On 10-24-03, a Kern County Superior Court judge struck down a decision by the Kern County Board of Supervisors’ to approve one of the largest industrial developments in Kern County history. The Tejon Industrial Complex-East would have developed 1,109 acres with a 15 million square foot Industrial Complex and would have been twice the size of downtown Bakersfield.

The Court determined that the County’s environmental analysis did not adequately review impacts on air quality. In 2002, Kern County was the second most ozone-polluted county in the country (behind only San Bernardino County) and received an F grade in the American Lung Association’s annual State of the Air Report. The Court also found fault with the County’s failure to analyze the air emissions generated by the broad array of industrial and manufacturing uses approved for the Industrial Complex. The County declined to speculate about the actual future tenants of the Industrial Complex, but at the same time tried to exempt those future uses from the required environmental review altogether.

This suit represents the first phase of what will be a long-term effort to protect Tejon Ranch from the sprawl development that characterizes much of southern California. The suit was brought by the Center for Biological Diversity, Sierra Club, Center on Race, Poverty, & the Environment, and Kern Audubon. It was argued by Kassie Siegel and Julie Teel of the Center for Biological Diversity.

A federal judge has reinstated a ban on off-road vehicles within 48,000 acre of endangered species habitat within southern California’s Algodones Dunes. The Clinton administration agreed to close the area to destructive off-roading to protect the endangered Peirson’s milk-vetch and an additional 160 other species living in the largest dune system in the United States. The Bush administration, however, reversed that decision, allowing vehicles back onto the BLM lands.

The Center for Biological Diversity, Sierra Club, Public Employees for Environmental Responsibility and Desert Survivors filed suit, winning an injunction that will keep the dunes safe until a new management plan is prepared and legally reviewed for its impacts on the fragile desert ecosystem.

The same judge on 9-18-03 reversed a different Bush administration decision to open more than 400 miles of off-road vehicle routes tracing across 685,000 acres of the Mojave Desert. That Bush decision also rolled back environmental protection previously put in place. The case was argued by Brendan Cummings and Julie Teel of the Center for Biological Diversity.

The Center for Biological Diversity and the Sierra Club have filed suit to overturn the City of Palm Springs' approval of a sprawling residential and resort development. The project, known as the "Palm Springs Classic," would blade 460 acres of wildlife habitat between the Whitewater River and the Palm Springs airport to make way for 1,450 homes, an 18 hole golf course, a 500 room hotel, timeshare units, as well as assorted clubhouses and an additional golf course in the active channel of the Whitewater River.

The project site is habitat for a host of threatened, endangered and sensitive species, including the Coachella Valley fringe-toed lizard, flat-tailed horned lizard, loggerhead shrike, Palm Springs ground squirrel, Palm Springs pocket mouse, and California burrowing owl. The Palm Springs Classic Project will also generate over 18,000 vehicle trips per day and create severe air quality impacts.

The case is being argued by Terry Kilpatrick and Wayne Brechtel (Worden, Williams, Richmond, Brechtel & Kilpatrick) and Kassie Siegel of the Center for Biological Diversity.

A controversial U.S. Forest Service plan to poison Silver King Creek within the Carson-Iceberg Wilderness Area in the Toiyabe National Forest with rotenone has been stopped. The project was designed to kill off non-native fish in order to return the Paiute trout, and endangered species to the stream. The trout can not survive in the presence of the exotic fish. Though the Center for Biological Diversity supports native trout restoration projects, including the removal of non-native fish, we filed suit because the project was exempted from environmental review and did not consider less drastic alternatives. Nancy Erman, a prominent Sierra Nevada aquatic biologist, also joined the suit.

The Forest Service’s inadequate environmental review failed to evaluate the potential ecosystem damage from the poisoning, potential irreversible damage to the food chain Paiute trout depend upon, the impacts of California Fish and Game’s continued stocking of non-native trout, and lack of success from past rotenone poisonings. The Center will work to ensure the Paiute trout restoration goes forward with full consideration of alternative methods of removal of non-native trout.

Attorney Julia Olson of Wild Earth Advocates filed the successful legal action against the Forest Service.

The Center for Biological Diversity filed suit against the Bush administration for delaying Endangered Species Act protection for the Sacramento Mountains checkerspot butterfly. In response to a petition and lawsuit from the Center, the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service proposed to list the butterfly as an endangered species in 2001, but the Bush administration has delayed issuance of a final decision. The Bush administration has the lowest rate of adding imperiled species to the endangered species in the history of the ESA and highest rate of removing them. It is the only administration to declare (three times) that the extinction of wildlife populations is "insignificant" and thus should not be prohibited by the Endangered Species Act.

While the butterfly has been waiting for protection, Fish and Wildlife has determined that several projects will harm the species, including construction at three campgrounds, a new powerline and associated service road and corridor, livestock grazing on several allotments, a land transfer between the Forest Service and the village of Cloudcroft, and a large Forest Service timber sale.

The Cloudcroft checkerspot butterfly is checkered with white and deep orange squares separated by black bands and is about two inches across its wings. It occurs in alpine meadows in a small area surrounding the Village of Cloudcroft, New Mexico.

Center for Biological Diversity | PO Box 710 Tucson, AZ 85702 | 520-623-5252 | [email protected]

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