House approves major overhaul of Endangered Species Act
By Erica Werner
The Associated Press
WASHINGTON — The House yesterday approved a top-to-bottom overhaul of the landmark 1973 Endangered Species Act, perhaps the nation's most powerful environmental law.
By a vote of 229-193, lawmakers passed legislation that could greatly expand private-property rights under the environmental law that is credited with helping keep the bald eagle from extinction, but that has led to battles over species such as the spotted owl, the snail darter and the red-legged frog.
The White House supports the legislation, although it wants some changes. The Senate has not taken up companion legislation and is unlikely to accept such drastic revisions in the law, so compromises are likely if the bill is ever to become law.
In addition, Sen. Lincoln Chafee, R-R.I., head of the panel that oversees the law, has expressed concerns about the House bill.
An alternative proposal, which would have offered incentives to landowners to help protect species on their property, failed to pass by 10 votes. Both the bill that passed and the alternative eliminated the "critical habitat" provisions of the Endangered Species Act that now limit development in certain areas.
The bill that passed would require the government to compensate property owners if steps needed to protect species thwarted development plans. It also would make political appointees responsible for some scientific determinations and would stop the government from designating areas as "critical habitat."
The changes were pushed through by the chairman of the House Resources Committee, Rep. Richard Pombo, R-Calif. The rancher contends the current rules unduly burden landowners and lead to costly lawsuits while doing too little to save plants and animals.
The Fish and Wildlife Service says there are 1,268 threatened and endangered plants and animals in the United States. About a dozen have gone off the list after they were determined to have recovered; nine have become extinct.
"You've got to pay when you take away somebody's private property. That is what we have to do," Pombo told House colleagues. "The only way this is going to work is if we bring in property owners to be part of the solution and to be part of recovering those species."
Many Democrats and moderate Republicans said Pombo's bill would eliminate important protections for species and clear the way for large government handouts to property owners.
In a daylong debate that included references to the glories of ecotourism and the medicinal benefits of saving the Pacific yew tree, critics decried the compensation provision as an uncapped raid on the federal Treasury, while proponents accused environmentalists of putting bugs over people.
"We should protect endangered species, but not at the expense of our property owners," said Rep. Henry Brown Jr., R-S.C.
Countered Rep. Jay Inslee, D-Wash.: "What is a fish without a river? What is an Endangered Species Act without protection?"
In the end, 34 Republicans joined Democrats in voting against the measure, and 36 Democrats joined Republicans in voting for it.
In the Washington state delegation, Republican Dave Reichert joined Democrats in voting against the legislation. Republicans Doc Hastings and Cathy McMorris voted for it.
Dicks amendment
Rep. Norm Dicks, D-Wash., was one of the key opponents of Pombo's measure. As ranking Democrat on the House Interior appropriations subcommittee, he worked the House cloakroom and the phones, pushing a substitute bipartisan amendment he had co-sponsored that would have removed the most controversial parts of Pombo's bill. But the amendment was defeated, 216-206.
Dicks and the amendment's authors, George Miller, D-Calif., and Sherwood Boehlert, R-N.Y., had rounded up 28 Republican votes. But they lost Democrats along the way, mostly from rural agricultural areas where the Endangered Species Act is controversial.
One of those Democrats, Joe Baca, D-Calif., began swatting at a fly buzzing near his head while he spoke on the House floor. Baca then told House members that under the existing law, he might not be allowed to kill that fly. He voted against the amendment.
"That was exasperating, to see this matter trivialized like that," Dicks said afterward.
In his speech to the House, Dicks called Pombo's bill "a step backward" that would lower scientific standards for the entire "endangered" designation process.
His hopes reside in a compromise in the Senate, which he thinks will be more sensitive to the environmental issues. "You have a chairman in Chafee who I think will hold this up for a while."
Dicks added, "It's going to be a 2006 elections issue."
Democrats in the state delegation supported the substitute amendment. Rep. Jim McDermott said the Endangered Species Act is now on the endangered-species list.
Reichert voted against the amendment and against the bill. "He heard a lot about this from his district," said his press secretary. "Even the amendment didn't have enough protection in it for him."
Worries about cost
In a statement, the White House supported the bill but noted that payments to private-property owners could have a "significant" impact on the budget.
The Congressional Budget Office estimated those payments would run less than $20 million a year. The bill's opponents predicted a much higher total.
Environmentalists decried the bill's passage, while property-rights advocates cheered.
"A critical mass is developing of people who are now aware of the problems that the existing Endangered Species Act imposes on landowners and communities and understands that it's counterproductive to recovering species," said Chuck Cushman, executive director of the American Land Rights Association.
Susan Holmes, senior legislative representative at Earthjustice, said the bill amounted to "the death warrant for treasured American wildlife."
"If the Senate fails to do the right thing and reject this bill, America stands to lose hundreds of species of rare plants and animals," she said.
