Crowdog
06-05-2002, 12:28 PM
Endangered species law fuels debate
By VIC POLLARD, Californian Sacramento Bureau
e-mail: vpollard@bakersfield.com
Tuesday June 04, 2002, 10:51:50 PM
SACRAMENTO -- The law that makes Kern County's blunt-nosed leopard lizard more protected than most other endangered species needs to be scrapped.
Lawmakers, environmentalists, developers, water officials and others spent hours agreeing on that Tuesday.
They also spent the time disagreeing bitterly on what should replace it.
The debate came as an Assembly committee conducted one in a series of hearings on a heavily lobbied bill to change an old state law that has become a potential roadblock to a number of major projects, including crucial development planning in Kern County.
The committee plans another hearing after the warring factions have had more time to reach a compromise. Without agreement among major interest groups, the measure has little chance of passage.
Unless the law is repealed or modified, it could threaten completion of the county's Valley Floor Habitat Conservation Plan, officials say. The plan is designed to provide relief from strict enforcement of endangered species laws on 3,000 square miles of land in the western side of the county.
Without the plan, environmental laws could block or stall residential, commercial, agricultural and oil development activities in the area. The plan would allow development to disturb the habitat of endangered species, as long as additional suitable habitat is provided elsewhere.
The old law lists 37 species of native animals and fish -- including the blunt-nosed leopard lizard -- that are "fully protected."
Unlike other state and federal endangered species laws, it has been interpreted to bar the state from issuing permits for the incidental "take," or killing, of other endangered species like the kangaroo rat and the San Joaquin kit fox, which also inhabit the valley floor.
When completed, the valley floor plan will constitute a blanket incidental-take permit for development in areas with endangered plants and animals while providing habitat for even more of the species nearby.
But if the fully protected species law is enforced, it may not protect landowners from prosecution if they kill a leopard lizard or disturb its habitat.
"The law either needs to be changed or we won't be able to cover it," said Steve Strait of the Kern County Planning Department. "If somebody gets into a take situation (involving the lizard) they would be on their own."
Even without the lizard issue, the habitat conservation plan has some major hurdles ahead. County Planning Director Ted James is now finishing up the project's draft environmental impact report. He hopes to distribute the massive document in the fall. It will analyze the potential environmental repercussions of the conservation plan and allow people to comment on the project. Then it must win state and federal approval.
The Legislature is in its third year of wrestling with the fully protected species problem, and it is facing an end-of-the-year deadline to solve it.
That's when California must adopt a plan to reduce the water it draws from the Colorado River for use in Southern California. But the plan depends on taking steps to manage the population of the fully protected brown pelican that depends on the Salton Sea east of Palm Springs.
Kern County Assemblyman Dean Florez, D-Shafter, has sponsored two bills to modify the strict law, without success so far.
Currently the leading bill, authored by State Sen. Sheila Kuehl, D-Santa Monica, would repeal the fully protected species law, placing its 37 listed species under the existing California Endangered Species Act.
At the same time, it would stiffen the requirements for state agencies planning major construction projects to heed the advice of the Department of Fish and Game and to provide plans to aid the recovery of the disappearing species.
"We want to get them off the endangered species list," Kuehl told the Assembly Water, Parks and Wildlife Committee.
At Tuesday's hearing, water officials, farming interests and developers urged Kuehl to strip the bill down to deal only with immediate problems like the brown pelican and the leopard lizard.
Kuehl, one of the Legislature's leading environmentalists, refused.
She insisted on a permanent, statewide solution that would also strengthen requirements to protect all endangered plants and animals.
"This is part of my cost," she said, "my price."
http://www.bakersfield.com/local/story/1208409p-1325355c.html
Copyright © 2002, The Bakersfield Californian
By VIC POLLARD, Californian Sacramento Bureau
e-mail: vpollard@bakersfield.com
Tuesday June 04, 2002, 10:51:50 PM
SACRAMENTO -- The law that makes Kern County's blunt-nosed leopard lizard more protected than most other endangered species needs to be scrapped.
Lawmakers, environmentalists, developers, water officials and others spent hours agreeing on that Tuesday.
They also spent the time disagreeing bitterly on what should replace it.
The debate came as an Assembly committee conducted one in a series of hearings on a heavily lobbied bill to change an old state law that has become a potential roadblock to a number of major projects, including crucial development planning in Kern County.
The committee plans another hearing after the warring factions have had more time to reach a compromise. Without agreement among major interest groups, the measure has little chance of passage.
Unless the law is repealed or modified, it could threaten completion of the county's Valley Floor Habitat Conservation Plan, officials say. The plan is designed to provide relief from strict enforcement of endangered species laws on 3,000 square miles of land in the western side of the county.
Without the plan, environmental laws could block or stall residential, commercial, agricultural and oil development activities in the area. The plan would allow development to disturb the habitat of endangered species, as long as additional suitable habitat is provided elsewhere.
The old law lists 37 species of native animals and fish -- including the blunt-nosed leopard lizard -- that are "fully protected."
Unlike other state and federal endangered species laws, it has been interpreted to bar the state from issuing permits for the incidental "take," or killing, of other endangered species like the kangaroo rat and the San Joaquin kit fox, which also inhabit the valley floor.
When completed, the valley floor plan will constitute a blanket incidental-take permit for development in areas with endangered plants and animals while providing habitat for even more of the species nearby.
But if the fully protected species law is enforced, it may not protect landowners from prosecution if they kill a leopard lizard or disturb its habitat.
"The law either needs to be changed or we won't be able to cover it," said Steve Strait of the Kern County Planning Department. "If somebody gets into a take situation (involving the lizard) they would be on their own."
Even without the lizard issue, the habitat conservation plan has some major hurdles ahead. County Planning Director Ted James is now finishing up the project's draft environmental impact report. He hopes to distribute the massive document in the fall. It will analyze the potential environmental repercussions of the conservation plan and allow people to comment on the project. Then it must win state and federal approval.
The Legislature is in its third year of wrestling with the fully protected species problem, and it is facing an end-of-the-year deadline to solve it.
That's when California must adopt a plan to reduce the water it draws from the Colorado River for use in Southern California. But the plan depends on taking steps to manage the population of the fully protected brown pelican that depends on the Salton Sea east of Palm Springs.
Kern County Assemblyman Dean Florez, D-Shafter, has sponsored two bills to modify the strict law, without success so far.
Currently the leading bill, authored by State Sen. Sheila Kuehl, D-Santa Monica, would repeal the fully protected species law, placing its 37 listed species under the existing California Endangered Species Act.
At the same time, it would stiffen the requirements for state agencies planning major construction projects to heed the advice of the Department of Fish and Game and to provide plans to aid the recovery of the disappearing species.
"We want to get them off the endangered species list," Kuehl told the Assembly Water, Parks and Wildlife Committee.
At Tuesday's hearing, water officials, farming interests and developers urged Kuehl to strip the bill down to deal only with immediate problems like the brown pelican and the leopard lizard.
Kuehl, one of the Legislature's leading environmentalists, refused.
She insisted on a permanent, statewide solution that would also strengthen requirements to protect all endangered plants and animals.
"This is part of my cost," she said, "my price."
http://www.bakersfield.com/local/story/1208409p-1325355c.html
Copyright © 2002, The Bakersfield Californian