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Capital Brief - Role Reversal
Congressman Don Young of Alaska (R-AK), better known for calling environmentalists "despicable" than sharing their goals, joined the green movement's outcry against a proposed $1 million spending cap on designating critical habitat for endangered species. This is the third year in a row that U.S. Fish and Wildlife officials have requested the cap.
Why would an agency limit its own funding? Insiders say the problem is that critical habitat is often misunderstood. Critical habitat designation does not preclude development; however, it does mean that the agency has to manage species without "adversely modifying" habitat necessary for recovery. That distinction is often lost, so critical habitat tends to fan the flames of the anti-environmental backlash.
"The agency's feeling is that people don't understand critical habitat and tend to think that it will create development-free zones," said Heather Weiner of Earthjustice. "That isn't true, but the sense within the agency is that they've already been burnt and they don't want any more firestorms." With a spending cap in place, agency officials hit by a raft of lawsuits can argue to judges that their budget doesn't allow critical habitat designation, even though it is required by law.
And why does Young oppose the cap? His aide, Elizabeth Megginson, says Young is concerned by the aggressiveness of Western environmental groups such as the Center for Biological Diversity. In recent years the group has been frenetically filing endangered species lawsuits in the intermountain west and Alaska, and recently filed suit to get critical habitat designated for Bay Area species including the Alameda woodsnake, the red-legged frog, coho salmon and the Bay checkerspot butterfly. "If the budget is capped at $1 million, the only place they'll be designating habitat is where these lawsuits are being filed, where the judges are making them do it," says Megginson. "Mr. Young wants a more evenhanded approach, not one Endangered Species Act for the West and one out East."
Ideally, of course, Young would like the entire critical habitat provision to go away. In an April 9 letter urging Ralph Regula, chairman of the House Interior Appropriations subcommittee, to deny Fish and Wildlife's budget cap request, Young wrote "If the Secretary of Interior believes that the designation of critical habitat is a waste of taxpayer funds, he should have the courage to ask the Congress repeal the entire provision."
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