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CENTER FOR BIOLOGICAL
DIVERSITY
<www.sw-center.org>
5-9-00
#236
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§
WHITE ABALONE PROPOSED AS ENDANGERED SPECIES
§ SUIT FILED TO PROTECT COOK
INLET BELUGA WHALE
§ SUIT FILED TO FORCE CONSIDERATION OF REFORM
TO
BLUE RIDGE DAM
§ JUDGE STOPS CALIFORNIA
DEVELOPMENT TO SAVE
ENDANGERED SPECIES -- NEWSPAPER
EXPOSES
CORRUPTION BY U.S. FISH & WILDLIFE
SERVICE
§ DON'T LET GAME AND FISH DUMP ARIZONA'S WOLVES!
SEND A LETTER TODAY
WHITE ABALONE PROPOSED AS ENDANGERED SPECIES
On
5-5-00, in response to a petition from the Center for Biological
Diversity,
the National Marine Fisheries Service proposed to list the white
abalone
(Haliotis sorenseni) as a federally endangered species.
The
white abalone is a marine snail which occurs from Point Conception,
CA to
Punta Abreojos, Baja California, Mexico. Its numbers have
declined
precipitously putting the species in imminent danger of extinction.
The
white abalone once numbered between 2 and 4 million animals but
have
been severely depleted by commercial fishing. The most recent
surveys
estimate that fewer than 2,500 remain, a decline of over 99%.
White
abalone are broadcast spawners, requiring males and females to be
within
a few meters of each other for successful fertilization and
reproduction to
occur. The few abalone that escaped commercial harvest are
now too few
and far between to successfully reproduce.
The life span
of an individual white abalone is estimated to be between 35
and 40
years. Thirty-four years have passed since the last known
successful
recruitment of the species in 1966. Scientists have predicted
that the
species will be extinct in less than a decade unless immediate
action is
taken. The white abalone will be the first marine
invertebrate
protected under the
ESA.
________________________
SUIT FILED TO PROTECT COOK INLET BELUGA
WHALE
On 5-8-00, a coalition of environmental groups and a former
Native
subsistence hunter filed suit to force the National Marine
Fisheries
Service to take action on a petition to protect the Cook Inlet
beluga whale
under the ESA. Joining the Center for Biological Diversity in
the litigation
are the Alaska Center for the Environment, Alaska Community
Action on
Toxics, Alaska Wildlife Alliance, Center for Marine Conservation,
National
Audubon Society, and Joel Blatchford an Inupiat Eskimo who
formerly
hunted beluga whales in Cook Inlet but has since become an advocate
for
their protection.
The Cook Inlet beluga whale is an isolated,
genetically distinct population,
occurring in the most developed region in
Alaska. Once numbering over
1000, the population has been reduced by
hunting to about 350 remaining
whales. It is threatened by oil development,
commercial fishing activity,
and discharge of urban and industrial wastes. In
March 1999, the Center
for Biological Diversity, Trustees for Alaska, Center
for Marine
Conservation, Joel Blatchford, and other filed a formal petition
to list the
species as "endangered" under the ESA. Though the Endangered
Species
Act requires NMFS to make a decision within one year, the agency
has
not done so. The coalition is represented by Jack Sterne of Trustees
for
Alaska.
_____________________________
SUIT FILED TO FORCE CONSIDERATION OF REFORM
TO BLUE
RIDGE DAM
On 5-08-00, the Center for Biological Diversity filed
suit against the Federal
Energy Regulatory Commission (FERC) for failing to
respond to a formal
petition filed under the Administrative Procedures Act
(APA) to protect the
endangered Little Colorado River spinedace which is
being driven to
extinction by the Blue Ridge Dam on East Clear Creek, AZ.
FERC has
jurisdiction over the dam which is owned by mining conglomerate
Phelps
Dodge.
The petition requests that FERC submit the dam's impacts
to the U.S.
Fish & Wildlife Service for review, and release more water to
ensure the
survival of the spinedace. Currently, the dam releases only 2.5
cfs during
low flows. Low water levels and elimination of natural flood
cycles are two
of the major threats to the species. The Fish & Wildlife
Service formally
requested that FERC consult over the effects of the dam
operation to the
spinedace and its formally designated critical habitat in
1992. To this date,
FERC has refused.
