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Tuesday, October 28, 1997

Some property owners' response to endangered species is lethal

By PEGGY FIKAC Associated Press Writer

AUSTIN (AP) - Some landowners are so concerned about being subjected to Endangered Species Act restrictions that their response to finding an endangered animal is "shoot, shovel and shut up," property rights advocates said Monday.

"When a landowner finds an endangered species on his or her property, that landowner can expect to lose most of the property rights in that land," said Becky Norton Dunlop, Virginia secretary of natural resources, at a conference of the legal foundation Defenders of Property Rights.

"You often find that people will work to eliminate habitat ... I have heard it said that out here in the West there's a little saying that goes along with endangered species. It's called ... shoot, shovel and shut up," she said.

She suggested that changes are needed in the law to encourage "good stewardship."

Texas state Rep. Bob Turner, D-Voss, said, "It's not just a speaker's joke. It's reality."

Because discovering an endangered species can limit the use of land, he said, "Nobody wants to have one of those things.

"If you have it, you damn sure don't want to admit it. You don't want anybody to know it. It's a little like getting drunk at the Baptist convention. You might do it, but you don't want everybody to know it," said Turner, a rancher.

Rather than killing an animal, Turner said, it is more common for landowners to do away with habitat that would attract an endangered species, such as cedar that's home to endangered birds.

Giving landowners incentives, such as tax breaks, to preserve the threatened species would be a help, he said.

Meg Durham of the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service, which oversees the Endangered Species Act, said the agency works with landowners.

"There have been policies adopted to try to deal with that type of landowners' concern," she said.

"We want to try to work with people for conservation. A lot of landowners want to work with us and are pleased to find ways they can do something good for the environment."

Susan Combs, a rancher, former Texas legislator and GOP agriculture commissioner candidate, said she doesn't think "shoot and shovel" is happening in Texas.

"I don't think people are destroying habitat or destroying species. They don't want to do that. They want to turn over a piece of property to their succeeding generations in a good, positive way, and they just want some help," said Ms. Combs, a sponsor of the state's property rights law.

Nancie Marzulla, president and chief legal counsel for the Washington-based Defenders of Property Rights, said talk of destroying habitat or animals is a "horrible result" of a law that she says takes the wrong approach.

She said it would be better for the government to pay for land that is put aside for the public good or to give tax breaks.

Ms. Durham said buying property might be a possibility depending on the land's location. As Congress reviews the Endangered Species Act, there also is talk of tax relief for people who are "responsible stewards" of the land, she said.

"When people preserve the environment, they're helping everybody," she said.

The Sierra Club's Scott Royder said the Endangered Species Act needs to be strong and should be strictly enforced because it represents a last effort to keep animals from extinction.

"When an animal is extinct, we don't have a second chance," he said. He said the fact that an animal is listed as an endangered species is a "very bad sign the ecosystem is in trouble."

"The landowner should take notice that something's wrong here. Other things may start to disappear as well." Royder said his group wants to work with landowners so animals don't become endangered in the first place.Send a Letter to the Editor about This Story | Start or Join A Discussion about This Story
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