The Tulane Institute on Water Resources and Policy works to foster understanding and development of laws and policies that allow for improved stewardship and sustainable management of our water resources through research, teaching, and outreach. The Institute uses the efforts to cope with recovery, sustainability and coastal change in New Orleans and the surrounding coast as a "living laboratory". This "laboratory" offers a unique crucible for forging an understanding of how water resources law and policy shape both risk and opportunity, and how efforts to apply science, engineering, and resource management practices to meet our society's ecologic, cultural, and economic needs might be better served by enlightened law and policy both locally and beyond.