Phelps Dodge illegally
constructed on the Coconino National Forest in
1963 to facilitate a complex
interbasin water transfer. It allows water to be
pumped from East Clear Creek
(Little Colorado River Basin) into the East
Verde River, a tributary of the
Gila River. Having put more water in the Gila
River Basin, Phelps Dodge is
then permitted to pump water out of the
Black River to its massive Morenci
Mine in southeast Arizona.
Because of their massive ecosystem disruption,
dams are one the world's
largest causes of species imperilment and
environmental degradation. The
Center's campaign to remove or reform critical
dams in the West has
targeted Hoover Dam, Roosevelt Dam, Isabella Dam, Blue
Ridge Dam,
Matilija Dam, the Fossil Creek dams, and Glen Canyon Dam. The
Center
is the fiscal sponsor of the Glen Canyon Action Network.
Dan
Rolhf, Director of the Pacific Environmental Advocacy Center
(Portland), is
arguing the Blue Ridge
case.
_________________________
JUDGE STOPS MASSIVE CALIFORNIA DEVELOPMENT TO
SAVE
ENDANGERED SPECIES -- NEWSPAPER EXPOSES GROSS
CORRUPTION BY U.S. FISH
& WILDLIFE SERVICE, DEPARTMENT
OF INTERIOR, AND U.S. ARMY CORPS OF
ENGINEERS
On 5/3/00, Judge Jeremy Fogel issued a preliminary injunction
halting
work on the "Ranch at Silver Creek" golf course and luxury
home
development just outside San Jose, CA. The injunction was won in
a
lawsuit by the Center for Biological Diversity and the
Guadalupe-Coyote
Resource Conservation District, a state chartered agency.
The two
groups sued the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers for allowing the
575
acre development to proceed despite very strong evidence that it
would
harm two endangered plants (the Santa Clara dudleya and the
Metcalf
canyon jewelflower) and the Bay checkerspot butterfly.
U.S.
Fish & Wildlife Service biologists vigorously opposed the project,
but
were cast aside by agency bureaucrats after the powerful developer
persuaded
anti-environmental congress-persons to apply political
pressure to make the
development go forward regardless of its impact
on the environment. Fish
& Wildlife Service biologists initially threatening
to prosecute the City
of San Jose and developer Presley Homes Inc.
(now William Lyon Homes) for
illegal take of endangered species. After
inappropriate and illegal
intervention by members of congress, however,
the Service withdrew all its
objections.
The case is being argued by Mark Wolfe (San Francisco) and
Matt
Kenna of Kenna & Hickcox (Durango).
The San Jose Mercury News
broke the political intervention story on May
4th, exposing a series of
internal memos by betrayed federal biologists
and long trail of illegal
political meddling. While this type of corruption is
common within the Fish
& Wildlife Service, it is rarely uncovered in
such
detail:
San Jose Mercury News, May 4,
2000
Judge halts grading on butterfly
habitat
BY BARRY WITT
A federal judge has
ordered work halted on a major golf course and
housing
development in San Jose's Silver Creek hills, ruling federal
officials failed to ensure that the rare bay checkerspot butterfly
and
other endangered species would not be harmed...The ruling
could
cause at least a year's delay, according to the developer,
and could
cost the company $5 million.
...
The ruling affirms the development's history as ``a classic
example of
political interference with the management of the
environment,'' said
Peter Galvin, a conservation biologist with
the Center for Biological
Diversity, which filed the suit along
with the Guadalupe-Coyote Resource
Conservation District. ``It's
a sad example of how (the Fish and Wildlife
Service) caves in
and doesn't fulfill its mandates, and it's a wake-up
call that
these political machinations are happening as a threat to open
space and wildlife.''
...
According to
documents obtained by the Mercury News, the Silver
Creek
development was a source of bitter disputes within the Fish
and
Wildlife Service and caught the attention of several
California
congressional representatives and high-ranking
officials in the
Department of the Interior, which oversees the
service.
