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WILDLIFE:Enviros petition CEQ to coordinate bat-protection efforts (Wednesday, April 11, 2012) Laura Petersen, E&E reporter The Center for Biological Diversity today petitioned the Obama administration to coordinate a federal response to slow the spread of a fungus that is killing millions of bats. White-nose syndrome is estimated to have killed more than 6.7 million bats in 19 states and four Canadian provinces since it was first discovered in a New York cave in 2006. Although the Fish and Wildlife Service released a white-nose syndrome national response plan last year, a lack of coordination between land-management agencies has led to inconsistent restrictions on cave access where bats hibernate and hampered the plan's implementation, the group wrote in a petition to Nancy Sutley, chairwoman of the White House Council on Environmental Quality. "What is most needed to resolve this crisis -- and it is a massive biological crisis -- is to really make sure all the federal agencies are on the same page and pushing in the same direction," William Snape, senior counsel for Center for Biological Diversity, said in an interview. CEQ, a presidential office that coordinates federal environmental efforts, is well-positioned to improve coordination between agencies and increase the chances of slowing the spread of the disease by people to currently uninfected areas, Snape said. The petition requests that CEQ direct federal agencies to develop and implement regulations that "restrict non-essential human access to caves and abandoned mines utilized by bats." "We are not talking about blanket closures," Snape said. "We are talking about science-based closures, science-based regulations. And CEQ, under [the National Environmental Policy Act] is the right agency to do that." While bats are believed to be the primary vector to spread the disease, research published Monday suggests the fungus originated in Europe, lending support to the theory that the disease was accidentally introduced to North America by humans (E&ENews PM, April 9). FWS currently recommends cavers follow strict decontamination protocols of their clothes and gear to ensure no stray spore spreads to other caves. The agency's biggest concern is that a human-mediated "jump" to a new part of the country could speed the spread of the disease, outpacing research efforts to slow its spread or even potential treatments, Jeremy Coleman, the agency's white-nose syndrome coordinator, said earlier this year (Land Letter, March 1). The petition asks CEQ to direct federal agencies to require decontamination protocols where access is still allowed. It also requests that the council require agencies to conduct inventories of caves to identify which contain bats and are considered "significant" under the Federal Cave Resources Protection Act. "The U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service has not had time to review the petition, and cannot provide comment about the content of the request to the Council on Environmental Quality,” said Ann Froschauer, the service's national white-nose syndrome communications leader. Click hereto read the petition. ~~~~~~~~~ Mollie Matteson, M.S. Conservation Advocate Center for Biological Diversity Northeast Field Office PO Box 188 Richmond, VT 05477 802-434-2388 (office) 802-318-1487 (cell) mmatte...@biologicaldiversity.org www.biologicaldiversity.org
CEQ_bat_petition_4-11-12.pdf
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