Biodiversity & Species
Court upholds polar bear “threatened” status
The first big opinion in the polar bear listing case is out. Score two for the Fish and Wildlife Service: the agency’s decision to list the bear as threatened under the Endangered Species Act prevailed against challenges from the Center for Biological Diversity on one side and the state of Alaska and hunting groups on …
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CONTINUE READINGPoor grades on Delta progress
Delta Vision Foundation, the non-profit formed to continue the work of Gov. Schwarzenegger’s Delta Vision Task Force, has released its second annual report card on Delta progress. (Legal Planeteer Rick Frank is a member of the Foundation’s Board of Directors.) If you had to bring this one home to your parents, you’d likely be grounded …
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CONTINUE READINGGood news for Hawaiian wetland birds
Regular readers know that we try to report good news when we can. This positive report caught my eye because I recently returned from an extended stay in the islands, where I had the opportunity to see these beautiful birds. Conservation magazine reports on a recent study showing that populations of three endangered Hawaiian wetland …
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CONTINUE READINGWolf delisting rule challenged in federal court
Yesterday, Alliance for the Wild Rockies, Friends of the Clearwater and WildEarth Guardians filed a compliant in the federal district court of Montana challenging the wolf delisting rider. You can check out a press release from WildEarth Guardians here. My previous posts describe the wolf delisting rider and the past litigation on the wolf delisting. …
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CONTINUE READINGGray Wolf Litigation Summary
I previously discussed the wolf delisting rider to the budget compromise bill. I thought it would be useful to summarize here the recent court opinions concerning the wolf, and consider the effects of the rider on those opinions.
CONTINUE READINGOf Wolves and Men
It looks like one of the losers in the budget compromise will be the wolf. The Tester-Simpson rider, attached to the compromise federal budget bill, will delist wolves from the federal endangered species list in Montana, Idaho, Washington, Oregon and Utah. Heather Hansen, at CU Boulder, has a detailed blog post on the wolf. The …
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CONTINUE READINGEndangered species bizarro-bill introduced
In the Superman comics, everything is backwards in Bizarro World. I thought I must have been unknowingly transported there when I read H.R. 1042, introduced by California Democrat Joe Baca, imaginatively (if incoherently) named the “Discredit Eternal Listing Inequality of Species Takings Act” (the DELIST Act, get it?). (Hat tip: ESA blawg.) The text of …
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CONTINUE READINGA Risky FWS Proposal to Limit ESA Petitions
The Endangered Species Act has long been a lightning-rod for controversy. The last administration tried to significantly circumscribe the scope of the ESA in a wide range of ways (see, e.g, here). The Obama Administration up to this point in time has in general sharply contrasted with its predecessor in ESA management, including listing a …
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CONTINUE READINGRight on the Commerce Clause, wrong on the ESA
Cross-posted at CPRBlog. As Rick noted earlier, the Ninth Circuit is now the fifth federal circuit court of appeals to reject a Commerce Clause challenge to the ESA. In San Luis & Delta-Mendota Water Authority v. Salazar, a Ninth Circuit panel upheld protection of the Delta smelt. I agree with Rick’s analysis of the Commerce …
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CONTINUE READINGNinth Circuit Rejects Commerce Clause Challenge to ESA
Aligning itself with four other federal circuits that have addressed the question, the Ninth Circuit has ruled that application of the Endangered Species Act to California’s imperiled Delta Smelt doesn’t violate the Commerce Clause of the U.S. Constitution. San Luis & Delta-Mendota Water Authority v. Salazar (http://www.ca9.uscourts.gov/datastore/opinions/2011/03/25/10-15192.pdf ) is the latest chapter in the long-running …
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