Originally posted by Crowdog
It's time to write your representatives to express your disgust in how Fish & Wildlife has handled these "studies" of endangered species. Demand action (those responsible should be fired).

And ask that the Endangered Species Act be reformed. This is the reason behind all of the lawsuits and fraud. The ESA has failed miserably in its' mission to protect species. The government spends more time fighting lawsuits than managing public land.

For an more info regarding what needs to be done with the ESA click here (http://www.crowley-offroad.com/grassroots_esa_coalition.htm) or
here (http://www.crowley-offroad.com/national_endangered_species_act_reform_coalition.h tm).

Here is how to find your representatives:
http://www.congress.org/


:usa:

Originally posted by Crowdog
Here is a letter you can use as a basis to send to your representatives. I didn't write it, but you have the authors permission to use whatever parts of it that you want:

I am writing to express outrage at the recently
uncovered incidents of scientific fraud perpetrated by
scientists from the Department of Fish and Wildlife.
The first incident was the planting of Lynx hairs in a
place that the Lynx does not inhabit. The second is a
report of similar actions being taken but with the
Grizzly bear (as reported in the Washington Times on
January 7, 2002).

The problem seems to be systemic within the various
agencies charged with making land use and public policy decisions. I
refer to Steven R. Arnold, a former researcher at the
Tulane University Center for Bioenvironmental
Research. The Federal Office of Research Integrity
found that Arnold had "committed scientific misconduct
by intentionally falsifying the research results
published in the Journal Science and by providing
falsified and fabricated materials to investigating
officials."

The Tulane Center said it found that various
pesticides, safe when tested individually, were 1,000
times more dangerous when tested together. It raised
the specter of modern agriculture's chemicals
undermining the health of the human population and the
natural ecology through a blind spot in our regulatory
testing. And it was a lie.

Further inaccuracies can be pointed out in desert
tortoise documentation authored by Dr. Kristin Berry
with the USGS. Whether it is intentional fraud,
unprofessional bias or just plain incompetence remains
to be seen. What is certain is that Dr. Berry's
unsubstantiated reports have influenced the California
Desert Plans which are currently in various stages of
preparation and/or completion. These plans, once
implemented, will virtually shut down over 800,000
acres of public lands to public use.

I only point out these incidents to stress that
something is seriously wrong with the way these
agencies are conducting business. Nobody can argue
against legitimately trying to save species or keep
the environment clean. However, when the studies that
public policy is based upon are skewed, fraudulent or
wrong, nothing good can be accomplished. Entire
industries have been shut down or curtailed. Mining,
ranching, farming, logging and recreation are being
shut down in some parts of the country based on these
data. If that data is falsified, the actions are not
only wrong, they are criminal.

With all due respect I am not only requesting, but
DEMANDING, that full congressional investigation be
made into all of these studies that so deeply affect
the economy, private property rights and people's way
of life. This affects the very freedom of this country
and should not be treated lightly.

The Endangered Species Act must be reformed. Until a balanced and fair set of parameters are decided upon, acts of fraud and frivilous lawsuits will continue.
--------------------------------------------------------------------

Crowdog


:usa:

Here is a statement by Hugh Vickery, spokesman for the Fish and Wildlife Service:

Milking a Government Cash Cow

If listing new species is so much more important than designating critical habitat for those already listed, why are the activist organizations pushing so hard to force the FWS to designate critical habitat?

"Because they know they can win the lawsuits. They know we cannot meet the deadlines. And they obviously have a different view of the conservation value of habitat," said Vickery.

Others are less diplomatic. Many people, especially those in the country's Western states, believe the activists are not really interested in protecting endangered species, but are deliberately misusing the ESA in their zeal to promote their anti-property rights, anti-growth, anti-military agenda at American taxpayers' expense.

Western states include millions of acres of land and water that have been put off limits or restricted for human activity because of government mandates.

Vickery said FWS has not calculated how many millions of acres have been designated as critical habitat throughout the country.
The Center for Biological Diversity boasts that since 1995 it has succeeded in limiting human activity on almost 40 million acres - almost 6 million in California alone.

Every time a professional activist organization wins a lawsuit, which Vickery pointed out was most of the time, the U.S. Treasury pays its legal fees.

During the 1990s, the U.S. Justice Department reportedly paid the various groups $31.6 million in legal fees. The average payment was more than $70,000.

One settlement netted the Sierra Club and other plaintiffs more than $3.5 million. Their lawyers charge as much as $350 per hour.

