Bush Administration versus the Spotted Owl

Source: "ENDANGERED SPECIES: Spotted Owl Recovery Plan Flawed, Review Panel Finds," by Erik Stokstad, Science, May 2, 2008.

Excerpts:

A blue-ribbon panel of scientists has confirmed major flaws in the proposed recovery plan for the northern spotted owl, a threatened species that has driven forest policy in the northwestern United States for nearly 2 decades. As did earlier reviews, the final one, by the Sustainable Ecosystems Institute (SEI) in Portland, Oregon, concludes that the Fish and Wildlife Service's (FWS's) plan does not put enough emphasis on protecting the owl's habitat......

In spring 2006, FWS formed a team to draft the recovery plan that included a broad range of expertise, including environmentalists and timber industry representatives, but lacked top scientists; some declined to participate in part because they feared the process would be politically charged, they told Science. The team's draft focused on the need to protect habitat and also dealt with the threat from barred owls, an invasive species that is competing with the spotted owl.

Politics did trump science, say observers and participants. After the first draft was sent to Washington, D.C., in September 2006, officials at the Department of the Interior (DOI) ordered the recovery team to add another management strategy, called Option 2, says recovery team member Dominick DellaSala, an ecologist who directs the National Center for Conservation Science & Policy in Ashland, Oregon. This option would reduce the amount of land set aside for owl conservation and give the Bureau of Land Management (BLM) and the Forest Service more flexibility to allow logging. The immediate goal was to make the recovery plan consistent with a BLM proposal to facilitate logging in Oregon, according to internal agency e-mails provided to Science by DellaSala. He says that officials also wanted the plan to list the barred owl threat as more dire than loss of habitat--over the objections of some of the recovery team members, as well as James Tate, DOI's own science adviser.

FWS released the draft plan, including Option 2, for public comment and requested scientific review in April 2007.

Comment: The Bush administration continues to try to overrule the recommendations of its own scientific advisers when they can advance commercial interests by doing so. The Congress, with the support of the American public, long ago set priorities for the preservation of endangered species, and the Bush administration should obey the law and accept the recommendations of scientists who are far better prepared to evaluate the risks of alternative policies. JAD