Weekly Newsletter |July 19, 2019

Issues

New sage-grouse management plan proposed in Wyoming. For the first time, Wyoming’s greater sage- grouse team is recommending the governor adopt an explicit policy in his executive order to increase the bird’s population and expand its habitat.

The executive order — first issued by Gov. Dave Freudenthal in 2008 and updated by Gov. Matt Mead during his time in office — protects grouse by defining core-area habitat and directing state agencies to adhere to limits on development there among other measures. Gordon has said he wants to put his mark on the document by updating it but not undertaking a “major overhaul.”

The Sage-Grouse Implementation Team said a clause should be added to the executive order declaring that, “an expansion of the species population and its habitat is a priority.”

National Audubon Society Vice President Brian Rutledge has worked on the team since the beginning and said the sage-grouse team’s goal is to set up parameters that are consistent and science based.

“One of the greatest things about the Sage-Grouse Implementation Team is that now, when we work towards conservation ends, I find that some of my strongest supporters are miners and gas developers, trying to make sure that we create an atmosphere in which they can do their job and the grouse can flourish,” he said.

This recommendation and others were given to Gov. Mark Gordon on Wednesday. Gordon’s staff is reviewing the recommendations by the 24-member Sage-Grouse Implementation Team for potential adoption in the governor’s executive order.

In the News

R.I. state insect in middle of national debate over Endangered Species Act. Newport RI Journal. For a creature whose life is so entwined with death and decay, the American burying beetle has a certain charm. Seen up close, the inch-and-a-half-long insect that raises its young on the rotting carcasses of small birds and mammals is striking in appearance: a heart-shaped orange blaze on a glossy black head, matching bands over a pair of wings, and most prominently, another fiery patch on the pronotum, the dorsal plate that looks a little like a dinosaur’s frill. Scott Comings cradles a burying beetle in one hand as he stands in hip-high grass at Lewis Farm on Block Island. He determines its sex by the shape of the coloring above its mandibles, and checks for tiny notches in its wing coverings, or elytra, that will show whether he has trapped this one before and marked it. “I got a male,” Comings, associate state director for The Nature Conservancy in Rhode Island, calls out. “He’s new.” Michael Amaral, a retired U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service biologist, records the information in a notebook.

Gray wolf delisting proposal draws record response. E&E News, Sub req’d. Opponents of removing the gray wolf from Endangered Species Act protections said they lodged a record number of opinions in a public comment period that ended at 11:59 last night. Environmental groups say 1.8 million digital comments were submitted opposing the Fish and Wildlife Service’s gray wolf delisting proposal, amounting to what they call the largest number of comments ever received on an ESA issue in the 1973 law’s history, according to the Center for Biological Diversity. The FWS official tally is still underway. The environmental group claimed credit for 650,000 of the comments. “This overwhelming opposition shows that the Trump administration’s anti-wildlife agenda is out of touch with the values of most Americans,” said Valerie Love, deputy organizing director at the Center for Biological Diversity, in a statement.

Environmental cases ebb in lower courts. E&E News, Sub req’d. The number of environmental lawsuits in federal district courts has declined slightly in recent years, new research says. Despite the barrage of legal action from green groups opposed to Trump administration policies, a total of 518 environmental cases were lodged in lower courts in 2018 and 578 in 2017 — a drop from most years during the Obama administration. That’s according to a new report from the legal research firm Lex Machina, which is owned by LexisNexis. Last year’s cases included 146 with claims under the Clean Water Act, 99 under the Superfund law, 113 under the National Environmental Policy Act, 69 under the Endangered Species Act, 45 under the Clean Air Act and 21 under the Resource Conservation and Recovery Act. The federal agencies most often targeted by environmental litigation were the Interior Department, the Forest Service and EPA. The next most active parties in recent years were the Center for Biological Diversity and the Sierra Club, both filing scores of cases under the National Environmental Policy Act, the Endangered Species Act and other statutes.

Senate Energy panel readies massive markup. E&E News, Sub req’d. The Senate Energy and Natural Resources Committee will gather this week to consider 23 pieces of legislation during its first markup of the 116th Congress. The bills, covering issues such as carbon capture, advanced nuclear and energy efficiency, have the potential to form various types of energy legislative packages that both Republicans and Democrats are looking to advance to the Senate floor. The markup agenda also has 14 other bills, including S. 990, from Sen. John Barrasso (R-Wyo.), which would authorize the secretary of the Interior to participate in the implementation of the Platte River Recovery Implementation Program Proposed First Increment Extension for threatened and endangered species in the Central and Lower Platte river basins.