ESA ROUNDUP
From ANIMAL PEOPLE, May 1995:
Senator Slade Gorton (R-Washington)
on April 12 promised a gathering of timber indus-
try executives in Stevenson, Washington, that he
would soon introduce a bill to replace the present
Endangered Species Act mandate to save all
species with a process by which by a political
appointee––probably the Secretary of the
Interior––would decide whether and how a species
should be saved. The bill was drafted by the
National Endangered Species Reform Coalition,
representing 185 corporations and so-called wise-
use groups, who gave Gorton’s re-election cam-
paign $34,000 last fall.
California governor Pete Wilson on
March 19 suspended the state endangered species
act to enable residents of sensitive habitat to clean
up damage from late winter flooding. The edict
allowed drainage, dredging, levee-building, and
removal of brush.
The World Society for the Protection
of Animals, already involved in training the
Nicaraguan and Honduran armed forces to do
wildlife law enforcement, in March expanded the
tutorials to El Salvador.
Eight radio-collared Texas cougars
were released circa March 30 in the Everglades,
to genetically replenish the closely related Florida
panther population. The project is underwritten
by the sale of a special license plate and a grant
from the Natl. Parks and Conservation Assn.
The Biodiversity Legal Foundation
and the Greater Ecosystem Alliance on March 27
filed notice of intent to sue Interior Secretary
Bruce Babbitt and the U.S. Fish and Wildlife
Service for failing to add the lynx to the
Endangered Species List. In a separate but simul-
taneous case, the USFWS agreed with the BDLF
that the Preble’s Meadow jumping mouse, native
to Colorado and Wyoming, warrants considera-
tion for Endangered Species protection.
