From: Kieran Suckling [ksuckling@sw-center.org]
Sent: Monday, November 15, 1999 11:55 AM
To: Recipient list suppressed
Subject: BIODIVERSITY ALERT #213
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             CENTER FOR BIOLOGICAL DIVERSITY

           <www.sw-center.org>      11-15-99      #213
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§ MASSIVE TIMBER SALE APPEALED TO PROTECT GOSHAWKS

§ SUIT TO CHALLENGE LACK OF WATER QUALITY STANDARDS
   ON OVER 1,000 MILES OF ARIZONA'S RIVERS

§ FAKE "PEER REVIEW" PROCESS THREATENS COLUMBIAN
   WHITE-TAILED DEER

§ GROUPS PROTEST REMOVAL OF MEXICAN WOLF RECOVERY
   LEADER

MASSIVE TIMBER SALE APPEALED TO PROTECT GOSHAWKS
The Center for Biological Diversity and a coalition of environmental groups
including the White Mountain Conservation League and the Southwest
Forest Alliance appealed the Baca timber sale on the Apache-Sitgreaves
National Forest in eastern Arizona. This sale (up to 30 million board feet
on 8,000 acre area) is one of largest proposed by the Forest Service in
the Southwest in a decade. Typical sales are 1 to 5 million board feet.
In addition to logging nesting and foraging habitat for the Mexican spotted
owl and Northern goshawk, Baca sale would cut in designated old growth,
reserves, violating the Apache-Sitgreaves Forest Plan and a 1990 binding
settlement agreement between the White Mountain Conservation League
and the Forest.

A recent five year study by the Arizona Department of Fish and Game of
the 42 known goshawk nest sites on the Sitgreaves portion of the Forest,
concluded that goshawks are likely declining and would go extinct within
45 years if the population was closed. The study suggested that the
probable causes is lack of quality habitat. Goshawk populations on the
heavily cuttover Sitgreaves are about 500% less dense than populations on
the more remote Kaibab Plateau which still has extensive stands of old
growth ponderosa pine.  Despite these alarming findings and the fact that
Baca contains five active goshawk nest sites, the Forest Service failed to
even reference the report in its environmental analysis.
     _____________________

SUIT TO CHALLENGE LACK OF WATER QUALITY STANDARDS ON
OVER 1,000 MILES OF ARIZONA'S RIVERS
The Center for Biological Diversity has filed a formal notice of intent to
sue the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) for failure to set
pollution limits on 144 river and stream segments and Arizona. The EPA
has already determined the rivers are polluted, but contrary to the
requirements of the Clean Water Act, has not established limits on
further pollution. The limits, known as total maximum daily loads
("TMDLs"), identifies how much pollution each body of water can
sustain on a daily basis. This would limit stormwater runoff, industrial
and livestock grazing pollution, erosion from logging, golf course runoff,
sewage plant discharges and numerous other sources.

The Clean Water Act mandated that each state have in place by 1979
TMDL designations limiting pollution for all significantly degraded
waterways. The state of Arizona is up to 20 years late in setting the
pollution limits. The Clean Water Act mandates that the EPA take over
the responsibility for setting water pollution limits if a state fails to do so.

Rivers, creeks and lakes that are the subject of the legal action include
the Gila, Salt, San Pedro, Santa Cruz and Colorado, Little Colorado,
Verde, Agua Fria and San Francisco rivers as well as Hassyampa and
Chevlon creeks, Mule Gulch along with San Carlos Reservoir, Lake
Havasu and Peck's Lake along with numerous others water bodies
totalling over a thousand rivers miles in length.

The Center is represented by Matt Kenna of Kenna & Hickcox (Durango)
and Robert Wygul of Earthjustice (Denver).
     ______________________

FAKE "PEER REVIEW" PROCESS THREATENS COLUMBIAN
WHITE-TAILED DEER
In response to a request from the Center for Biological Diversity and
Umpqua Watersheds Inc., the U.S. Fish & Wildlife Service claims it is
submitting its proposal to remove the Roseburg population of the
Columbian white-tailed deer from the Endangered Species Act to
a "scientific peer review process." The agency, however, is knowingly
providing the peer reviewers with false information and refuses to
provide them with the public comments it has already received which
document the errors. Though we have demonstrated the many areas
claimed by the proposal to provide "secure" habitat for the deer are
being planned for logging and development, the agency has refused
to provide this information to the reviewers. Even worse, one of the
agency's "independent" peer reviewers is the person whose research
the Center and Umqua Watersheds has challenged. In a recent letter,
we informed the agency that it has undermined the validity of the peer
review process and is heading rapidly down a path that will lead to
litigation.

The Columbian white-tailed deer is endemic to coastal and foothill
floodplains of Washington and Oregon. Formerly ranging from Puget
Sound to southern Oregon, the species has been reduced to just two
isolated populations: one near Roseburg, Oregon, and one on a group
of islands near the mouth of the Columbia River. The delisting proposal
only includes the latter.
     ______________

GROUPS PROTEST REMOVAL OF MEXICAN WOLF RECOVERY
LEADER
On 11-3-99, fifty one groups and individuals sent a letter to Secretary
of Interior Bruce Babbitt protesting the U.S. Fish & Wildlife Service's
abrupt and unethical removal of David Parsons as its recovery
team leader for the endangered Mexican gray wolf. Parson's removal
comes at a critical time in the recovery effort, and could hinder the
agency's budding plan to release wolves directly into the Gila/
Aldo Leopold Wilderness Complex in the Gila National Forest. The
letter calls for the re-instating of Parsons and an investigation into
his removal.

The letter can be viewed at <www.eswr.com/ish50.htm>. The Center's
Wolf Safe Haven Plan can be viewed at
<www.www.sw-center.org/swcbd/activist/wolfhaven.html>
_____________________________________________________________

Kierán Suckling                     ksuckling@sw-center.org
Executive Director                  520.623.5252 phone
Center for Biological Diversity     520.623.9797 fax
<http://www.sw-center.org>          pob 710, tucson, az 85702-0710