Crowdog
10-03-2005, 01:56 PM
http://www.lahontanvalleynews.com/article/20051003/News/110030006
Fish & Wildlife faces possible lawsuit on blue butterfly petition
BURKE WASSON
BURKE WASSON, bwasson@lahontanvalleynews.com
October 3, 2005
More than 17 months after submitting a petition to the U.S. Fish & Wildlife Service to name the Sand Mountain blue butterfly an endangered species, the Center for Biological Diversity is tired of waiting for an answer.
The Center, in accordance with the Xerces Society, Public Employees for Environmental Responsibility and the Nevada Outdoor Recreation Association, intend to file suit against the USFWS for violating the Endangered Species Act.
Specifically, the Nevada division of the USFWS has taken longer than the required 90 days to answer a petition in favor of naming the blue butterfly an endangered species.
Bob Williams, field supervisor of the Nevada Fish & Wildlife Office, said while he certainly does not wish the USFWS to be face a lawsuit, he's not shocked.
"It's not a surprise," Williams said. "By law, when we get a petition, we're supposed to act on it within 90 days and make some type of a preliminary finding. If we do find that there's enough information to warrant a full-blown review, then we have 120 days. By the statute, they have a right to file suit and cause us to probably negotiate us sitting down and really doing a petition finding."
Williams said the failure to publish a finding has not been due to a lack of interest, but rather a small amount of funding.
Because of the lack of these funds needed to promptly complete petition findings, Williams said he believes "about 90 percent" of the petitions are not answered within the required time.
"Congress only gives us enough money on an annual basis to do listing actions," William said. "We aren't allowed to use other resources or funds within our agency to do these petition findings. When we got this, we just didn't have any resources or money to pick it up and do it immediately, so we kind of put it on the list of other petitions and continued to work on a conservation strategy for the blue butterfly with the (Bureau of Land Management) and people who use Sand Mountain."
Williams' best guess is that the USFWS will receive a court order to do a finding and that they will answer it.
Besides the intent to sue, the effort to save the blue butterfly's habitat at Sand Mountain has also been continued by groups like the Lahontan Valley Environmental Alliance and the BLM.
The BLM recently approved new designated routes for off-highway-vehicle riders at Sand Mountain in order to protect the Kearney buckwheat, which is the blue butterfly's habitat.
BLM Associate Field Manager Elayn Briggs said rangers would be ticketing riders who go off the routes as soon as the new rules have been approved by the federal government.
While he and the USFWS brace for a court order, Williams said he would also like to remind people that a conservation plan is still in the works for habitat and that it might prevent the need to list the blue butterfly as endangered.
"The fact there's a notice of intent to sue and that we'll likely go into the petition-finding process is not a reason to stop the conservation activities that the parties are engaged in," Williams said.
"We can try to put together an agreement for the butterfly and the host plant. Let's keep working on a strategy that conserves the species. Then in our listing process, we can say we don't need to list the species and we've got the conservation activities we can do and have them in place. Let's beat them at the pass if we can."
Burke Wasson can be contacted at bwasson@lahontanvalleynews.com
Fish & Wildlife faces possible lawsuit on blue butterfly petition
BURKE WASSON
BURKE WASSON, bwasson@lahontanvalleynews.com
October 3, 2005
More than 17 months after submitting a petition to the U.S. Fish & Wildlife Service to name the Sand Mountain blue butterfly an endangered species, the Center for Biological Diversity is tired of waiting for an answer.
The Center, in accordance with the Xerces Society, Public Employees for Environmental Responsibility and the Nevada Outdoor Recreation Association, intend to file suit against the USFWS for violating the Endangered Species Act.
Specifically, the Nevada division of the USFWS has taken longer than the required 90 days to answer a petition in favor of naming the blue butterfly an endangered species.
Bob Williams, field supervisor of the Nevada Fish & Wildlife Office, said while he certainly does not wish the USFWS to be face a lawsuit, he's not shocked.
"It's not a surprise," Williams said. "By law, when we get a petition, we're supposed to act on it within 90 days and make some type of a preliminary finding. If we do find that there's enough information to warrant a full-blown review, then we have 120 days. By the statute, they have a right to file suit and cause us to probably negotiate us sitting down and really doing a petition finding."
Williams said the failure to publish a finding has not been due to a lack of interest, but rather a small amount of funding.
Because of the lack of these funds needed to promptly complete petition findings, Williams said he believes "about 90 percent" of the petitions are not answered within the required time.
"Congress only gives us enough money on an annual basis to do listing actions," William said. "We aren't allowed to use other resources or funds within our agency to do these petition findings. When we got this, we just didn't have any resources or money to pick it up and do it immediately, so we kind of put it on the list of other petitions and continued to work on a conservation strategy for the blue butterfly with the (Bureau of Land Management) and people who use Sand Mountain."
Williams' best guess is that the USFWS will receive a court order to do a finding and that they will answer it.
Besides the intent to sue, the effort to save the blue butterfly's habitat at Sand Mountain has also been continued by groups like the Lahontan Valley Environmental Alliance and the BLM.
The BLM recently approved new designated routes for off-highway-vehicle riders at Sand Mountain in order to protect the Kearney buckwheat, which is the blue butterfly's habitat.
BLM Associate Field Manager Elayn Briggs said rangers would be ticketing riders who go off the routes as soon as the new rules have been approved by the federal government.
While he and the USFWS brace for a court order, Williams said he would also like to remind people that a conservation plan is still in the works for habitat and that it might prevent the need to list the blue butterfly as endangered.
"The fact there's a notice of intent to sue and that we'll likely go into the petition-finding process is not a reason to stop the conservation activities that the parties are engaged in," Williams said.
"We can try to put together an agreement for the butterfly and the host plant. Let's keep working on a strategy that conserves the species. Then in our listing process, we can say we don't need to list the species and we've got the conservation activities we can do and have them in place. Let's beat them at the pass if we can."
Burke Wasson can be contacted at bwasson@lahontanvalleynews.com