Are Our Courtrooms Deciding How We Will Manage Our Wildlife?

Yesterday I received an email that originated with David Allen, President and CEO of Rocky Mountain Elk Foundation. In that email was a memo from the law firm of Budd-Falen Law Offices, LLC, more specifically attorney Karen Budd Falen. Mr. Allen explained that Ms. Falen, whose offices is in Wyoming, is “well versed in issues relevant to significant landowners and sportsmen, primarily in the West.”

The memorandum, which can be downloaded in its entirety with this link, shares data that readily explains how the Endangered Species Act isn’t about saving species. Instead it has been manipulated, which most honest people have come to realize, in order to use taxpayer money to make some environmental groups and individuals quite wealthy.

Looking at the data supplied by Budd-Falen, she claims that as of May 17, 2010 there are a total of 1,374 species in the United States listed as either “threatened” or “endangered”. To get a grip on how this translates into the cost for taxpayers, she also states that it costs, on average, $85,000 per species simply to add to the Endangered Species list. In addition, $515,000 per species to designate critical habitat.

If you add that all up, taxpayers are staring down the barrel of a loaded gun that is costing them $707,610,000. And all this only for listing and designating critical habitat in what is supposed to save 1,374 species of plants and/or animals.

Add to this cost the attorney fees paid out to mostly environmental groups of around $12 million and us taxpayers are forking over some $720 million dollars and with that have “recovered” 21 species. That’s something in the order of $34 million per saved species. Good investment?

None of this accounts for what’s happened to businesses and private lands and land ownership and the costs associated with those.

For some of us who actually care about conservation, saving species and protecting habitat, this leaves us with a question. How much of this money or any money for that matter that these “conservation” and “environmental” groups is used to actually save species and protect habitat? According to Budd-Falen there is no evidence to suggest one dime of their money is used for that purpose. If the majority of these groups are only sucking the coffers dry and doing nothing to save species, doesn’t rational thinking tell us something has to change?

With an extended strong arm of the government and a money-making con job from environmental groups, this seriously limits the ability of state fish and game departments to properly manage their wildlife……doesn’t it? Let me cite one small example of this.

In Maine, many of these same environmental groups successfully petitioned the USFWS to name the Canada lynx a threatened species and along with it designated critical habitat. As a result effective means of trapping large predators were eliminated which resulted in an overgrown population of coyotes. The whitetail deer herd, in much of the same areas as where the lynx critical habitat was designated, has dropped below sustainable levels. Because of ESA manipulation, an Act that needs rewriting and countless, unchecked lawsuits, the Maine Department of Inland Fisheries and Wildlife has been partially handcuffed, having been stripped of management tools to do their job. Is preserving species about ruining one or more to save another?

In the email, David Allen asks: “The question begs to be asked, where are we going with our wildlife system in this country and what is the anticipated end result? The issue with the “wolf recovery” program in MT, ID & WY is the tip of the iceberg in this entire issue, however it is a prime example of the results of using the ESA far beyond what it was intended. Those who cherish the North American Model of Wildlife Conservation need to become acutely aware of what & how the Endangered Species Act is being utilized today and where it is heading.”

In order to “anticipate” the “end result”, I think it first imperative to get over some hurdles that far too many refuse to even consider. Attorney Budd-Falen spells it out very clearly and I concur. None of this is about saving species. It’s about making money and promoting an agenda. I think many will agree that making money through these lawsuits is obvious. What they don’t want to admit is that these groups have an agenda that’s not about saving species. What that specific agenda is varies, however the “end result” is the same – stop hunting, fishing and trapping. There’s also no better way to do this than to take people’s land away from them and strip them of their rights.

As Allen pointed out the wolf litigation is but the tip of the iceberg as is the Canada lynx, the spotted owl, the desert tortoise, the delta smelt, etc., etc. If outdoor sportsmen and our state fish and game departments think we can stop this by arguing about one specific species in one specific area of one specific state, we’re woefully wrong.

Until the Endangered Species Act is rewritten and modernized nothing will change. It will be more of the same and the end result will not be pretty. If we employ the old adage that for those who fail to learn history, they will repeat it, we see that the North American Model of Wildlife Conservation is being dismantled piece by piece. This is being done by systematically taking away one tool of management at a time. This management system will then fail. This is when the environmentalists move in declaring the failure and the end result will be the further implementation of their agendas of which I have spoken.

My prediction is not one of encouragement. I believe there are not enough people who care enough or are willing to accept the bigger picture, resulting in more of the same. I don’t need to spell out what more of the same is going to look like in 5, 10, 15 or more years. All too often what it takes to get people involved is when it hits directly home. By then it’s too late.

The only hope, is to figure out a way to convince enough people to fight back against this indoctrination that runs counter to everything that is right.

Tom Remington