be returning to Congress.)

Meanwhile, in the Senate, Louisiana Democrat Mary Landrieu secured three Republican co-sponsors and four Democratic co-sponsors for the Offshore Petroleum Expansion Now Act, which would eliminate the cap altogether. But that bill never even made it out of committee.

For now, both the caps on drilling-royalty revenue and the delay for the four Gulf Coast states in initiating fund-sharing remain in place. We rate this a Promise Broken.