EDITORIAL: A big deal about a little bird: Economic impact of listing would have cost billions

Posted 9/29/15

So why should you care?

Wyoming is home to more sage grouse than any other state; an estimated 37 percent of the species roosts here. Meanwhile, we are also one of the top energy-producing states. If sage grouse were listed as endangered, it …

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EDITORIAL: A big deal about a little bird: Economic impact of listing would have cost billions

Posted

You may have noticed there’s more sage grouse in the news than usual lately, and for very good reason: After decades of conservation work, the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service announced that protection of the bird is not warranted under the Endangered Species Act.

So why should you care?

Wyoming is home to more sage grouse than any other state; an estimated 37 percent of the species roosts here. Meanwhile, we are also one of the top energy-producing states. If sage grouse were listed as endangered, it would have had a tremendous impact on the energy industry, as well as the ranching industry in critical habitat areas.

Literally, the entire state would feel the repercussions. Even seemingly unrelated aspects to Wyoming’s economy would be impacted, such as school funding, the number of jobs available and housing development, said Wyoming Game and Fish sage grouse coordinator Tom Christensen in an interview last November.

“It impacts everyone,” Christensen said. “I think the economic impact has been calculated and it is in the billions of dollars.”

You read correctly, that is not just $1 billion, but multiple billions — a price tag Wyoming simply can’t afford.

Had the bird been listed as endangered, the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service would have created critical habitat areas that would be restricted more tightly from development, Christensen said. Many places in Wyoming are considered to be important habitats according to recent maps from the Bureau of Land Management and U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service’s “Greater Sage Grouse Conservation Effort” plan. (See last Thursday’s edition and Page 1 of today’s edition for more details.)

This would have meant oil and gas developments would slow down in some places and be non-existent in others. Their upcoming plans are pretty restrictive on new developments on federal lands in order to prevent sage grouse from getting listed, but their plans are far less restrictive than if the bird was actually listed under the ESA.

“It would put the brakes on, but it wouldn’t end all the activities,” Christensen said.

Even though the listing was deemed not warranted, we are not out of the woods yet. A big reason for the not warranted decision was because of all the past, ongoing and future conservation efforts to help the species stabilize, multiply and increase.

We applaud everyone who has played a role in helping sage grouse, because doing so means future generations will be able to enjoy this quirky little bird as it scuttles around the area, and it means more control over our state’s economic endeavors.

Wyoming is a balancing act. On one hand we want to protect our wildlife and pristine environment. But on the other hand, we want to have jobs, homes and infrastructure to make living here possible.

If sage grouse were listed as endangered, we would not be able to have our cake and eat it too. Any project that could impact sage grouse would take much longer to complete, if it would be allowed at all.

We like having our citizens employed, we like being one of the energy leaders in the country and we also like being able to go out into the brush to see a group of sage grouse enjoying our beautiful state just as much as we do.

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