New proposed Habitat Conservation Plans threaten wildlife
Petitions increase burden on Fish and Wildlife Service
Timber companies, developers, local governments and others are seeking federal permission to nearly triple the 37 million acres that fall under the nation's controversial and underfunded habitat conservation program.
Of the 433 pending plans listed by the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service, most are in the West and South, where development and timber-cutting most frequently collide with endangered species, records obtained by the Seattle Post-Intelligencer show.
In the Pacific Northwest, more than two dozen habitat plans are officially under review, according to Fish and Wildlife records released under the Freedom of Information Act.
One of the largest is a 9.1 million-acre deal in Washington that would shield much of the state's private timber industry from prosecution for harming salmon, steelhead, bull trout and 47 other kinds of fish. Approval of the 50-year "Forests and Fish" deal is expected later this year.
Other regional plans range from Port of Vancouver construction projects to irrigation water withdrawals in Eastern Washington to the Oregon coastline.
Some of the biggest in the works elsewhere: a 16 million-acre Louisiana plan that would allow logging and construction in areas populated by endangered red-cockaded woodpeckers; a 10.7 million-acre plan covering a Texas aquifer that is home to imperiled salamanders and insects; and a construction-farming strategy for 9.4 million acres inhabited by desert tortoises in California's Mojave Desert.
Habitat conservation plans are supposed to balance property rights and protection of endangered animals, often with developers restoring or setting aside some wild lands for vanishing species while bulldozing others. The deals typically offer an exemption from liability under the Endangered Species Act, effectively allowing the harming or killing of protected animals.
Continue reading this story from the Seattle P-I:
Area under habitat conservation plans could soar
