Critics push ways to improve the ESA, but politics block major reform

Westerners who gripe about the Endangered Species Act often have very clear ideas about how they’d change it. But actually making those changes is another matter entirely. The ESA is the very definition of a political hot potato, and there may not be much anyone can do to alter it anytime soon. Getting people of all persuasions together to help a species is easier said than done. Idaho residents and government officials alike clearly see local input and guidance as vital to the ESA. Steve Westphal of Filer, a member of the Rocky Mountain Elk Foundation, praised the role grassroots groups — such as the one he supports — play in conservation. “It’s made up almost entirely of volunteers like me,” he said. “And we do it because we love the outdoors and we want to protect our interest for the future generations.” But even locals can disagree, and politics and philosophy can infect attempts to cooperate. One of the agencies’ most critical roles from a local perspective is crafting habitat conservation agreements for listed species. In exchange for pledging to improve habitat over a 10-year span, landowners aren’t punished for minimal harassment or harm to a listed species in the course of business. That’s the ESA’s main tool in recruiting private landowners, explained Kendra Womack, who handles Fish and Wildlife conservation partnerships in Idaho. “So it’s a real win-win, where we get conservation … and in return we kind of take away the perceived disincentive of having species on the property,” Womack said. The agencies also pursue more voluntary habitat projects with watershed groups, soil conservation districts and the state Office of Species Conservation. By offering cost-share incentives, the feds find more landowners who conserve...read more

“So it’s a real win-win, where we get conservation … and in return we kind of take away the perceived disincentive of having species on the property,” Womack said.

Notice the balance here. The feds "get" conservation. They don't "kind of" get conservation nor is it just "perceived" conservation. They get the real thing.

The private landowner on the other hand "kind of" gets protected.

According to Womack any "disincentive" to having endangered species on your private property is only "perceived". I guess since the disincentives are not real, that is how you can "kind of" "take (them) away."

I think this April I'll "kind of" pay my taxes.