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SOUTHWEST CENTER FOR BIOLOGICAL
DIVERSITY
http//www.sw-center.org
#178
4-9-99
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o
JUDGE ENJOINS FILLING OF CALIFORNIA DAM TO SAVE WILLOW FLYCATCHER
o LATEST
ARMY PLAN TO DEWATER SAN PEDRO RIVER KILLED
o SUIT FILED TO PROTECT IMPERILED
CUCKOO, TROUT, FROG AND PLANT
Overturning of National
Policy Against Species Protection Sought
o OUTSIDE MAGAZINE: SW CENTER ONE OF
NATION'S MOST EFFECTIVE GROUPS
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JUDGE
ENJOINS FILLING OF CALIFORNIA DAM TO SAVE WILLOW FLYCATCHER
On 3-31-99,
Federal Judge Lance Burell issued an injunction barring
the Army Corps of
Engineers from inundating the South Fork Wildlife
Area behind Isabella Dam on
the Kern River north of Bakersfield, CA.
Noting that the Corps is nearly two
years behind on its promise to
mitigate habitat loss for the endangered
Southwestern willow
flycatcher, Burell ordered the agency to reinitiate
consultation with
the U.S. Fish & Wildlife Service, and desist from
destroying the
flycatcher's habitat until the Service issues a new finding on
the
case, and until the promised mitigation of 1,000 acres is
complete.
The Southwest Center was represented by Neil Levine of EarthLaw
and
Larry Sanders.
________________________
LATEST ARMY PLAN TO DEWATER SAN PEDRO RIVER
KILLED
The Arizona National Guard ended a two year battle with the
Southwest
Center, announcing on 4-2-99 that it will not move its 118th
Cavalry
Unit to Fort Huachuca. The southeast Arizona army base is the
largest
single water user in the upper San Pedro River basin, and is
heavily
responsible for the drying of the river and the impending
destruction
of the BLM's San Pedro National Riparian Conservation
Area.
In 1997, the Southwest Center learned that Fort Huachuca was
illegally
building facilities for the National Guard without an
environmental
review. We forced the base to suspend construction, but it
eventually
conducted the required review, concluding that there would be
no
significant impact to increasing its size even though an
international
team of scientists has determined that the river will dry up
unless
human population pressure decreases. The Center challenged the
adequacy
of the review in November, 1998, alerting the Army and National
Guard
that it would file suit if necessary to stop the expansion.
Realizing
its odds were not good, the military cancel the move this
month.
The National Guard, however, is but one facet of Fort Huachuca's
impact
on the river. The SW Center is continuing to challenge the fort's
failure
to conduct a systematic review of all its impacts to the San Pedro
River
and the imperiled wildlife which depend on it, including the
Southwestern
willow flycatcher and Huachuca water
umbel.
___________________________
SUIT FILED
TO PROTECT IMPERILED CUCKOO, TROUT, FROG AND PLANT
Enviros Seek to Overturn
National Policy Against Species Protection
On 3-22-99, the Southwest Center
for Biological Diversity, the
Biodiversity Legal Foundation, Oregon Trout,
Oregon Natural Desert
Association, the Montana Native Plant Society, the
Maricopa Audubon
Society and others filed suit in a Portland federal court to
list four
species as endangered and overturn a Clinton era national policy
against
protecting imperiled species.
The Clinton administration has
refused to issue decisions on whether the
yellow-billed cuckoo, southern
California mountain yellow-legged frog,
redband trout and Spaulding's
catchfly should be listed and protected as
endangered species. The plaintiffs
have asked the federal judge not only
to order a decision on the species, but
to throw out a 1996 Clinton
policy which overrides the mandates of the
Endangered Species Act.
The "Listing Priority Policy" states that the
Fish & Wildlife Service
should disregard the Endangered Species Act if it
does not have
sufficient resources to list species as endangered. Upon
adopting the
policy, however, the Clinton administration slashed its own
listing budget,
thereby manufacturing a false budget crisis in order to avoid
having to
list politically contentious species as endangered. In 1998,
for example,
Clinton requested less money for processing species listings
than did George
Bush in 1992.
All four species are critically
imperiled and continue to decline. The
southern California mountain yellow
legged frog has been reduced to
approximately 100 individuals. Even so, the
Fish & Wildlife Service took
two years to issue a positive 90-day finding
and is now 2.5 years late on
the proposed rule. For more information on the
Clinton policy and the
status of the four species, check out our web page
at:
http://www.sw-center.org/swcbd/activist/cuckoo.html
The
case is being argued by Neil Levine of EarthLaw, and Dan Rohlf of the
Pacific
Environmental Advocacy Center.
__________________________
OUTSIDE MAGAZINE: SW CENTER ONE OF THE
NATION'S MOST EFFECTIVE GROUPS
The April, 1999 edition of Outside Magazine
has an extensive story by Jack
Skow on the Southwest Center which he calls
"one of the most effective
regional environmental groups in the country, and
certainly the most
in-your-face...With its brawling, lawsuit-brandishing,
no-compromise approach
to battle, the highly successful Southwest Center for
Biological Diversity
has
earned as many critics as victories. Meet the
regional firebrands who
proclaim
that extremism in defense of the
environment is no vice."
The full story can be read at:
http://www.outsidemag.com:80/magazine/0499/9904scorch.html
_____________________________________________________________________________
Kierán
Suckling
ksuckling@sw-center.org
Executive
Director
520.623.5252 phone
Southwest Center for Biological
Diversity 520.623.9797 fax
http://www.sw-center.org
pob 710, tucson, az 85702-710