A judge has ordered federal agencies to take more precautions for threatened and endangered creatures across national forest land in San Diego County and the rest of Southern California.
U.S. District Court Judge Marilyn Hall Patel said in a ruling this week that the National Marine Fisheries Service and the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service failed to fully analyze the potential problems caused by management plans for the Cleveland, San Bernardino, Los Padres and Angeles forests.
She said the agencies needed to put in place limits on how many imperiled plants and animals can be harmed in the forests and develop “reasonable and prudent” measures to minimize harm to them. The plans are supposed to include monitoring and reporting of protected animals that are hurt or killed in the forests.
The order marks another victory for environmentalists who have challenged the Forest Service management plans as tilted toward development at the expense of imperiled species. In December, roughly 1 million acres of forest land in Southern California gained protections against development under a settlement worked out among conservation groups, state officials, off-road vehicle enthusiasts and the U.S. Forest Service.
Monday’s ruling came in a related case, in which conservationists charged that wildlife agencies hadn’t fully assessed the biological impact of forest plans as required by the Endangered Species Act. The 40 species affected by the order include the California condor, the Quino checkerspot butterfly and the peninsular bighorn sheep.
“The American people overwhelmingly think of national forests as a place where wildlife populations should be safe, and endangered species should be restored. That’s what the law requires, and the federal court agrees,” said Peter Nelson, director of federal lands for the environmental group Defenders of Wildlife. Other plaintiffs were the Center for Biological Diversity, Los Padres ForestWatch, Sierra Club and California Native Plant Society.
A spokesman for the Cleveland National Forest could not be reached Friday.
Mike Lee: (619)293-2034; firstname.lastname@example.org. Follow on Twitter @sdutlee.