>From: <DavidOrr@aol.com>
>Date: Mon, 20 Jul 1998 15:19:30 EDT
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>Subject: LA Times on HCP study
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>Los Angeles Times
>
>Monday, July 20, 1998
>
>
>
>Study Finds Few Watching Protected Areas
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>
>
>By DEBORAH SCHOCH, Times Staff Writer
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>
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>
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>A much-touted national blueprint that allows development in
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>environmentally fragile areas has sometimes failed to provide sufficient
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>monitoring or data to ensure that plants and animals are protected from
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>extinction, the draft of a major new study concludes.
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>
>
>Championed by the Clinton administration, Habitat Conservation Plans
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>have been crafted nationwide as a pioneering means of balancing the
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>welfare of rare wildlife with the pressures of growth. As conceived, they
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>were created to make peace between the two sides and avoid costly
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>litigation, allowing developers to build while keeping some fragile
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>habitat intact.
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>
>
>But the draft study--developed by a research team from eight
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>universities--indicates that a lack of scientific input went into some
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>plans, and raises warning flags about whether some species--from rare
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>tortoises to delicate flowers--are receiving the protection government
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>regulators hoped for in pacts with developers, lumber companies and other
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>landowners.
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>
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>Among its recommendations, the draft study issues a strong and urgent
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>call for changes in future Habitat Conservation Plans, or HCPs. It
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>presses for basic scientific standards and suggests changing the law to
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>require review of proposed plans by independent experts. And it urges
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>more sharing of information, noting that no centralized library appears
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>to exist for the 200-plus plans already in place.
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>
>
>The study, obtained by The Times, was sponsored jointly by the
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>National Center for Ecological Analysis and Synthesis at UC Santa Barbara
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>and the American Institute of Biological Sciences based in Washington,
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>D.C. It was developed over the past year by 13 faculty members and 106
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>graduate students from eight universities nationwide. Its findings are
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>expected to be published by the end of the year.
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>
>
>When finalized, the study is expected to be the most complete
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>scientific report card to date of one of the most significant federal
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>environmental initiatives of the 1990s. It also is expected to fuel a
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>mounting debate over whether the plans constitute a landmark conservation
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>effort or instead, as some environmentalists claim, skimp on biological
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>research to placate developers.
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>
>
>While it found that the plans' designers generally do a good job of
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>gathering what details they can find about key plants and animals, it
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>also showed there were gaps, not just in the scientific underpinnings of
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>some plans, but in society's knowledge of the biology of rare species.
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>
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>"We just don't know the information, and we don't for an awful lot of
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>species," said Peter Kareiva, the University of Washington zoology
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>professor who led the study. Still, he believes that with some reforms,
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>the Habitat Conservation Plan approach can be made to work.
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>
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>"It's not like in principle, it can't work."
>
>
>
>The findings could have particular impact in California, where 2.3
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>million acres of land already are covered by 50 approved HCPs, from
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>timberlands near the Oregon border to sage-specked hills overlooking
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>Mexico.
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>
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>"Southern California is one of the most important places in the world
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>to be having this discussion," said Frank Davis, a UC Santa Barbara
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>professor and deputy director of the National Center at UC Santa Barbara.
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>
>
>The study is widely anticipated in Washington, and some study
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>scientists and other experts briefed U.S. Interior Secretary Bruce
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>Babbitt on key points of the study when they met with him in May to
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>discuss their concerns about HCPs.
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>
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>"It's absolutely clear that this is the most comprehensive review of
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>HCPs that's been done," said Dee Boersma, president of the Society for
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>Conservation Biology and a University of Washington professor.
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>
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>The U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service has told experts at its offices
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>nationwide to review the draft study, and a formal agency response is due
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>later this summer, said Laverne Smith, chief of the agency's Division of
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>Endangered Species. She expressed concern about reporting on preliminary
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>findings, adding that her agency could not comment until its critique is
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>done.
>
>
>
>Douglas Wheeler, California secretary of resources, who has reviewed
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>the draft study, said: "I take from the report, not that we've done a
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>good job or a bad job, but the approach we've taken is the right
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>approach, which is to rely on science when it's available."
>
>
>
>HCPs have been lauded with increasing fervor in Washington and
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>Sacramento during the 1990s as a means of balancing the demands of
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>development with the stringent standards of the Endangered Species Act.
