Species List Less Endangered; Proposal to Weaken It Dropped

WASHINGTON Interior Secretary Dirk Kempthorne said Friday that he has scrapped a proposal critics said would seriously weaken the law protecting endangered species.

Kempthorne said while he doesn’t think Congress should change the Endangered Species Act, the department is reviewing how the law is implemented.

Environmentalists in March had made public a draft of changes the Interior Department was considering that the critics said would reduce the number of species that could be saved and contained provisions that amounted to gutting the program.

"That predated me. I’ve put a stop to that," Kempthorne said during a lunch with a small number of reporters.

Some environmentalists have criticized Kempthorne for not moving more aggressively to declare new species endangered.

"Kempthorne has been a disaster for endangered species," Noah Greenwald of the advocacy group Center for Biological Diversity said Friday. Greenwald said that while 279 species have been declared "candidates" for listing as endangered, and three have been recommended for "emergency" listing, none has been added since Kempthorne became secretary.

But Kempthorne said Fish and Wildlife Service officials "are frustrated" that the federal law has not protected more species and that rules implementing it need improvement.

"We’re seriously looking at that," said Kempthorne. He did not provide further details except to say he thought more emphasis should be given to recovery "so that we do not wait until you’re at a point where a species is on the brink."

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