OUR VIEW

0 Comments | Gazette, The (Colorado Springs), Dec 21, 2007

Rodent fatigue

Small turnout for Preble's meeting shows people tired of never- ending games

One might interpret the sparse turnout at last week's U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service meeting on the Preble's meadow jumping mouse as a sign of indifference and acquiescence. Or one might take it as a sign of resignation and silent protest -- evidence that Coloradans by now recognize that the agency will do everything in its power to keep the animal on the endangered species list, no matter what contradictory evidence or arguments are made.

It might also have had something to do with the meeting being scheduled for 4 o'clock in the afternoon on a Monday in the midst of the holiday season -- a time when normal people are working, commuting, greeting returning school kids, Christmas shopping and leading busy lives. If it's a choice between going to happy hour and sitting through another seemingly pointless act in this charade, most people quite wisely would choose the former. Unless a Preble's mouse has infiltrated their homes and is gnawing away at the base of the Christmas tree, most people have higher priorities than attending another dog-and-pony show.

Of course those who support the agency's decision to keep the mouse listed in Colorado showed up. What else do professional agitators and advocates have to do? This isn't just an interest of theirs: it's their mission in life. They've turned their obsessions into a vocation.

Most of the rest of us, even if we care, are sprinting to stay two steps ahead of the tax collector, so USFWS bio-crats can hold meetings and pretend to listen, but go on regulating as if this creature is on the brink of extinction. It obviously isn't on the brink of extinction, judging from the agency's proposal to lift federal protections in Wyoming but keep them in place in Colorado. One dubious subspecies has thus spawned two more: the Colorado Preble's meadow jumping mouse and the Wyoming Preble's meadow jumping mouse.

Perhaps no one is up in arms about such an absurd decision because absurdities have in this case become commonplace. Seeing the lengths to which the agency went to discredit or discount those who questioned the animal's taxonomic status and challenged its listing, resignation is a perfectly rational response.

Officials in Wyoming made sufficient noise on the issue that they got the regulatory relief they wanted. More power (and freedom) to them. Most officials in Colorado either avoided the confrontation or watched passively from the sidelines. Coloradans will pay for their passivity with their property rights. That's the long and short of it.

Show up at meetings and file comments if it brings you catharsis. But it's obvious to most folks that the process was rigged by advocacy groups and agency insiders, who view any challenge to the Endangered Species Act as a threat to their agendas and influence. That recognition is breeding cynicism and surrender.

We might take away one lesson from all this, however: an ill- conceived and irrational law can't result in rational prioritysetting or policy-making. Until the ESA itself is discarded or re-written, such absurdities will continue. The long, strange saga of the Preble's meadow jumping mouse should serve as Exhibit 1 in the case of The People v. the ESA.

Water pact should help during drought

Coming after eight years of drought, seven Western states, including Colorado, have hammered out an accord -- hailed as the most significant water agreement in 85 years -- with the federal Interior Department to deal with declining water supplies from the Colorado River. As government arrangements go, this pact was a good one, given that the alternative would have been a long and costly legal battle.

Although the drought hasn't been too bad in Colorado the past year or so, downstream states are still suffering through one of the worst droughts in history. This has led to fears of water wars among the states in the Colorado River basin.

The agreement allows for California, Nevada and Arizona to store water at Lake Mead for later use. It also allows water districts to pay for farmers to let their fields go fallow. The deal also sets additional rules that basically share the drought risk more equitably among states.

In a news report in the Rocky Mountain News, Ted Kowalski, a member of the Colorado team negotiating the pact, said, "It means our water future is a little more secure. It's also a huge step forward in managing water more efficiently."

Officials in downstream states worry that without a break in the drought, they might have to place more restrictions on water use.

Unfortunately, water increasingly is being used by elected officials as a means to control growth, even though growth is coming whether states makes adequate accommodations for it or not. Environmental activists, for instance, prefer that Western states deal with falling reservoir levels by imposing Draconian mandates on the populace. "None of the municipal agencies are saying, 'We need to re-evaluate our urban plans, our growth plans, because there's only so much water,' " said Michael Cohen, with the Pacific Institute, as quoted in one newspaper article. Another environmentalist, quoted by National Public Radio, asked: "What's wrong with saying, 'I'm sorry, we ran out of water, you can't live here?' "