Page 12 - Flathead Beacon // 10.14.15

NEWS
Judge Orders Quicker Decision on Energy Lease Near Glacier U.S. District Judge Richard Leon ordered the Interior Department to decide Badger-Two Medicine by Nov. 23
BY TRISTAN SCOTT OF THE BEACON
A federal judge ordered the govern- ment to quicken its plodding consider- ation of a drilling proposal near Glacier National Park, on land considered sacred by members of the Blackfeet Nation in the United States and Canada.
U.S. District Judge Richard Leon on Oct. 8 ordered the Interior Department to decide by Nov. 23 whether to begin the process of canceling the energy lease in the Badger-Two Medicine, or to lift a sus- pension on the drilling.
The Louisiana-based company Solenex LLC holds the lease, and in 2013 sued the government, calling the three-decade suspension unreasonable and asking that the suspension be lifted so that it can begin drilling for oil and gas on the 6,200- acre parcel.
The judge agreed that the delay has been unreasonable, and ordered the gov- ernment to determine by Nov. 23 whether to initiate the process for cancellation of the lease or move toward lifting the sus- pension. If the government chooses the latter course of action, it must acceler- ate its schedule for compliance under the National Environmental Policy Act. The government had requested it have until July 15, 2017 to complete those steps toward compliance.
“There is no explanation provided ... as to why this much time is necessary to determine whether – after 33 years and four APD [Application for Permit to Drill] approvals – the lease was improp- erly issued,” Leon wrote.
The Blackfoot tribes in both the U.S. and Canada contend the government illegally issued the lease in 1982, and that
drilling should be prohibited on an area they consider their spiritual homeland.
Judge Leon previously denied Solen- ex’s request to immediately lift the sus- pension, but he ordered the government to come up with an accelerated timeline to end the lengthy delay, which he decried as unreasonable.
Last month, the Advisory Council on Historic Preservation (ACHP) conducted an independent review of the impacts drilling would have on the area, which is designated a Blackfeet Traditional Cultural District, located in the Lewis and Clark National Forest. The federal agency said energy exploration on the Badger-Two Medicine would degrade the region’s cultural values, and that drilling in any form could not be mitigated.
Leases covering approximately 40,000 acres remain in the Badger-Two
Medicine, and removing the leases is the only remedy, according to tribal leaders and attorneys representing the conser- vation groups. The tribe argues the leases violate both the National Environmental Policy Act and the Endangered Species Act, and the U.S. government granted them with neither tribal consultation nor a review of cultural resources.
Tim Preso, an attorney with Earthjus- tice representing a coalition of environ- mental groups seeking cancellation of the leases, said he’s pleased that Leon’s order includes lease cancellation as a proposed remedy.
“We continue to maintain that the only acceptable outcome is cancellation of the leases,” Preso said.
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Groups File Notice to Sue Over Bull Trout Recovery Plan Legal challenge planned unless government remedies ‘deficiencies’ in plan
BY TRISTAN SCOTT OF THE BEACON
A pair of environmental groups announced Oct. 7 they will sue the fed- eral government unless a recovery plan for threatened bull trout is amended to address violations of the Endangered Species Act.
The groups, Alliance for the Wild Rockies and Friends of the Wild Swan, filed the 60-day notice to sue a little more than a week after the U.S. Fish and Wild- life Service released its final Bull Trout Recovery Plan on Sept. 28.
A 60-day notice to sue under the ESA is required in order to provide enough information to the FWS so that it has the opportunity to identify and address alleged violations in order to make the plan sufficient.
The final recovery plan offers little variation from the draft plan proposed one year ago, drawing criticism from conservation groups who have been at the vanguard of legal challenges on the road toward bull trout recovery for more than two decades. They say the efforts are inadequate.
“We implore you to not make yet another mistake with this recovery plan,” according to the notice, mailed to U.S. Department of the Interior Sec- retary Sally Jewell. The notice states the groups will file suit after the 60-day period has run out “unless the violations described in this notice are remedied.”
Bull trout were listed under the Endangered Species Act as “threatened” in 1999, and the plan to recover the spe- cies is more than 15 years in the making.
Unlike other recovery plans, however, the final plan does not rely on target num- bers of adult bull trout as a barometer of success, raising concerns in the conser- vation community that the definition of and metric for “recovery” is too liberal.
Instead of population numbers, the plan focuses on alleviating specific threats to the species’ habitat and genetic diversity, while accepting that as much as 25 percent of the trout populations will face extirpation in the face of climate change.
Michael Garrity, executive director of Alliance for the Wild Rockies, said the federal agency’s omission of population criteria is among the plan’s most glaring deficiencies.
“They’re essentially redefining recov- ery so they can list bull trout as recovered,”
Garrity said. “They’ve lowered the bar so much with this plan that there is no way they can’t achieve recovery.”
The ultimate goal of the ESA is to remove a species from the list, but a recovery plan must first be in place to ensure that once the measure’s protec- tive umbrella is removed, management requirements are in place so that the species will not again become imperiled.
The proposed plan’s overall strategy calls for widespread population distri- bution throughout six geographical areas in the Northwest, and would achieve that by minimizing threats from non-native fish, such as invasive lake trout, improv- ing bull trout habitat and continuing to study the species in order to identify other stressors.
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