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December 6, 2011
PERMALINK
Excessive Endangered Species Act Litigation Threatens
Species Recovery, Job Creation and Economic Growth
WASHINGTON, D.C.
– Today, the Committee on Natural Resources held a full
committee
oversight hearing to examine how excessive Endangered
Species Act (ESA) related litigation impacts species
recovery, job creation and the economy. This was the first
hearing in series that will be held by the Committee to take
a fair look at the ways in which the ESA is working well and
areas where it could be improved and updated.
“The purpose of
the ESA is to recover endangered species – yet this is where
the current law is failing – and failing badly. Of the
species listed under the ESA in the past 38 years, only 20
have been declared recovered. That’s a 1 percent recovery
rate. I firmly believe that we can do better. In my opinion,
one of the greatest obstacles to the success of the ESA is
the way in which it has become a tool for excessive
litigation. Instead of focusing on recovering endangered
species, there are groups that use the ESA as a way to bring
lawsuits against the government and block job-creating
projects,”
said Chairman Doc Hastings
(WA-04).
“By strengthening
and updating the Endangered Species Act, improvements can be
made so it’s no longer abused through lawsuits and instead
can remain focused on fulfilling its true and original goal
of species recovery.”
Due to rigid
timelines, vague definitions in the Act and the propensity
of some groups to sue the federal agencies as a way of
generating taxpayer-funded revenue, the ESA has become taken
over by lawsuits, settlements and judicial action. According
to information provided to the Committee, Interior
Department agencies currently have a combined total of over
180 pending ESA-related lawsuits. In July 2001, the Interior
Department agreed to a settlement with the Center for
Biological Diversity and the Wild Earth Guardians that
covered 779 species in 85 lawsuits and legal actions.
At the hearing,
Karen Budd-Falen, an attorney specializing in private
property rights and rural counties and communities,
explained how the ESA has become a tool for litigation.
“With specific consideration of the ESA, if the federal
government fails to respond to a petition to list a species
within the 90 day time period mandated by the ESA, an
environmental group can sue and almost always get attorneys
fees paid. In these cases, the court is not ruling that the
species is in fact threatened or endangered, but only that a
deadline was missed by the FWS.”
U.S. Fish and
Wildlife Director
Dan Ashe
acknowledged that prolonged and costly lawsuits plague the
ESA, and divert time and resources away from species
recovery. “We fully agree with the concern that our
resources are better spent on implementing the ESA than on
litigation.” According to Mr. Ashe, “our FY 2011
resource management allocation for listing and critical
habitat was $20.9 million, of which we spent at least $15.8
million taking substantive actions required by court orders
or settlement agreements resulting from litigation.”
ESA litigation
also has been used
to block and delay important development projects, stifling
economic activity and job creation.
Doug Miller, General Manager of Public Utility District
No. 2 of Pacific County, Washington, discussed a
renewable energy wind project in Washington state that was
abandoned due to the ESA’s overly-burdensome regulatory
process. According to Mr. Miller, the Radar Ridge Project
was intended to “meet the renewable needs of our green
power retail customers, and provide an economic boost to
Pacific County… The Project would have also generated
250-300 temporary jobs and 9 permanent positions in Pacific
County, along with indirect benefits to local businesses
serving this workforce.” After the decision was made not
to proceed with the project due to lengthy and costly
regulations, Mr. Miller concluded that a “reliable
permitting process is needed under the ESA to permit
renewable energy projects … more formal oversight by
Congress of the permitting process is needed to insure that
waste of public resources can be avoided … [and] a need
exists for independent review of FWS decisions, short of
litigation, to insure that the agency makes its decisions
without delay, and on the basis of the best available
scientific information.”
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http://naturalresources.house.gov
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