Decisions on species to be reviewed
Methods of Interior official who resigned in question
In the wake of the resignation of a Bush administration official who was rebuked for meddling in scientists' calls about protecting endangered species, federal officials on Friday announced plans to re-examine eight decisions influenced by the disgraced official.
But three Pacific Northwest species that sparked controversy -- the spotted owl, the bull trout and a seabird called a marbled murrelet -- won't be included in the review. Environmentalists labeled the administration's move a "token effort designed for damage control."
Friday's announcement by Dale Hall, director of the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service, comes less than three months after the resignation of Julie MacDonald, an Interior Department official in charge of the wildlife service. She had been chastised by the agency's inspector general for bullying agency scientists and leaking information to industry groups.
Hall said officials ordered the re-examination of eight decisions about imperiled species because "we want to make sure that the science is true."
The agency said the review would not cover numerous other decisions MacDonald influenced because officials "determined that her involvement in the outcome of those decisions did not affect the species' status. Many other decisions influenced by MacDonald involved application of law and policy that were within her authority to make."
But Kristen Boyles, a Seattle lawyer with the Earthjustice law firm who frequently sues on behalf of threatened species, argued that the review should be much broader.
"If Ms. MacDonald and others in D.C. made illegal decisions, I don't care if you call them policy, science or economic decisions, they should be reviewed if those decisions are invalid," Boyles said.
The most recent controversy in the Northwest involved a Washington, D.C.-based team of Bush administration officials, including MacDonald, who overruled a panel of Northwest-based experts and reduced by one-fifth the amount of acreage protected as "critical habitat" for the spotted owl.
"People's bells should go off when the folks in an agency's regional office are overruled by political appointees in D.C.," Boyles said. "I don't believe the region is always right, but I believe they are paying attention to the science because they are the scientists."
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Decisions on species to be reviewed
