ENDANGERED SPECIES: Greens plan to sue BLM over species management in Calif. deserts
Scott Streater, E&E reporter
Published: Tuesday, April 1, 2014
A coalition of environmental groups is threatening to sue the Bureau of Land Management for allegedly failing to track the impacts of agency-sanctioned activities on endangered and threatened species in the California deserts.
The coalition late yesterday filed two 60-day notices of intent to sue over the agency's failure to supply mandatory annual reports to the Fish and Wildlife Service regarding monitored impacts to federally listed species on federal land portions of the Mojave and Colorado deserts in Southern California.
The areas in question are within the 25-million-acre California Desert Conservation Area designated by Congress in 1976. BLM manages about 11 million acres in the conservation area, which is home to the threatened desert tortoise and endangered peninsular bighorn sheep, among other listed plant species.
The two notices from the coalition, led by the Center for Biological Diversity, say BLM has failed for seven years to submit annual reports on impacts to endangered and threatened species in parts of these areas to Fish and Wildlife, and that the failure to do so has made it impossible to gauge the health and welfare of these sensitive species.
It's also impossible to know whether the agency has developed required monitoring protocols and plans to gauge the impacts of off-highway vehicle use and livestock grazing on the listed species as required by Fish and Wildlife in various biological opinions, the coalition states in the notices.
The failure to submit the required reports violates the Endangered Species Act, and the agency "remains in ongoing violation" of ESA until it complies and submits the required information, according to the notices.
"The Bureau of Land Management has shrugged off its duty to report impacts of grazing and off-road vehicle use on protected species on our public lands," said Lisa Belenky, a senior attorney for the center, who filed the notices of intent on behalf of the coalition, which also includes the Sierra Club, Public Employees for Environmental Responsibility (PEER) and Desert Survivors.
The notices were addressed to Interior Secretary Sally Jewell, along with BLM California State Office Director Jim Kenna and Ren Lohoefener, director of Fish and Wildlife's Pacific Southwest Region in Sacramento, Calif.
Belenky said BLM "needs to come forward with the information" on the impacts of authorized activities on the federal lands at issue, so the coalition can determine if the lands are being managed to protect the listed species.
"We are really interested in hearing what the BLM has to say," she said.
Mike Sintetos, a BLM spokesman in Sacramento, said in an email that agency officials "take our obligations under the Endangered Species Act very seriously." However, he added, BLM cannot comment on pending litigation.
But the groups in the coalition threatening to sue BLM say that the reporting requirements are significant and that the absence of this information to Fish and Wildlife could harm endangered and threatened species in the deserts.
"Without accurate monitoring results and reporting, there is no way to evaluate the harm to endangered species that is occurring and therefore no way to modify activities to decrease harm," Karen Schambach, director of PEER's California office, said in a statement.
