[env-trinity] Associated Press

[Byron Leydecker]

updated 5:24 p.m. PT, Tues., Oct. 21, 2008


Feds rush to ease endangered species rules


15 reviewers, 200,000 comments, 32 hours to go through all of them


 

 

WASHINGTON - Rushing to ease endangered species rules before President Bush
leaves office, U.S. Interior Department officials are trying to review
200,000 comments from the public in just 32 hours, according to an e-mail
obtained by The Associated Press.

The Fish and Wildlife Service has called a team of 15 people to Washington
this week to pore through letters and online comments about a proposal to
exclude greenhouse gases and the advice of federal biologists from decisions
about whether dams, power plants and other federal projects could harm
species. That would be the biggest change in endangered species rules since
1986.

In an e-mail last week to Fish and Wildlife managers across the country,
Bryan Arroyo, head of the agency's endangered species program, said the team
would work eight hours a day starting Tuesday to the close of business on
Friday to sort through the comments. Interior Secretary Dirk Kempthorne's
office, according to the e-mail, will be responsible for analyzing and
responding to them.

Last week's end to the public comment period initiated the review.

'Last-ditch attempt'
Democratic Rep. Nick Rahall, chairman of the House Natural Resources
Committee, whose own letter opposing the changes is among the thousands that
will be processed, called the 32-hour deadline a "last-ditch attempt to
undermine the long-standing integrity of the Endangered Species program."

At that rate, according to a committee aide's calculation, 6,250 comments
would have to be reviewed every hour. That means that each member of the
team would be reviewing at least seven comments each minute.

It usually takes months to review public comments on a proposed rule, and by
law the government must respond before a rule becomes final.

"It would seem very difficult for them in four days to respond to so many
thoughtful comments in an effective way," said Eric Biber, an assistant
professor at the University of California, Berkeley, School of Law. Along
with other law professors across the country, Biber sent in 70 pages of
comment.

Fish and Wildlife Service Director Dale Hall told the AP on Tuesday that the
short time for processing the comments was requested by Kempthorne and would
set a record.

"There is an effort here to see if this can be completed" before the
administration is out, Hall said. He said the goal was to have the rule to
the White House by early November. In May, the administration set a Nov. 1
deadline for all final regulations.

Overruling Congress?
How fast the rule is finished could determine how hard it is to undo.


 

A new administration could freeze any pending rules. But if the regulation
is final before the next president takes office, reversing it would require
going through the review and public comment period again, which could take
months and sometimes requires years.

Democratic presidential candidate Sen. Barack Obama already has said he
would reverse the proposal. Congress also could overturn the rules through
legislation, but that could take even longer. Sen. John McCain's campaign
has not taken a position on the Bush administration's proposed change in
endangered species regulations.

Environmentalists said the move was the latest attempt by the Bush
administration to overrule Congress, which for years has resisted efforts by
conservative Republicans to make similar changes by amending the law.

Criticism from environmental groups and Democratic leaders prompted the
Interior Department to extend the public comment period from 30 days to 60
days.

"Somebody has lit a fire under these guys to get this done in due haste,"
said Jamie Rappaport Clark, executive director of Defenders of Wildlife and
the head of the Fish and Wildlife Service under former President Clinton.

The Interior Department received approximately 300,000 comments over the
60-day comment period, many critical of the changes. About 100,000 of them
were form letters, Hall said.

 

Byron Leydecker, JCT, Chair

Friends of Trinity River

PO Box 2327

Mill Valley, CA 94942-2327

415 383 4810 

415 519 4810 cell

bwl3 at comcast.net

bleydecker at stanfordalumni.org

www.fotr.org 

 

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