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>Babbitt has been among the program's leading mentors.
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>
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>In short, the program allows developers to destroy habitat containing
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>some rare species as long as other habitat is set aside and managed for
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>species protection. For instance, Orange County's largest developer, the
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>Irvine Co., negotiated with regulators to craft a 37,000-acre preserve
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>for the California gnatcatcher and other rare creatures. The developer in
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>turn was granted freedom from endangered species laws on certain land
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>outside the preserve.
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>
>
>* * *
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>The Orange County plan assembled a massive piece of habitat larger
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>than the cities of Costa Mesa and Irvine combined that is managed to
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>protect species, said Laer Pearce, executive director of the Coalition
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>for Habitat Conservation, a landowner group. He called the review process
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>rigorous.
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>
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>"I've watched the process up close and personal, and seen the level of
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>review involved in it. It's been a tough, tough process," Pearce said.
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>
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>The draft study champions the importance of science in creating
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>HCPs--a process that some critics claim can be driven more by economics
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>and politics than by biology. Because HCPs are compromises, understanding
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>what each side has at stake is important.
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>
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>"It is easy to identify what is given up from the viewpoint of a
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>private landowner--since the dollar value of future land development or
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>exploitation is readily calculable," the study states.
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>
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>"It is much harder to quantify what is given up in terms of a species'
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>prospects for long-term survival. That is the challenge for the
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>scientific component of HCPs."
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>
>
>The study looked at 208 plans, or most of those in place in 1997. It
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>examined 43 plans in-depth, including the Orange County plan and one in
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>San Diego County. More than half involved building construction, with
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>another quarter related to logging.
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>
>
>The smallest plan studied is a tiny project just four-tenths of an
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>acre in size intended to protect the Florida scrub jay. The largest: a
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>sprawling plan on 1.6 million acres in western Washington state
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>containing the Northern spotted owl and the grizzly bear.
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>
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>The draft concludes that many existing plans do not estimate the
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>specific number of plants and animals to be harmed or destroyed. And only
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>a small fraction of the habitat plans studied in-depth contain clear
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>monitoring programs adequate for measuring success, according to the
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>study.
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>
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>"I was surprised by the monitoring," Kareiva said. "I thought that
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>without too much effort or expense, we could do a lot better monitoring.
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>Otherwise, there's no way of finding out if they're effective or not."
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>
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>Plans must often be completed quickly, by overworked staff. "Often the
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>time pressure under which they're put together is enormous,"said Kareiva.
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>He said he felt tremendous sympathy for the Fish and Wildlife Service,
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>which has been deeply involved in the process. The explosion of HCPs
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>"puts a huge workload on them" Kareiva said, but without a major boost in
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>funding.
>
>
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>With the right safeguards in place, however, these and other plans
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>should be capable of protecting species, according to Kareiva and several
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>other scientists, including Fran James, a professor in biological science
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>at Florida State University who is involved with the study.
>
>
>
>One bright spot in some plans, James said, is how they manage
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>sensitive habitat, using such techniques as controlling harmful nonnative
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>weeds that can crowd out native plants. And few other tools besides HCPs
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>are available to manage endangered species on private land, she said.
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>
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>*This tool, even though it has its flaws, we really need to think
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>positively about how to make it better," said James, immediate past
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>president of the American Institute of Biological Sciences.
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>
>
>***
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>The study comes at a critical time for HCPs, which grew out of a 1982
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>change in the Endangered Species Act that gave landowners more
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>flexibility in dealing with rare plants and animals. The first such plan
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>in the nation was created on San Bruno Mountain south of San Francisco to
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>protect the fragile Mission blue butterfly.
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>
>
>California has become a focal point for HCP planning, in part because
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>237 of the state's plants and animals are federally listed as endangered
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>or threatened--more than any other state except Hawaii. More impetus came
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>in 1991 when Gov. Pete Wilson launched a state effort known as the
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>Natural Community Conservation Planning program that has yielded some of
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>the largest and most ambitious plans in the nation.
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>
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>More proposals are in the pipeline, such as a wide-ranging draft HCP
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>proposal released last Monday for public review, covering the bitterly
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>fought-over Headwaters forest land in Northern California.
