Endangered Species Law & Policy

On September 17, 2024, the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service (Service) proposed listing the Kentucky creekshell (Villosa ortmanni) as an endangered species under the Endangered Species Act (ESA) and designating critical habitat for the species (Proposed Rule). The freshwater mussel is found in rivers and streams in both Kentucky and Tennessee. Historically, the species was found in thirteen river basins in southern Kentucky and northern Tennessee, but it has been extirpated from four of those basins.

The Proposed Rule identifies water quality degradation, urbanization ...

The Trinity River Hatchery, which is operated by the California Department of Fish and Wildlife and funded by the U.S. Bureau of Reclamation, has a production capacity of approximately 40 million salmonid eggs.  Operations at the Hatchery are intended to mitigate for lost salmonid habitat due to the construction and operation of various water projects.  However, a recent lawsuit filed by the Environmental Protection Information Center alleges that instead of mitigating for impacts to endangered and threatened salmon and steelhead, the Hatchery is "taking" the protected species ...

On March 8, 2012, the U.S. District Court for the Eastern District of California entered judgment in Coalition for a Sustainable Delta and Kern County Water Agency v. Federal Emergency Management Agency, et al., No 1:09-cv-02024 (E.D. Cal.) based on a settlement agreement in which FEMA agreed to request consultation with the National Marine Fisheries Service (NMFS) and the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service (FWS) under section 7 of the Endangered Species Act regarding the impacts of its implementation of the National Flood Insurance Program (NFIP) on threatened and endangered ...

On February 29, 2012, the California Natural Resources Agency released approximately 10,000 pages of "preliminary" draft planning documents relating to the Bay Delta Conservation Plan (BDCP) for public review and comment.  The documents fall into two categories: Draft BDCP documents, and Draft Environmental Impact Report/Environmental Impact Statement (EIR/EIS) documents (see the list below for details).

The BDCP is being developed in compliance with the Federal Endangered Species Act (ESA) and the California Natural Communities Conservation Planning Act (NCCPA ...