Lower ranking biologists had concluded that the
developer needed the
agency's agreement on what portions of the
property could be
developed because so little habitat remains
for the butterfly...After
preliminary grading on the property
began last July, the service's
Sacramento field supervisor
issued a strongly worded letter to San
Jose's planning
department threatening the city with violating the
Endangered
Species Act if the city allowed the developer to continue.
As a
result, the city refused to issue the developer another grading
permit that would allow deep cuts into the hillside until the
federal
environmental issues were resolved.
But by October, Fish and Wildlife withdrew its threat, even as
agency
investigators were in the middle of a probe into whether
the early
grading work violated federal law.
In between, Rep. Gary Miller -- a former developer and Republican
from
Diamond Bar in western Los Angeles County -- had written to
Interior
Secretary Bruce Babbitt charging that the wildlife
officials in Sacramento
had treated the developer unfairly. In
his Aug. 31 letter, the first-term
congressman accused the
Sacramento officials of engaging in a ``gross
abuse of power''
in their efforts to stop the development.
An Oct. 7 letter
from Rep. Ken Calvert, R-Riverside, to the Fish and
Wildlife
Service asked that the developer's ``ongoing plight" and
apparent "mistreatment'' be addressed. Miller and Calvert
represent
districts hundreds of miles from San Jose...Rep. Zoe
Lofgren, the San
Jose Democrat whose district includes the
Silver Creek hills, wrote a
shorter letter on Oct. 13 seeking to
``better understand the concerns
of the U.S. Fish and Wildlife
Service.''
...
By late September, according to
the documents, Assistant Secretary
of the Interior Donald Barry
had gotten involved in the matter, and two
weeks later the
Sacramento office reversed course and told the
developer no
attempts would be made to stop further grading on portions
of
the property that had been disturbed in July...Barry did not
respond
Wednesday to a request for comment.
Barry's actions clearly irked lower-ranking officials in the
Sacramento
office, who wrote a December memo to put on record
their objections to
what had happened.
``We
do not believe (the service's) position is supported by the
record,'"
wrote Cay Goude, assistant field supervisor for
endangered species, and
Michael Thabault, a deputy assistant
supervisor. Their memo stated the
grading that already occurred
had violated the Endangered Species Act
and that the law would
continue to be broken ``as a result of further
development
activities.'"
______________________-
DON'T LET GAME AND FISH DUMP ARIZONA'S
WOLVES!
SEND A LETTER TODAY
At the next meeting of the Arizona Game and
Fish Commission, the
commissioners will consider whether to cancel its
participation in
the Mexican gray wolf recovery program. The politically
appointed
commission is actively hostile toward endangered species
and
environmental protection. Please write them today to show once
again
that the public is overwhelmingly in support of wolf reintroduction.
The
next commission meeting is scheduled for Friday May 19 in Safford,
AZ at the
Ramada Inn, 420 E. Hwy. 70. The time is set for 1pm for an
update on the
reintroduction and overview of the number of wolves
currently in the wild. If
you can make the meeting that would great, but if
you can't please write the
commission now.
Governor Jane Dee Hull
Arizona Game & Fish
Commission
1700 W. Washington St., 9th
Floor 2221 W. Greenway Rd.
Phoenix, AZ
85007
Phoenix, AZ 85023-4399
(800)
253-0883, fax (602) 542-1575 fax (602)
789-3299
azgov@azgov.state.az.us
mketterer@gf.state.az
phone (520) 628-6580, fax
628-6512
_____________________________________________________________
ENDANGERED
TOTEMS. Eleven of the twelve western states have adopted
imperiled species as
their state fish: New Mexico (Rio Grande cutthroat
trout), Arizona (Apache
trout), Colorado (Greenback cutthroat trout), Utah
(Bonneville cutthroat
trout), Nevada (Lahontan cutthroat trout), California
(Golden trout), Oregon
(Chinook salmon), Washington (Steelhead trout),
Idaho, Montana and Wyoming
(Cutthroat trout).
Kierán
Suckling
ksuckling@sw-center.org
Executive
Director
520.623.5252 phone
Center for Biological
Diversity 520.623.9797
fax
<www.biologicaldiversity.org>
POB 710, Tucson, AZ
85702-0710
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