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>
>
>Yet a spate of recent letters from scientists and reports from groups
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>like Defenders of Wildlife and the National Wildlife Foundation have
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>questioned aspects of the program. Even so, those environmentalists
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>consider the study to be the most comprehensive to date, due to its sharp
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>focus on science and use of voluminous data from plans nationwide.
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>
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>"Overall, I don't see how a study could have been done better," said
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>Peter Brussard, a biology professor at the University of Nevada at Reno
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>who has worked with the HCP program. "It's probably as free of bias as
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>any of those studies can be."
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>
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>* * *
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>A Closer Look at What Study Found and Recommended
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>
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>A pioneering conservation effort has attempted to strike a balance
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>between development and the protection of endangered plants and animals.
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>But the draft of a new study has found flaws in the biological
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>underpinnings of many so-called Habitat Conservation Plans, or HCPs.
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>
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>KEY FINDINGS
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>* Many plans fail to judge how many plants and animals would be
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>"taken"--destroyed or injured--by the HCP system of developing some lands
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>while saving others to protect and sustain endangered wildlife.
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>
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>* Plan designers frequently try to compensate for lost wildlife by
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>buying land, restoring habitat or even moving animals. But the scientists
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>found "low-quality" data often being used in these compensation efforts.
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>
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>* The status of plants and animals in a plan is often well-known and
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>analyzed. Even so, as planning moves forward, the analysis of species
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>disturbance, impact, mitigation and monitoring are more poorly done or
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>lacking.
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>
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>* The study's authors were troubled by what they call a frequent lack
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>of follow-up study.
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>
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>RECOMMENDATIONS
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>* Plans should assess how species would be disturbed, such as counting
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>the population of plants and animals and predicting what portion would be
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>disturbed or lost.
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>
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>* Habitat restoration and other mitigation should start earlier,
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>preferably before species are disturbed, so that any flaws can be found
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>and corrected. Monitoring programs are needed to judge how well wildlife
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>is being protected.
>
>
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>* Plans should be reviewed by independent experts to make sure they
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>are based on sound biology.
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>
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>* Findings should be put in centralized databases so scientists can
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>study the overall status of endangered species and their habitats.
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>
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>* When important scientific information is missing, an HCP should not
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>be approved.
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>
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>Safety Net?
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>An effort to balance economic and environmental interests has led to
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>the creation of Habitat Conservation Plans in California and nationwide.
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>Today, 50 plans protect dozens of species statewide. Some of the plan
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>areas and the wildlife protected:
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>Northern California
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>Plan Area Acres Start
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>Blackhawk Pipeline 5 1996
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>Natomas 53,342 1997
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>North of Playa 33 1996
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>Parkside Homes 25 1996
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>Quail Hollow 32 1997
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>Regli Estate 500 1995
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>San Bruno Mountain 3,324 1983*
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>Seascape Uplands 192 1997
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>Simpson Timber 380,000 1992
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>Teichert Vernalis 497 1997
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>
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>Southern California
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>Plan Area Acres Start
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>Arco Western Energy 120,320 1996
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>Chevron Pipeline 26 1996
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>Coachella Valley 70,000 1986
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>Cushenbury Sand & Gravel 200 1996
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>Fieldstone 1,918 1995
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>Kern Water Bank 19,900 1997
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>Lake Mathews 5,110 1995
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>Metropolitan Bakersfield 262,000 1994
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>Ocean Trails 270 1997
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>Orange County Central/Coastal 208,000 1996
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>Poway Subarea 25,000 1996
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>Riverside County 540,000 1996
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>San Diego County 582,243** 1997
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>San Diego Gas & Electric -- 1995
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>Shell Oil Co. 3,216 1996
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>
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>Northern spotted owl: Protected in Simpson Timber plan.
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>San Joaquin kit fox: Endangered, listed in 1967. Protected by plans
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>in Kern County.
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>California jewelflower: Endangered, listed in 1990. Protected by
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>plans in Kern County.
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>Mission blue butterfly: Endangered, listed in 1976. Protected by San
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>Bruno Mountain plan.
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>California coastal gnatcatcher. Threatened, listed in 1993. Protected
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>by several Southern California plans.
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>
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>Sources: U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service, Bureau of Land Management
>
>
>
David M. Walsh
P.O. Box 903
Redway, CA 95560
Office and Fax(707) 923-3015
Home (707) 986-1644


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