FOCUS ON AGRICULTURE
Fundamental
Shift in Federal
Endangered
Species
Management
Required
RYAN YATES
For more than 40 years, the U.S. Fish
and Wildlife Service has been tasked with the
protection of plants and animals facing the threat
of population decline, habitat loss and extinction.
As the nation’s attention turned to environmental
issues in the 1970s and 80s, Congress began to
take on popular concerns and passed a number
of bills that continue to govern the way we
protect America’s resources today. While our
environment has seen many benefits since that
time, recovery of threatened and endangered
species continues to be an abysmal failure.
Lawmakers, however, have done little to
change this course. Congress has been unable or
unwilling to provide meaningful changes to the
Endangered Species Act in more than 25 years.
Meanwhile the FWS and the National Marine
Fisheries Service have free reign to fundamentally
alter and increase the regulatory strength of
the ESA through rulemaking after rulemaking.
Today, the ESA provides “protections” for nearly
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