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ESA lacks key ingredient, says Capital Press editorial

Posted by: Maven on March 12, 2010 at 5:26 am

From the Capital Press, this editorial:

“The most frustrating thing about the Endangered Species Act is that it precludes bureaucrats and judges from taking into account hardships that efforts to protect species can impose on humans.

But don’t take our word for it.

U.S. District Judge Oliver Wanger probably knows as much or more than anyone about the limits the Endangered Species Act places on those charged with enforcing it. It is by his orders upholding biological opinions that water deliveries from the Sacramento-San Joaquin Delta have been restricted to protect the threatened Delta smelt and endangered salmon.

It would be too easy to label Wanger an extremist jurist who puts the welfare of fish above the welfare of his fellow Californians. That would be wrong. Wanger is a judge who is taking pains to follow the law as written and not to legislate from the bench.

Wanger provided unusual insight into his thoughts about the Endangered Species Act during a recent address at the Madera County Farm Bureau Water Conference. His remarks were extensively reported by Ag Alert, the newspaper of the California Farm Bureau.

In reading that report it becomes obvious that Wanger appreciates the impact his rulings have had on Central Valley farmers, and sympathizes with their position. … “

Continue reading this editorial from the Capital Press by clicking here.

March 12, 2010 · Filed Under Wildlife & Endangered Species

Comments

One Response to “ESA lacks key ingredient, says Capital Press editorial”

  1. dfb on March 12th, 2010 2:25 pm

    I would disagree with this assessment only as far as to say there actually is a pressure release mechanism built into the law — the so-called “God Squad.”

    The law was intentionally designed to make it very difficult for regular everyday pressures of a bureaucrats job to play a role in deciding to kill off a species. The fact that the law has remained in tact since the 1970′s says something about how popular saving species from extinction is, despite obvious hardships faced by some people and our economy.

    As for the Delta pumps, changing the ESA would have little impact today. Salinity restriction tied to the state and federal water project water rights are substantially more to blame for current pumping volumes than are the smelt or salmon. Once mother nature delivers more water, then the ESA would play a greater role in limiting the pumps.

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