E&E Daily
1/19/2006
Allison A. Freeman, E&E Daily reporter
Separate proposals to overhaul the Endangered Species Act could see action this year in the Senate, as the Environment and Public Works Committee prepares to move a bill in the next two months and another ESA measure sits before the Finance Committee.
EPW Committee Chairman James Inhofe (R-Okla.) is working on an ESA rewrite and plans to have a vote in his committee in late February or early March, EPW spokesman Bill Holbrook said yesterday.
Inhofe had deferred to Wildlife Subcommittee Chairman Lincoln Chafee (R-R.I.) last year to take the lead on the issue and hold hearings on the act. But Inhofe has now stepped in, and staff for the chairman, Chafee and the committee's Democrats are working together in an effort to draft a bipartisan bill, according to the committee.
Throughout the process, Chafee has said he would wait to see recommendations from a meeting in Keystone, Colo., that brought in an array of stakeholders to discuss the contentious issue of critical habitat. A report from that meeting was first expected last September and is now scheduled for next month.
Holbrook said yesterday that Inhofe's staff has been working on other issue areas within the bill. "We have not allowed the delay to delay our efforts in crafting a bipartisan bill," he said.
The bill is also likely to include changes to the critical habitat requirements. "There is general agreement that particular program has failed," Holbrook said. The ESA overhaul the House passed last fall eliminated critical habitat, but environmental groups have protested the designations are necessary to ensure the continued growth of a species.
Holbrook said lawmakers do not yet have a draft, but it would "build on the best aspects of the current law and what we have learned in terms of science and the best practices for managing our land." The bill would also likely include changes to allow private property owners more involvement in the ESA process.
Meanwhile, another ESA bill, which Sens. Mike Crapo (R-Idaho) and Blanche Lincoln (D-Ark.) introduced last month, sits under the sole jurisdiction of the Finance Committee. The legislation would give landowners tax breaks as incentives for helping to recover endangered and threatened species and enact a market-based system to allow landowners to benefit from the sale of conservation credits.
Crapo spokeswoman Susan Wheeler said yesterday that Crapo has worked with EPW Committee members on the ESA issues, but his legislation would be independent from theirs. Wheeler said she does not yet know of hearings or other action scheduled for the bill in the Finance Committee, where Crapo is a member.