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The Endangered Species Act (ESA) was
enacted in order to achieve some
laudable goals and has posted some
worthy accomplishments. However, some of its provisions
are not based in science, but on popular opinion, and the act has been
used as a tool for political agendas. At the present time, it provides
a nationwide forum for special interests who are not stakeholders in the
results of species recovery . As a result, people are being hurt and
lives ruined for no reason other than politics and greed.
Currently, in Klamath Falls, we see the impact on our friends and fellow cattlemen and farmers, and those businesses who have been a part of that community's infrastructure struggling to survive the consequences of the
ESA. For us it is watching them endure a pain that equates to the loss of a mate, or the death of a child, or any other life altering event from which they will never fully recover. We do not ever again want to see that look in the faces of our people, and will do everything in our power to keep that kind of betrayal from being repeated.
It is time for a resolution for all people suffering under the Endangered Species Act. We are now united behind a common strategy to focus on a few, very important changes in the act. None of us cares who gets the credit for successes nor for assigning blame for failures. We strongly believe changing the act is possible because there are now so many who understand the evils in the act that can take our land, our water, our livelihoods, our communities and our families futures.
In the American Natural Resource Alliance we will bring about needed reform. Among us we have many experts in public relations, in legal and political areas, we have scientists and we have people who know how to raise money. We all know this is but a single battle in a war that affects our very liberty. We accept Bruce Babbitt's challenge when he stood in Oregon and said "this is the battlefield".
We do not lack for leaders. We are all leaders and we have our eyes on the goal. We are an American Natural Resources Alliance, and each of us is a member. Together we will bring the needed ESA changes into focus and continue the campaign by demanding amendments before reauthorization of the act, and reauthorization before funding.
We begin now. The American Natural Resource Alliance Resolution states the amendments we must have in the
ESA. We invite groups to sign on, we envision counties and states signing on as as well, and we invite all people to sign and be a part of our mission and a part of the voice that will only grow stronger. We are resolved to see an Endangered Species Reform Act of 2001 which restores dignity to the people who feed, clothe and shelter Americans and much of the rest of the world, and the pride we need to have in our
country
Whereas: The Endangered Species Act (1973) allocations have continued for 18 years to fund recovery and habitat restoration, and
Whereas: 1126 U.S. species of animals and plants are now listed with more U.S. species of animals and plants currently proposed for listing, and
Whereas: since 1967,
nine species of plants and animals have been delisted due to erroneous data or changes in the information used to list, 11 species have been recovered due to population estimation errors when they were first listed, and 7 species are now listed as extinct (due to possible taxonomic errors or hybridization), and
Whereas: after 34 years the Endangered Species Act has failed to restore species populations, failed to provide direction to agencies for implementation of the law in a
"reasonable manner" with fairness and balance, and
Whereas: it has become clear that the ESA is not being implemented to save or protect species of plants and animals, but is a tool for political agendas and is merely providing a nationwide forum for special interests who are not stakeholders in the results of species recovery, and
Whereas: regulations that are applied to "endangered" and "threatened" species, sub subspecies and distinct populations of species have taken precedence over people and economies; while one listed species, a predator, destroys another listed species, its prey, and
Whereas: community input is insignificant to the biological opinions, and agencies, lawyers, and courts have begun to interpret "best available science" as "prevailing environmental opinion" thus
denigrating "science" and its meaning as old fashioned notions rather than a knowledge-based discipline founded on natural laws and known facts that repeat over time and space, and
Whereas: Science has made no determination that wild listed species are significantly different from the same species born or hatched under the careful hands of a human, nor has it made a determination that species born or hatched cannot make an important contribution to recovery in the wild; and
Whereas: the ESA allows arbitrary determinations of Evolutionarily Significant Units to be created by National Marine Fisheries Service without sufficient, credible, and statistically valid science to ensure that the protections placed on each species, subspecies or population segment is indeed protection at all, and
Whereas: the plants and animals on the ESA list that we must protect and provide for now threaten communities, prosperity, private property and rights throughout the US, without economic consideration for those who by accident carry the burden to protect and preserve, and
Whereas: the pain endured in the Klamath Basin is the pain we all bear when no reform has been made for 34 years to a law that has harmed one, then hundreds and now a community; and
Whereas we are united in our belief that the ESA must be reformed now so that not one more community falls and that we are united in the belief that each of us is responsible for the evil which we could have prevented; and
Therefore be it resolved: that the ESA be reformed to define science as: a branch of knowledge or study dealing with a body of facts or truths systematically arranged within the context of a finite set of general laws; and
Therefore be it resolved: that the ESA be reformed to provide that the US Fish
and Wildlife Service and other federal agencies must analyze and consider the full economic impact to designate critical habitat for an endangered species including, the economic impact for the area affected by adding the species to the endangered list and economic consideration of those who must provide recovery opportunity; and
Therefore be it resolved: that supplementing populations using our skills and knowledge to further recovery must become a part of the equation and each addition to a population by a supplemental program must become a solution and not a means to continue or add to the ESA listings; and
Therefore be it resolved: we are plagued with remedies of every kind that in actuality may be contributing to the population declines; and
Therefore be it resolved: it is imperative to seek protection from takings, to place science over biological opinions, and to consider the unintended consequences of saving something at all cost without consideration of how few there are when we start, or how many we need to be finished, and to prohibit introduction of a listed species into areas without also providing protection for the people, property and livelihoods that are affected by the action; and
Be it resolved that: the ESA be reformed to require that all restoration actions and activities that reproduce a listed species as part of the recovery program to supplement populations must become a part of the solution.
Click here to sign on to the petition
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