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Don't Let Obama Shut Out Endangered Species
  1. Signatures
    258 out of 5,000
    Petitioning
    1. The President of the United States (+ 2 others)
      Petitioning
      close
      • The President of the United States
      • President Obama
      • USDA (USDA)
  2. Created By
    Chrissy H
    Gelsenkirchen, Germany
About this Petition Petition Letter Petition Updates

Right now, the Obama administration is accepting comments on a draft policy interpreting the phrase "significant portion of its range" (SPOIR), which specifies that if a species is at risk of extinction in any significant portion of range, it shall be protected.

This provision has played a key role in the recovery of the bald eagle, grizzly bear and many other iconic wildlife species, ensuring that animals and plants receive protection before they're past the point of saving by providing protection to
species in important parts of their home ranges.

The draft policy would limit species protection in two ways. First, it proposes that a portion of range would only be considered significant if loss of the species from that portion would threaten the species as a whole. This amounts to a regulatory sleight-of-hand that would effectively eliminate the SPOIR provision by making it largely synonymous with a species being at risk in all of its range.

Second, the policy says historic range will not be considered when determining whether a species is endangered in a significant portion of range. In effect, this calls for turning a blind eye to past losses of species, providing a perverse incentive to delay determinations of species' status, so that they may go extinct in various portions of their range, which would then, in turn, no longer be considered for protection.

Please tell the Obama administration to scrap this disastrous policy proposal and develop one that will truly protect species when they are at risk in significant portions of range.
please sign: http://action.biologicaldiversity.org/o/2167/t/5243/p/dia/action/public/;jsessionid=0F378BA3533E9CF803F52F0F8F89ED74-n4?action_KEY=9275

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Protect Endangered Species

Greetings,

I am writing to request that you rescind the proposed policy interpreting the phrase "significant portion of its range" (SPOIR), and replace it with a policy that will truly ensure that species are not lost from significant portions of range.

The draft policy specifies that a portion of the range of a species is significant only if "its contribution to the viability of the species is so important that without that portion, the species would be in danger of extinction." This definition does not provide a meaningful distinction between when a species is endangered in a SPOIR and when a species is endangered throughout all its range, thereby rendering the SPOIR phrase superfluous and nullifying any conservation benefit of protecting species before they are threatened with worldwide extinction.

The draft policy further specifies that when considering whether a species is endangered in a SPOIR, only the current range of a species will be considered. Ignoring historic range when determining whether species are endangered in significant portions of range amounts to a shifting baseline, whereby species that experienced major declines are considered secure only because the analysis is limited solely to current range. Such an approach is clearly not in the interest of species conservation.

I ask that you rescind this anti-science, anti-common-sense draft policy and instead adopt one that considers the significance of both current and historic range and adopts a broad definition of significance that considers many factors when evaluating portions of range, including biological importance, ecological value and size.

Sincerely,




[Your name]

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