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Alaska will sue over polar bear listing
Kristen Nelson & Alan Bailey Petroleum News
Alaska Gov. Sarah Palin announced May 21 that the state intends to file suit in U.S. District Court for the District of Columbia “challenging U.S. Interior Secretary Dirk Kempthorne’s decision to list the polar bear as threatened under the Endangered Species Act.”
In a previous statement issued May 18 Palin had expressed her disappointment at Kempthorne’s decision.
“As I have said, I am disappointed with U.S. Interior Secretary Dirk Kempthorne’s decision to list polar bears as threatened under the Endangered Species Act,” she said. “Measures are already in place to protect the polar bear.”
She said she would do everything within her power “to protect the interests of the people of Alaska” and to minimize the impact of the listing on the national economy.
The attorney general’s office will now file a complaint under the Administrative Procedures Act and will begin drafting a 60-day notice of intent to sue under the Endangered Species Act.
“This action is based on the Secretary’s failure to make a decision based solely on the best available scientific and commercial information,” the governor’s office said in the May 21 announcement. “It is also based on the Secretary’s unwarranted expansion of the ‘foreseeable future’ into periods where detailed forecasts of climate change are not possible.”
State monitoring other litigation The governor’s office also said that the state is monitoring other litigation in the Northern District of California that relates to the polar bear listing “and will consider intervention in that lawsuit if it becomes clear that the court in that case intends to address substantive rather than just procedural issues.”
“While climate change is a significant issue, the Endangered Species Act is not the right tool to address impacts to a species from climate change,” Attorney General Talis Colberg said.
Palin has noted that Kempthorne exempted oil and gas development and subsistence use from his decision and “found no linkage between economic development in the Lower 48 states and the loss of critical polar bear habitat in Alaska.”
But Tom Irwin, commissioner of the Department of Natural Resources, expressed concern about the potential impact of the polar bear listing.
“Inappropriate implementation of this listing decision could result in widespread social and economic impacts, including increased power costs and further increases in fuel prices, without providing any more protection for the species,” Irwin said.
And the North Slope Borough has already expressed concern about the impact on subsistence hunters and fishermen.
“The problem is that polar bears are not endangered by human activity in the Arctic, and the ESA listing only restricts activities up here. So it quite possibly will interfere with our Inupiat subsistence hunting and fishing, which does not get at the problem but does impact us,” NSB Mayor Edward Itta told the Associated Press.
Itta: ESA listing misleading Itta said he knows Arctic sea ice retreat could jeopardize Alaska’s polar bear population, but questioned whether an ESA listing will do anything to protect polar bears or slow the disappearance of the ice pack.
“My fear is that this will lull many Americans into believing that now we’re protecting the bears,” Itta said in a statement.
But the ESA listing has the potential to restrict hunting.
“The Endangered Species Act is a very big hammer, and it could easily land on us even if the agencies don’t want it to,” he said.
Palin also repeated her earlier statement that the state will work with the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service in protecting “the health and viability of polar bear populations.” The governor said she believes the Marine Mammals Protection Act “already provides the safeguards that are required for polar bear protection,” and said the state will express that view to Fish and Wildlife.
“While the state is challenging the listing, we remain committed to assuring Alaska’s polar bears are conserved,” Palin said. “The state will continue to monitor Alaska’s polar bear populations and their behaviors in relation to changing sea ice.”
—The Associated Press contributed to this story
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