The $5.6 Billion Bird: How Will The Sage Grouse Fight End?

Now the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service must decide by Sept. 30 whether to add the bird to its endangered species list, and it is a decision with billion-dollar consequences. Declaring the bird endangered would virtually shut down huge swaths of land to other uses in the 11 states the bird currently inhabits. That possibility has sparked a backlash from some Republicans and other pro-business proponents — who cite a well-regarded study that claims declaring the sage grouse as endangered would cost the U.S. more than $5.6 billion in annual economic output. Energy development, mining, oil and gas drilling and some forms of ranching all pose threats to the land inhabited by the sage grouse. Coal, natural gas, crude oil, and beef industries, to name a few, all stand to take a huge hit if the land is deemed off-limits to them. "When they listed the spotted owl in the Northwest, it literally devastated the counties and communities" that relied on the timber industry to fuel their economy, Joel Bousman, a Wyoming rancher and a Sublette County commissioner, told NPR earlier this summer. "Our fear here is it would have a similar impact on gas, grazing." "Everybody would have some level of impact," said Ed Arnett, a senior scientist with the Theodore Roosevelt Conservation Partnership, a group dedicated to guaranteeing quality places to hunt and fish in the U.S. The Bureau of Land Management is one of many agencies, both federal and state, that has worked tirelessly for the past several years to rehabilitate the landscape and preserve habitat to prevent an endangered listing. Through the Sage Grouse Initiative, which partners with ranchers and businesses, the agencies have imposed land restrictions that are less harsh than the ones that would be in place if the endangered designation is approved, but still protect sagebrush. The colossal effort, said Ed Arnett of the Theodore Roosevelt Conservation Partnership, a group dedicated to guaranteeing quality places to hunt and fish in the U.S., "is just unprecedented." "We've never seen anything quite like this," he said. "People are realizing that we can work together, collaborate, and come up with management practices to avoid the listing."...more

Here's a prediction:  Interior will not list the sage grouse and everyone will shout hosannas about a) how the Endangered Species Act really does work and doesn't need amending, and b) how wonderful everything would be if we'd all just "collaborate" with the enviros.