Issues
Riders in 2018 budget still up in the air. Energy and environmental groups are waiting in anticipation to see what will be included in the fiscal budget bill that Congress is hoping to pass by the end of this week. The outcome of this bill – which will comprise all twelve appropriations bills – is viewed as being particularly consequential as it may be one of the only major pieces of legislation that gets passed before midterm elections in November.
Appropriators in both parties say what remains in debate are generally policy riders that favor the energy industry and landowners. Provisions that are reportedly still being discussed are Senator Lisa Murkowski’s rule that outlines a management plan for Alaska’s Tongass National Forest, provisions that would alter the Clean Water Act, and more than twelve that would reform aspects of the Endangered Species Act.
If lawmakers complete negotiations by the end of this week, the bill will move to the House and Senate floor for approval by next week. Ultimately, the goal is to have the legislation ready to be signed by President Trump before March 23rd.
Iowa sets new goals in effort to keep monarch butterflies off endangered species list. The Iowa Department of Agriculture and Iowa Department of Natural Resources (DNR) announced this week they want to have 480,000 to 830,000 acres of monarch butterfly habitat throughout the state by 2038. This expanded habitat would allow the state to plant more milkweed, a plant that is essential to monarch butterfly conservation efforts as the only plant monarchs lay their eggs on.
If it reaches its goal of harvesting 480,000 to 830,000 acres of habitat, Iowa will be able to plant 127 to 188 million new milkweed stems — double the amount currently growing in the state. Despite numerous conservation efforts from areas all across the country, the butterfly’s numbers have decreased by 80 percent in the past 20 years. “The Endangered Species Act has tremendous impact on private land ownership,” said Iowa DNR director Chuck Glipp. “And so we don’t want to get at a point as a partner with DNR with our other partners out there, we don’t want to get to the point where there is no choice but to do this then it becomes mandated under the endangered species act. We’d rather have voluntary participation.”
Iowa’s goals are only one part of a national effort to get 1.3 billion new milkweed stems planted from the Mexican border up to the northern states in anticipation of the monarch’s migration.
In the News
Should some species be allowed to die out? New York Times. One day last spring, Lisa Crampton stood at the base of a tall ohia tree, deep in the forested interior of Kauai. That morning, Crampton and five other field biologists had spent two hours hiking to a narrow clearing, where a hovering helicopter airdropped a large aluminum ladder. Although the distance from the clearing to the tree was comparatively short, it took the team most of the morning to maneuver the ladder across a stream, through the brush and up a steep slope. During that time, it also started to rain. Ohia trees are tall and spindly, with a flowering red crown that spreads out in twiggy filaments. The object of the team’s efforts was a scraggly nest, about two inches wide, that was gusting around at the end of a branch four stories overhead. Peering up at it, Crampton frowned. “It’s pretty high up,” she said. “Do you think we can get the ladder close enough on this slope?”
Federal plan to auction mineral rights near Great Sands Dunes National Park opposed by environmentalists. Denver Post. Plans by a federal agency to auction off mineral rights on 18,000 acres near Great Sand Dunes National Park and Preserve to oil and gas drillers has placed Colorado at the center of growing controversy over President Donald Trump’s energy-production initiatives. Environmentalists want to block the federal Bureau of Land Management’s push to lease out the mineral rights of 11 parcels near the sand dunes for energy development. They say drilling on those parcels will disrupt fragile ecosystems, harm tourism and put wildlife species at risk. The concerns include potential damage to the Rio Grande cutthroat trout, a fish that environmentalists have unsuccessfully sought to have protected under the endangered species act. Elk herds prevalent in the area could be diminished, and air and water quality could be damaged, the conservationists contend.
Federal judge in Missoula speeds up grizzly lawsuit ahead of fall hunting seasons. Missoulian. A federal district judge derailed a docket full of legal preliminaries about removing the grizzly bear from Endangered Species Act protection on Tuesday, in hopes of getting the whole matter decided before Wyoming and Idaho open grizzly hunting seasons this fall. “I don’t think we always make our best decisions, our best briefs or our best arguments in the context of emergency injunctive relief motions,” U.S. District Judge Dana Christensen said in Missoula. “It’s not efficient to deal with issues of this importance in the context of restraining orders.” In a ruling from the bench, Christensen denied the federal government’s request to delay proceedings in six lawsuits challenging the delisting of grizzly bears in the Greater Yellowstone Ecosystem. He also rejected requests by three different groups to decide the case based on technicalities. And he ordered all parties to put their sprawling arguments into a single set of briefs for a hearing in August.
Hatchery-raised salmon released into Sierra creek to save endangered species. San Francisco Chronicle. Seeking to stave off the extinction of a storied species, state and federal wildlife officials are releasing 200,000 hatchery-raised salmon into a restored High Sierra creek where once-magnificent winter runs were wiped out over the past century. The releases starting this month of endangered, winter-run chinook into Battle Creek — a Sacramento River tributary that winds through Shasta and Tehama counties — is part of a 19-year effort to rebuild a wild population of the migrating species before the effects of climate change become more pronounced and expected droughts take away the cold mountain water they need to survive. “Each step we take to re-establish these endangered winter-run chinook salmon is vital and helps us remember that in less than a century a run of salmon nearly a million strong has been reduced to thousands,” said Charlton Bonham, director of the California Department of Fish and Wildlife.
Trump administration sued over Pacific walrus. Alaska Public Media. The Center for Biological Diversity is suing the Trump Administration for not granting an Endangered Species Act listing for the Pacific walrus. The environmental advocacy group filed the lawsuit on Thursday, March 8, 2018, in U.S. District Court. In October 2017, the U.S. Fish & Wildlife Service decided the Pacific walrus didn’t warrant additional federal protections. The agency said the population appeared “stable” and had “demonstrated an ability to adapt to changing conditions.” But some conservation groups say the decision was politically motivated and not based on the best available science. In 2008, polar bears were granted an Endangered Species Act listing under President George W. Bush. But the U.S. Fish & Wildlife Service says the two animals aren’t the same. Polar bears face a host of challenges with declining sea ice — more than what’s been observed of walrus.