According to Vickery, the FWS is coping with approximately 80 lawsuits that have been settled in recent years. At $70,000 per suit, the activist organizations would have reaped $5.6 million of taxpayer money just from those lawsuits.

That's almost as much as this year's $6.4 million FWS budget for listing endangered species and designating critical habitat.
And that does not count the money paid to the government's attorneys to defend the lawsuits.

Attempts to reach Justice Department officials to find out how much has been spent this year or proposed in next year's budget to pay for the environmental activist organizations' lawsuits were unsuccessful.

Ag meeting heats up over endangered species law
By BECKY SHAY
Billings Gazette Staff

The January Thaw agriculture conference warmed up Thursday night with a heated discussion on the Endangered Species Act.


The discussion “Where Does Man Fit In? Resource Conflict in the Twenty-First Century” began with benign opening statements by the five panelists but intensified as the audience asked questions about the now-controversial Endangered Species Act.


The panelists were former U.S. Sen. Helen Chenoweth-Hage, R-Idaho, and her husband Nevada rancher and author Wayne Hage; Peter Kolb, MSU extension forester and ecologist; Jennifer Lyman, Rocky Mountain College professor of botany and environmental studies; Daniel Kemmis, director of the University of Montana’s Center for the Rocky Mountain West and a former Montana representative and Missoula mayor; and Rod Heitschmidt, research leader and rangeland ecologist at the Fort Keogh Livestock and Range Laboratory. Moderator was Vern Dooley, the division chairman of the agriculture department at Northwest College in Powell, Wyo.


Yellowstone County Extension Agent Paul Dixon posed the first question from the floor, asking the panel to address what agriculture producers can do when endangered species are found on their land.


“Don’t ever admit you have them,” Kolb said to laughter and applause from the crowd of about 100 at Rocky Mountain College.


Kolb later said the Endangered Species Act is flawed right down to its name. Rather than “species” it should be endangered “habitat,” he said, and the government should launch a program that gives incentives for landowners who save that habitat.


“The philosophy behind it was very noble, and like some noble things it got twisted,” Kolb said.


The atmosphere in Losekamp Hall grew charged as participants in the annual farm and ranch conference and panel members aired their frustrations with the 1972 law.


“The Endangered Species Act was never meant to protect endangered species,” said Hage, who advocates private property rights. “It was written for one reason: To take your property.”


Hage said “ownership” is defined as control of property, and once the government takes that control in the name of protecting a species, it takes ownership.


Chenoweth said she would prefer to find a way in which government and the people can work together to make species thrive, but until that time she suggested following Kolb’s advice to “be quiet about it.”


“Our government has instituted an act that has become punitive to property owners,” Chenoweth said.


“This problem is in the public interest, but we can sure do it a better way,” the former congresswoman said to applause.


Lyman and Kemmis spoke in favor of the intent of the law – to keep species from extinction – although both admitted its administration has become flawed.


“The Endangered Species Act is a mess and it’s making a mess of a lot of public policy,” Kemmis said. “We have to find a much better way to do what the act set out to do.”


One audience member asked if policy director Kemmis or botanist Lyman had ever had to defend their own land against the “guerrilla tactics” taken by some government agencies working under the act. Both said no, and Lyman said her one acre in suburban Billings probably won’t be affected by the law.


But Kemmis took the challenge more seriously and said the form of the question is typical of the confrontational, extremist points of view and deep suspicions that have erupted in Western politics.


“Simply because I go so far as to say there are good intentions behind the act, I put myself in the position of being treated like an enemy,” Kemmis said. “We’ve got to get beyond that.”


Casey Emerson of Bozeman told the panel that he wondered if the so-called “environmentalists” who tout the Endangered Species Law have read the Bible passage that says people must “subdue the Earth.”


“I think there are some species that ought to be killed off to subdue the earth,” Emerson said, and compared them to eradicating weeds in a wheat field.


Kolb, the forester and ecologist, said the term environmentalist shouldn’t be used with a broad stroke of the brush.


“There are some very good people who are environmentalists, and there are some radicals who call themselves environmentalists,” Kolb said.


Keith Schott said his family farm northwest of Billings treats the land with respect, including using methods that avoid dirt blowing away and using grazing management.


“Ninety percent of us in here are environmentalists,” Schott said. “I don’t think there is a better environmentalist than any of us here.”

http://www.montanaforum.com/rednews/2002/01/04/build/wildlife/esawar.php?nnn=3

Here is an online petition for reforming the Endangered Species Act:
http://www.petitiononline.com/PEOPLE1/petition.html