News
In historic move, Biden to pick Native American Rep. Haaland to lead U.S. Department of the Interior
NPR – August 22
President-elect Joe Biden will nominate Rep. Deb Haaland to lead the Department of the Interior, his transition team announced Thursday. If confirmed by the Senate, Haaland, a member of the Laguna Pueblo in New Mexico, would be the country's first Native American Cabinet secretary. The Interior Department upholds the federal government's responsibilities to the country's 574 federally recognized Indian tribes and Alaska Native villages. Its roughly 70,000-person staff also oversees one-fifth of all the land in the U.S. as well as 1.7 billion acres of the country's coasts.
Brenda Mallory selected to lead White House’s Council on Environmental Quality
The New York Times – December 16
President-elect Joe Biden has chosen Brenda Mallory, an environmental lawyer who spent more than 15 years working at various positions within the EPA under both Republican and Democratic presidents, to lead the Council on Environmental Quality (CEQ), according to two people close to the Biden transition team. Under Mallory, who currently serves as the director of regulatory policy at the Southern Environmental Law Center, a watchdog group, the CEQ is expected to have an expanded focus on environmental justice.
U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service narrows protection of habitat for endangered species
The Hill – December 15
The U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service (USFWS) on Tuesday narrowed habitat protections for endangered species, finalizing its second major rollback to the federal Endangered Species Act. The latest rule narrows the definition of habitat to areas that “currently or periodically” support a species, a move environmentalists say ignores the changing climate or efforts that could be made to modify a landscape. The agency said the new rule would “bring greater clarity and consistency to how the [USFWS] designates critical habitat.”
Lockheed Martin set to perform state-ordered cleanup of toxic substances in San Diego Bay
The San Diego Union-Tribune – December 15
Lockheed Martin (Lockheed) is expected to begin work soon on a state-ordered and court-mandated environmental remediation project to clean up a portion of San Diego Bay’s Harbor Island East Basin that was subject to decades of pollution. Last week, the San Diego Unified Port District’s Board of Port Commissioners (Port) voted unanimously to certify the project’s environmental impact report and to issue a coastal development permit for demolition work and sediment remediation, which should ready the East Harbor Island area for redevelopment. The Port, which owns the tideland areas in question on behalf of the public, initially sued the businesses in 2005 over the Tow Basin site, which was operated by aerospace and defense contractors General Dynamics, its subsidiary Convair (through 1970), and then Lockheed through 1991. The actions pave the way for Lockheed to tear down its 54-year-old Harbor Island marine terminal building early next year. Shortly thereafter it will remove and replace sand in the basin contaminated by cancer-causing polychlorinated biphenyls and mercury.
State water officials levy $6.4M fine against luxury resort
SFGate – December 15
Sonoma Luxury Resort LLC, the developer of the Montage Healdsburg luxury resort and residential project near Healdsburg, is facing a $6.4 million fine over dozens of alleged water quality violations involving streams that feed into the Russian River, according to state water officials. The company is alleged to have violated state and federal water rules 38 times in 2018 and 2019 and to have discharged “9.4 million gallons of highly turbid water into Russian River tributaries,” by failing to take sufficient steps to prevent such discharges during the course of its construction, according to officials with the North Coast Regional Water Quality Control Board.
Environmental groups sue to block oil project in Carrizo Plain National Monument
Courthouse News Service – December 15
Environmental advocates sued the federal government on Tuesday to block an oil well and pipeline project that would cut through Southern California’s Carrizo Plain National Monument, claiming the federal government is moving forward on the project without fully analyzing the environmental effects the proposed pipeline would have on the region. The monument site, established in 2001, is the single largest native grassland region in California. In 2012, the U.S. Bureau of Land Management issued a preliminary environmental report for a new oil drilling permit, but four years later determined the site would be abandoned and the surrounding area restored to its natural conditions. In 2020, the Trump administration announced it would resume plans to open the plain to oil drilling. E&B Natural Resources Management Corp., which is not a party to the suit, wants to construct a pipeline on federal lands in the Russell Ranch Oil Field located in the San Luis Obispo County portion of the monument.
Federal government to delay seeking legal protection for monarch butterfly
Associated Press – December 15
The USFWS this Tuesday declared the monarch butterfly “a candidate” for threatened or endangered status under the federal Endangered Species Act, but said no action would be taken until 2024 to further consider the listing unless the situation improves enough to make the step unnecessary. Scientists estimate the monarch population in the eastern U.S. has fallen about 80% since the mid-1990s, while the drop-off in the western U.S. has been even steeper, with the California-based western species population count dropping from about 1.2 million in 1997 to fewer than 30,000 in 2019. Preliminary survey results this fall have turned up only about 2,000 monarchs, according to the USFWS.
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