LAND GRAB FOR ANIMAL
THAT CAN'T SURVIVE THERE
'Critical habitat' established though critter hasn't
appeared in state for 50 years, by Bob Unruh, 8/19/18, WND.
There probably are not many people with serious antagonism
toward the dusky gopher frog.
But the question before the U.S. Supreme Court is whether the
federal government has the right to take over private property for the frog’s
habitat despite admitting the animal never could survive there.
The Pacific Legal Foundation is
challenging a
2012 U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service designation of more than 1,500 acres of
Louisiana as “critical habitat” for the frog on behalf of one of the
landowners, Edward Poitevent.
The complaint argues the frog hasn’t been seen in Louisiana let
alone on the private land in question in more than 50 years.
“Moreover, this land cannot sustain the frog: the Fish and Service
admits the frog could never survive (in ESA parlance, ‘be conserved’) on
Edward’s land without significant, expensive changes to the land, including
regularly prescribed burnings and an entire tree repopulation,” states the
complaint.
“No matter to the
government; it believes one day Edward and the other landowners will simply
‘cooperate’ with the government’s plan for their property and invest millions
of dollars to try and create habitat for the frog to survive.”
The complaint argues “the only place you’ll find the critter, in
its actual real world habitat, is nearly 70 miles away from Edward’s property.”
That would be in Mississippi.
Oral arguments in the case, Weyerhaeuser v. U.S. Fish and
Wildlife Service, will be heard Oct. 1 before the Supreme Court.
“Under the Endangered
Species Act, the critical habitat designation prevents Edward and his fellow
landowners from using their own land as they wish in the future without the federal government’s
permission,” says the complaint.
Among its arguments: The government can’t call the land “critical
habitat” because it’s not even “habitat.”
“The ordinary dictionary meaning of the term is ‘the place where a
particular species of animal or plant is normally found,'”
the complaint noted.
The government argues the Endangered Species Act does not
necessarily require a “habitat” to be habitable.” The ESA defines two
kinds of critical habitat, occupied and unoccupied, and references the
“features essential to conservation” only in connection with occupied habitat.
The PLF complaint addressed the government’s argument: “Under this
reading, if all habitat is required to be habitable, i.e., to have the
‘essential features,’ then the specification that occupied habitat have the
‘essential features’ would be redundant.”
The brief asserts U.S. Fish and Wildlife’s position “boils
down to nothing more than ‘critical habitat is what we say it is.'”
“No objective, enforceable criteria that a court could apply to
this or any future designation can be gleaned from the critical habitat
designations identified by the service,” the brief argues.
“The service’s assertions
that Unit 1 might be habitat, conditionally (if the landowners change their
minds and dedicate significant money and effort to establish
functional habitat on their property) and in the future (i.e., after the
condition is met), are not germane to whether the service can designate Unit
1 now, because the ESA allows the service to
designate only those areas that meet the criteria at the time of designation.”
The site cannot be designated as essential, the
complaint says, because it is not currently “adequate.”
Norb Leahy, Dunwoody
GA Tea Party Leader
No comments:
Post a Comment