Raymond Proffitt Foundation
Pollution Update: 13 Sept 1997
Environmental activists with story ideas or comments can e-mail me at gateway@rayproffitt.org I’d like to thank the readers of Pollution Update for their comments and suggestions, and DEP for giving us plenty to write about.
****
DEP vs. Bog Turtle, et al
When it comes to endangered species protection, activists from a number of conservation groups are wondering if the Department of Environmental Protection's deeds will match their latest words. On Monday September 15, DEP Secretary James Seif was named head of a state committee to study ways to protect the bog turtle, a small wetland-inhabiting creature that is proposed for listing under the Federal Endangered Species Act as a "threatened" species.
The meeting was called by influential Harrisburg lobbyist George Wolff, and besides Seif, was attended by representatives from PennDOT, the PA Fish and Boat Commission, the Department of Conservation and Natural Resources, The Nature Conservancy and the Sierra Club. The U.S. Fish and WIldlife Service, the Federal agency that proposed the threatened listing in January, was not invited.
The Commonwealth's agencies have been split over the turtle's listing. PennDOT was a vocal critic of the proposed listing at an April public hearing on the issue. The PA Fish and Boat Commission, who already has the bog turtle listed as state-endangered, and DCNR both support the listing.
Reports from the meeting indicate that Seif is looking for a way to protect the turtle without hindering economic development, and also is worried about the Ridge Administration's image. He doesn't want to have the Commonwealth look like they don't care about the turtle. He also thinks that the Federal law doesn't work well, and that the state can take the lead in protecting the bog turtle.
"DEP's latest words don't match up with their recent deeds," says Joe Turner, member of the Raymond Proffitt Foundation. "DEP has had plenty of chances to protect the bog turtle and other rare species. In every case, DEP has gone the other way."
Examples of DEP's failure to protect bog turtles and other rare species include:
1) In 1996, DEP was prepared to issue a permit to pump 288,000 gallons a day from a well in Berks County to the "Wissahickon Spring Water Company." The pumping would have altered the water table in a wetland with bog turtles. Only legal action by the Pike-Oley District Preservation Coalition and a favorable decision from the Environmental Hearing Board stopped the permit for the time being. Harlan Snyder, a member of the group, says that.."Having the Ridge Administration being responsible for the protection for any endangered species or any other environmental concern is like having the fox guard the hen house."
2) Money Island is located in the Delaware River between the twin WMX trash mounds (mountains) at Falls and Tullytown Townships, Bucks County, Pennsylvania. Until recently the island contained several endangered and threatened species of frogs and plants. DEP and the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers decided that this would be a convenient area to dump dredge material. WMX, the owner of the property, was pleased with this selection since the dredge material would be used as cover for their mountains of garbage. Problem was, endangered plants and frogs. Not a problem for DEP and ACOE when they want something. Over objections from the PA Fish and Boat Commission these, two regulatory agencies sent their troops out on a rainy day and supposedly dug up and then transplanted all of the endangered plants. No word on the fate of the endangered frogs.
3) DEP recently issued a draft wastewater permit for the PH Glatfelter
paper mill along Codorus
Creek in York County. The permit did not contain a limit for dioxin, one of the most toxic
chemicals ever, and a poison that is passed up the food chain. In December 1996, DEP was
alerted by the US Fish and Wildlife Service that the dioxin levels found in fish far
downstream might be affecting bald eagles eating the fish along the Susquehanna, and that
the Glatfelter mill was a likely source of the poison. DEP disregarded the warning and
issued the draft permit with a weak "monitor and report" requirement. "Only
an objection to the permit by the Environmental Protection Agency has made DEP take a
second look. We are very hopeful that EPA will step in on this permit as the lead agency,
because of DEP's failures to renew the permit. How long and how badly do they have to
screw up before someone will enforce the law that DEP has failed to enforce?" said
Dr. Richard J. Clark, spokesperson for Stop Targeting Our People (STOP), a York
County-based citizens group.
4) In March 1997, DEP issued their controversial proposal on antidegradation and actually lessened protection for endangered species. Under the Casey Administration, presence of state or Federally threatened or endangered species meant that a watershed qualified for "Exceptional Value" classification in Pennsylvania's water quality standards, also known as Chapter 93. Seif's DEP dropped that protection, saying that there was no Federal requirement for it, and that endangered species were adequately protected under "Tier 1," the lowest classification of water quality protection. DEP received thousands of negative comments on their proposal, and has yet to make a final recommendation to the Environmental Quality Board.
5) DEP has had the opportunity all along to conserve bog turtle habitats through their wetlands protection program. Since 1991, DEP's regulations (Chapter 105) have stated that wetlands with state or Federal endangered or threatened species in them were considered "Exceptional Value Wetlands" (different from "Exceptional Value" watersheds in Chapter 93). The bog turtle was listed as "Pennsylvania Endangered" before 1991. Nancy Rauch, Conservation Chair of the Pennsylvania Sierra Club tells us that; "DEP stands for `DON'T EXPECT PROTECTION', and that's what endangered and threatened species can expect from DEP Secretary Seif."
DEP has had the power in its existing regulations to protect bog turtle habitat, but has not used it. "The area north of the Fall Line between Philadelphia, Wilmington and Baltimore is the region now most heavily populated with bog turtles. In this area there are more colonies than there are in the combined remainder of the species' range. Not only is the area highly urbanized and bisected by numerous interstate highways, but even the rural remnants of this region support a rapidly expanding maze of suburban environments, " said Larry Schaeffer of Bucks County, Pa.
"A wetland within a property to be subdivided could be retained with a surrounding buffer. However it is virtually certain that the surface hydrologic changes resulting from adjacent grading and construction of housing units, roadways etc would result in a wetland unsuitable for bog turtles." DEP's current wetland regulations mandate that they take hydrological changes into account, but they rarely, if ever do so.
"If we wait for Jim Seif's DEP to protect the bog turtle, we'll have to go to a
museum to see them, like we do Tyrannosaurus rex," Turner continues. "He can do
a lot of things, such as tell Wissahickon 'NO,' and issue a permit to the PH Glatfelter
mill that actually protects bald eagles and the Codorus Creek. He can start enforcing the
wetlands laws, and give back the EV
status for watersheds with rare species, like we had under Art Davis. Seif knocks the
Federal Endangered Species Act, but he hasn't used his authority to protect rare species.
"Until he does some things that are actually in his power, we have to assume that this is just more of the same smoke and mirrors that we have been handed from DEP since Seif took office."
<<<<END>>>>