Military seeking to have endangered species rules eased

The Pentagon is moving toward asking Congress to rewrite the Endangered Species Act and other laws so that the military training exercises can be exempted from restrictions to protect sea turtles, desert tortoises, shore birds and other rare creatures, according to documents leaked to the press. Military officials have said they would like more flexibility in environmental rules, in large part because of growing friction between these protections and training exercises. While there are no specific areas of concern for the military in Hampton Roads, in general the armed services are aware of what they must protect in terms of endangered species in the region. The migration of right whales off the Atlantic coast affects ship maneuvers, and amphibious training on North Carolina beaches is affected by turtle and woodpecker populations. The military uses 57 training sites in the United States. It drops live ordnance on 33 range complexes in 14 states, two territories and six foreign countries. Many of these sites were once remote. But, as the U.S. population swells, military reservations with expanses of open country have become de facto wildlife refuges for rare and endangered species. Yet officials contend that the armed forces are being penalized for being good stewards of their land. Laws to protect these last refuges are obstructing their plans to drop live bombs, to fire weapons, maneuver tanks and conduct war games and other exercises designed to keep troops ready for battle.
“We are definitely moving out with action plans,” said Rear Adm. Larry Baucom, the Navy’s director of environmental protection. “We are looking at the Endangered Species Act and the Marine Mammal Protection Act,” he said.

Baucom said these laws are “fairly vaguely written” and subject to widely differing interpretations. The Navy, designated the lead armed service on many such “encroachment” issues, would like to see definitions clarified to make them easier to follow and more compatible with the military’s central mission: national defense. “It’s a matter of balance,” Baucom said. “How do we balance our environmental stewardship with training and maintaining national security?” The answer proposed by Defense Department documents, leaked by an environmental group made up of former government employees, is to rewrite the Endangered Species Act so the secretary of defense can “grant exemptions for reasons of mission readiness.” A memo and slides from a presentation carrying the Department of Defense seal recommends that the department work with Congress to reauthorize the act with reforms that: Delete all references to “critical habitat.” Allow increases of “incidental take,” meaning harassment or death of endangered species, when federal agencies can demonstrate an increase in the species’ population.
Shorten the time limits for environmental review and require consultation with wildlife agencies only when a military activity “may adversely affect” a protected species, rather than the current language, which requires a review when such activity “may likely affect” the wildlife.

Glenn Flood, a Pentagon spokesman, on Wednesday said he could find no one familiar with the documents.
“This document exists, but whether it’s an official Department of Defense document, I’d have to say it’s not, based on what I’ve heard,” Flood said. Yet Public Employees for Environmental Responsibility, the group that released the documents, said they were leaked by a military official helping prepare the recommendations to be delivered to Congress this fall. “Nobody should be surprised that this is happening,” said Dan Meyer, the group’s general counsel and a former Navy lieutenant. “It’s entirely predictable to come out of the Bush administration, as a way to weaken progressive environmental rules of the Clinton administration.” Congressional staff said that after the Bush administration took over, the Pentagon started a lobbying effort to try to get Congress to lift some of the restrictions of the Endangered Species Act. Earlier this year, Rep. Dan Burton, R-Ind., chairman of the House Committee on Government Reform, asked leaders from all three services to recommend ways to amend environmental laws that restrict military training.

He and 15 other House leaders formalized that request on May 24, in a letter to President Bush to “initiate government reforms” of environmental laws, airspace restrictions and conflicts over radio waves that threaten national security and military readiness.
The leaked documents maintain that the Endangered Species Act, more than any other federal law, has the potential for obstructing the Defense Department’s mission. The documents note that military lands nationwide provide habitat foe more than 300 species listed by the federal government as threatened or endangered. In a series of congressional hearings earlier this year, military leaders complained of environmental laws, urban sprawl and other constraints hampering activities.