Missouri AG Josh Hawley joins federal suit over 'critical habitat' regulation
Attorney General Josh Hawley has added Missouri to a federal lawsuit challenging Obama-era wildlife regulations as the Republican follows through on his campaign pledge to fight what he calls federal overreach.
The most recent suit is a challenge to two new rules passed in February 2016 by the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service and the National Marine Fisheries Services that allow federal agencies to designate land as "critical habitat" for an endangered species.
The rules "are an unlawful attempt to expand regulatory authority and control over State lands and waters" and "trample upon the sovereign rights of the States as landowners and stewards of their natural resources," the complaint reads in part.
"If allowed to stand, the Final Rules would allow the Services to exercise virtually unlimited power to declare land and water critical habitat for endangered and threatened species," it continues, noting that this could apply even if no endangered or threatened species are present.
Read more: http://www.news-leader.com/story/news/politics/2017/02/07/missouri-ag-josh-hawley-joins-federal-suit-over-critical-habitat-regulation/97558974/
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it's a mandate in the law and is within the powers of the services to do so.
The Endangered Species Act isn't that hard to understand, it's a whole 45 pages long if you're talking half-sized pages. The Act contain three mandates and spells out how they are to be carried out.
The Mandates (conveniently interpreted in layman's terms) are as follows:
1) Identification, we have decided as a species and a nation to identify those species who are threatened or endangered with extinction within and throughout their historic range. (each of these words were carefully chosen for clarity and a definition of terms is also included in the 45 page document.)
2) Critical Habitat, each species has a habitat and since so much of an endangered/threatened species' habitat has been taken over by humans that we also, upon identification, have decided to identify where they can thrive in what's left of any habitat and set it aside and protect it for those species and unmolested by humans whether they exist in such place or not, they have to have some place to be and hopefully recover.
3) Recovery Plan, upon identification of species and critical habitat for them, we as a species and a nation have decided that we need to do something about helping these identified species recover from being threatened and endangered by the prospect of extinction.
This is the process by which the Bald Eagle (our national symbol) was brought back from the brink and the same with the wolves as two examples. The best available and current scientific information is to be used in determining the process by which all three mandates shall be fulfilled. There are several specifics regarding parameters of human activity or encroachment might occur within any critical habitat but for the most part the habitat should not be disturbed. If the species recovers and expands in a healthy population beyond their Critical Habitat, they are usually removed from the Act's protections though the habitat may remain under some kind of protections. More than 70% of the species protected under the Act have lost their habitat to human encroachment.
Critical Habitat has been a big issue since about the late 1980s and was a big nasty battle over the Northern Spotted Owl. and a few other species when some developer wanted to build on Critical Habitat and made a big legal fuss with the help of paid off politicians.
When I give presentations on endangered species I start by asking the audience to raise their hand if they've heard of the Act, they all do. When I ask if hey know what it's about and what it says, usually nobody can keep their hand up. So I give the basics of the explanation above, most see the Act more clearly and they usually are more in favor of it and its components thereafter.
