Given a small grant by the Fund For Wild Nature, the organization started in 1989 as a small group by the name of Greater Gila Biodiversity Project, with the objective to protect endangered species and critical habitat in the Southwestern United States. The organization grew and became the Center for Biological Diversity.
Kieran Suckling, Peter Galvin, and Todd Schulke founded the organization in response to what they perceived as a failure on the part of the United States Forest Service to protect imperiled species from logging, grazing, and mining. As surveyors in New Mexico, the three men discovered "a rare Mexican spotted owl nest in an old-growth tree", but their discovery was ignored and the Forest Service continued with plans to lease the land to timber companies; Suckling, Galvin, and Schulke believed that it was within the Forest Service's mission to save sensitive species like the Mexican spotted owl from harm, and that the government had not performed its duty in deference to corporate interests. Suckling, Galvin and Schulke went to the media to register their outrage with success: the old-growth tree was protected from harm, and this success led to the founding of the Center for Biological Diversity.[1]
Suckling, Galvin and Schulke assert that in 1990 they discovered the Forest Service was allowing commercial logging within the protected habitat of the owl nests. Speaking to the New York Times in 2010 a spokeswoman for the Forest Service refuted this claim, saying logging “did not occur in these areas” and that owl nests were then given a 100-acre protected area she characterized as “no touch” zones. She implied the CBD co-founders may have been mistaken regarding tree-cutting then occurring in nearby non-protected areas: “other projects did occur and could have included thinning projects to reduce wildland fires, tree plantings or other wildlife projects.” [3] The Forest Service spokeswoman was wrong. Silver had already filed a Petition[4] to List the Mexican Spotted Owl on December 21, 1989, based in part on the fact that at the time 55% of the owls were located in areas the Forest Service had scheduled for cutting.[5] The U.S. Fish and Wildlife concurred that the Forest Service was endangering the owl, listing[6] the owl on March 16, 1993, acknowledging that "[t]here were 316 MTs [management territories] (61 percent) on lands available for timber harvest..."
Today the center's mission encompasses far-reaching problems such as global threats to biological diversity and climate change. One of the center's biggest recent victories was in 2011, when it reached a historic legal settlement with the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service compelling the agency to make progress on protecting 757 imperiled but previously neglected animals and plants. The Center employs a group of paid and pro bono attorneys to use litigation to effect change, and claims a 93 percent success rate for their lawsuits.[1] The 2010 New York Times profile stated the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service (FWS) was the “target of most of [CBD’s] legal work” and that FWS “says the relentless petitions and lawsuits over endangered species have diverted too many agency resources to the courtroom.” The Times quoted the chief of the FWS office of litigation, who observed that the heavy load of Endangered Species Act legal filings from CBD and others had “crippled our ability to put species on the endangered species list.” [3]
Total revenue for 2017 exceeded $20.1 million, and as of March 2019, it had at least 160 employees, including more than 40 attorneys.[7] Kieran Suckling is executive director and co-founder of the center. Todd Schulke is senior staff, co-founder, and a Center board member. He oversees forest protection and restoration. Robin Silver is senior staff, co-founder, and a Center board member. He is a retired emergency room physician and a professional wildlife photographer. Peter Galvin is director of programs, co-founder, and a Center board member. Paula Simmonds is the center's chief development officer. Brendan Cummings is the center's conservation director and attorney. Michael Hudson is chief operating officer for the center. Kassie Siegel is senior counsel and director of CBD's Climate Law Institute.
Press
In a 1989 article in a local New Mexico paper, the founders claimed that the “Forest Service … was more invested in its relationship with big timber than in its commitment to the public to protect forest wildlife.” As a result of the article being published, the lives of an old-growth tree and the sensitive species which had made it their home were able to continue.[1] One critic reportedly began referring to the Forest Service as the “Forest Murder Service”.
