Judge Molloy to retire from active service in 2011

[nidahunter]

"You're also wrong about it being the "same wolf no matter where it came from"..."

Actually, the Canadian Grey Wolf is not endangered. That is the wolf that was reintroduced. The problem is the EIS arbitrarily used a political boundary in its designation. And the majority of the "agreements" have already been broken. We have over 4 times the number of wolves that was agreed upon, and yet we still cannot hunt them.

 

[BuzzH]

The Canada segment certainly is not...but the segment in the lower-48 sure is (by law).

The total population of wolves is only one criteria for delisting under the EIS. You cant pick and choose which criteria you can ignore, they all must be met. That is what Molloy ruled on, the contract between the states and the feds not being met via Wyomings unaccepted state plan.

Further, the reasons Molloy allowed the hunts in MT and ID to happen were because 1. he knew MT and ID both had accepted plans in place...and 2. The population goals had been met for several years.

He also warned in that ruling that if WY couldnt come to the table with an accepted plan he'd have no choice but to relist the wolves via the law if it went to court....he wasnt bullshitting.

 

[mixedbag]

Who exactly has to accept Wy. plan??Not trying to be smart either.I thought the majority of Wy. residents were in favor of their plan, but I'm not sure.I'm going off imfo from friends I have there.I thought the original plan was to have so many packs in the reintroduction area only.Am I wrong, or has something changed?I won't pretend to know as much as you guys that live with them do so these are honest questions

 

[Big Fin]

Mixedbag - I will try to throw out a few answers. If I am mistating, I am sure some will step in to clarify.

The three states were told that once a certain level of was were present (30 packs over the three state area), the delisting process would start. Fair enough. It didn't take long to reach that level.

It took a few years for each state to develop their plans and submit to the USFWS for approval of the plan. In the interim, the wolves have continued to breed like......well, wolves.

This process to get the state plans accepted has been the legal harang that we all knew it would be, giving the wolves even more time to breed.

Therefore, we have been long past the original population levels that were the trigger for starting the delisting process. There was never any commitment that we would only have that many wolves, only a number to trigger the start of delisting and a baseline population that if we got below that, would trigger re-listing.

The state plans were submitted to the USFWS service for acceptance. The ID and MT plans have been accepted. The WY plan has been rejected by the USFWS. The delisting agreement states that all three states must have acceptable plans for delisting to occur.

The most recent Malloy decision was based on the issue of the USFWS allowing MT and ID to move forward with their management plans, while WY was not. The planitffs claimed that was not allowed, as it was all three states, or none. Malloy agreed.

So, we are at this point. Wyoming has its plan, and is sticking to it. There right to do so. USFWS cannot do anything about it and has to follow the decision of Malloy.

I see only two solutions for relisting - 1. Wyoming submit a different plan, something not likely to happen. 2. Congressional delisting and exempting of this non-essential experimental population from the ESA rules most other species are protected by.

Right now, seems like all the energy is being invested in option 2. If neither of these option happen, we will never see de-listing, making me feel, as I stated earlier, that the states will never again sign off on a re-introduction agreement of any species, with the Feds.

Hope that helps. And, yes, you are right, the recovery plans of each state were crafted by the citizens of the state, not the Feds.

 

[Ben Lamb]

Certainly not much to add to Fin and Buzz's excellent accounting here.

As for congressional delisting, we still hold out hope that something will move forward in the next congress. The ESA exemption option can't get past the senate unless they drop their nation-wide delisting. Barbara Boxer is the chair of Environment and Public Works (EPW) and is a strong ally for the ESA. Feinstien is the chairwoman of Interior Appropriations, and again, a strong ally for the ESA.

Baucus/Tester has a better chance in the senate, but some anti-wolf folks are actively trying to kill that effort because it doesn't fit in with their agenda (and actually crowed about killing the B/T effort during lame duck).

Having worked on this issue for 8 years in MT and WY, I share the frustration and despondency that Fin has. However, I do think that if some statesmen from WY stood up and altered their plan to fit Molloy's ruling, we would have a delisting rule by spring. That still means litigation, but the point of the ruling should not be to eliminate litigation, but to make the ruling bullet proof.

The wolf issue should be remembered as what happens when politicians decide they can manage wildlife better than the professionals. If WY would have gone with their original plan (trophy game statewide) rather than listen to the special interests, we would have been through most of the litigation today, and would have had another successful hunt last year.

 

[Sytes]

The wolf issue should be remembered as what happens when politicians decide they can manage wildlife better than the professionals. If WY would have gone with their original plan (trophy game statewide) rather than listen to the special interests, we would have been through most of the litigation today, and would have had another successful hunt last year.

Couldn't agree more...

This thread has been great for sharing information. Informative for understanding the frustrations (not too hard as I think many of us are frustrated) to the "behind the scenes" info as shared by Buzz, BFin, BLamb - and everyone contributing.

 

[mixedbag]

that makes things a lot more clear for me