An Endangered Act
By the Daily Barometer, Oregon State
January 21, 2005

In the summer of 2001, the federal government cut off the irrigation water supply to farmers in the Klamath Valley. Water in the Klamath Basin was in short supply, and the Endangered Species Act decreed that coho salmon in the river, classified as "threatened," needed the water.

According to a study conducted for the Property and Environment Research Center in Bozeman, Mont., Klamath farmers lost up to $54 million due to restrictions enforced by the Endangered Species Act.

This act has many opponents, and the National Endangered Species Act Reform Coalition, with 150 member organizations, has been established to push legislation to change it.

The group contends that once listed, species are never unlisted ---- thus, the act is unsuccessful. They call for "better" science to make species assessments and recommendations.

They also call for incentives and compensation to property owners that have been affected by the act.

Proponents of the Endangered Species Act point out that it is, by its very nature, a last-ditch effort. According to NOAA, the act is designed to save species and their habitats when other efforts have failed. Therefore, it is not surprising that listed species have a long recovery process and thus stay listed for long periods.

And the act has had some successes ---- populations of grizzly bear, the American alligator and brown pelican, among others, are all recovering.

As for calling stock assessments into question, the real problem is not "bad science," but a lack of funding for scientific research. Instead of using federal dollars to compensate property owners, more support should be given to research and conservation efforts.

In the background of the Endangered Species Act, controversy is a moral argument -- one of short-term-versus-long-term benefits. In the short term, it may seem more important to protect one's individual assets at the expense of a threatened species. But in the long term, isn't the preservation of a species worth more?

Many species on the planet are of economic significance in and of themselves. Pacific salmon are a vital part of the economy of the Northwest, and have been for a long time. To not protect Klamath coho is to court a regional economic setback. Species that don't have obvious economic value are hardly insignificant. The environment is a complex web of interactions that researchers are only beginning to understand. Losing a species may have unforeseen consequences.

As wildlife ecologist and conservation writer Aldo Leopold said, "The first law of intelligent tinkering is to save all of the pieces." We are "tinkering" with our environment in unpredictable ways. We need to look past our own life-spans and short-term desires and preserve the Endangered Species Act to protect all of the diverse, integral components of our planet.

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