In 1994, Kieran Suckling, then the director of the organization that would later become CBD, shoplifted hiking boots and bedroom slippers from a Wal-Mart. He pleaded no contest to the charges and was fined $67. Explaining the incident two years later, Suckling said “It was a bad combination of poverty and stupidity—mostly the latter.” The board of directors suspended him from the director's job for three months and prohibited him from speaking to media for six months. Local critics reportedly began referring to him as the “Shoeman.”.[8]
In 2005, an Arizona jury assessed a $600,000 libel judgment against CBD in a case filed by rancher and investment banker Jim Chilton. In July 2002, CBD had tried to get Chilton's public-land grazing permit rescinded and had posted photos and allegations on its website asserting Chilton was allowing destructive overgrazing and damage to animal habit on his 21,500-acre allotment in a national forest. Chilton's lawyers provided wider angle photos of the same scenery, revealing healthy trees and greenspaces located in the same vistas. What had allegedly been presented by CBD as barren images caused by overgrazing were shown to be campsite areas used by hunters, and a parking lot used for an annual festival. The jury was persuaded the CBD photos had been misleading.[9] Only $100,000 of the judgment was for actual harm inflicted on Chilton and his cattle company. The jury tacked on $500,000 in punitive damages, which a newspaper account said was the jury's intent to “punish [CBD] and deter others from similar libel.” CBD, asserting the representations were protected under the First Amendment, unsuccessfully tried to have the decision appealed and lost, forcing CBD and its insurance company to pay the judgment.[10]
On 13 June 2007, the Center spoke out against a George W. Bush administration proposal to reduce the protected area for the spotted owl in the United States Pacific Northwest. According to Noah Greenwald, the group's representative in the Northwest, the proposed habitat cut is "typical of an administration that is looking to reduce protections for endangered species at every turn." Greenwald said that the rollback is part of a series of "sweetheart deals," in which the administration settles an environmental lawsuit out of court and, "at the industry's wishes, reduces the critical habitat." According to the center, the move conforms to a broad trend that includes at least 25 earlier Bush administration decisions on habitat protections for endangered species. In those cases, the protected areas were reduced an average of 36 percent.[11][needs update]
On 16 December 2008, the center announced intent to sue the United States government for introducing "regulations ... that would eviscerate our nation’s most successful wildlife law by exempting thousands of federal activities, including those that generate greenhouse gases, from review under the Endangered Species Act." The lawsuit, which is critical of U.S. Interior DepartmentSecretary Dirk Kempthorne and President George W. Bush, was filed in the Northern District of California by the center, Greenpeace and Defenders of Wildlife. According to the center, "The lawsuit argues that the regulations violate the Endangered Species Act and did not go through the required public review process. The regulations, first proposed on August 11, were rushed by the Bush administration through an abbreviated process in which more than 300,000 comments from the public were reviewed in 2-3 weeks, and environmental impacts were analyzed in a short and cursory environmental assessment, rather than a fuller environmental impact statement."[12][non-primary source needed][needs update]
In 2015, the Center partnered with Conservation CATalyst to release their video of El Jefe, among the last jaguars residing in the United States.[13] This video was seen by over 100 million people and brought attention to their conservation needs.
In 2019, the Center sued the U.S. Department of Agriculture's Wildlife Services program over its killing of thousands of native animals a year in Washington state.[14] Later, in 2020, the case resulted in a determination that Washington State had exceeded its authority and that bear hunting must be curtailed.[15]
↑ Silver, Robin (March 16, 1993). "Federal Register Listing Notice"(PDF). Center for Biological Diversity. Archived(PDF) from the original on 2021-08-13. Retrieved August 13, 2021.
Brisbane Water National Park is a national park on the Central Coast of New South Wales, Australia. The national park is situated 70 kilometres (43 mi) north of Sydney and 12 kilometres (7.5 mi) southwest of Gosford. It consists the Brisbane Water and Mooney Mooney Creek waterways.
This is an index of conservation topics. It is an alphabetical index of articles relating to conservation biology and conservation of the natural environment.
The northern flying squirrel is one of three species of the genus Glaucomys, the only flying squirrels found in North America. They are found in coniferous and mixed coniferous forests across much of Canada, from Alaska to Nova Scotia, and south to the mountains of North Carolina and west to Utah in the United States. They are light brown with pale underparts and grow to a length of 25 to 37 cm. They are proficient gliders but uncoordinated walkers on the ground. They feed on a variety of plant material as well as tree sap, fungi, insects, carrion, bird eggs and nestlings. They mostly breed once a year in a cavity lined with lichen or other soft material. Except when they have young, they change nests frequently, and in winter a number of individuals may huddle together in a shared nest. Unlike most members of their family, flying squirrels are strictly nocturnal.
Dirk Arthur Kempthorne is an American politician who served as the 49th United States Secretary of the Interior from 2006 to 2009 under President George W. Bush. A member of the Republican Party, he previously served as a United States Senator from Idaho from 1993 to 1999 and the 30th governor of Idaho from 1999 to 2006.
The spotted owl is a species of true owl. It is a resident species of old-growth forests in western North America, where it nests in tree hollows, old bird of prey nests, or rock crevices. Nests can be between 12 and 60 metres high and usually contain two eggs. It is a nocturnal owl which feeds on small mammals and birds. Three subspecies are recognized, ranging in distribution from British Columbia to Mexico. The spotted owl is under pressure from habitat destruction throughout its range, and is currently classified as a near-threatened species.
The Endangered Species Act of 1973 is the primary law in the United States for protecting and conserving imperiled species. Designed to protect critically imperiled species from extinction as a "consequence of economic growth and development untempered by adequate concern and conservation", the ESA was signed into law by President Richard Nixon on December 28, 1973. The Supreme Court of the United States described it as "the most comprehensive legislation for the preservation of endangered species enacted by any nation". The purposes of the ESA are two-fold: to prevent extinction and to recover species to the point where the law's protections are not needed. It therefore "protect[s] species and the ecosystems upon which they depend" through different mechanisms. For example, section 4 requires the agencies overseeing the Act to designate imperiled species as threatened or endangered. Section 9 prohibits unlawful ‘take,’ of such species, which means to "harass, harm, hunt..." Section 7 directs federal agencies to use their authorities to help conserve listed species. The Act also serves as the enacting legislation to carry out the provisions outlined in The Convention on International Trade in Endangered Species of Wild Fauna and Flora (CITES). The Supreme Court found that "the plain intent of Congress in enacting" the ESA "was to halt and reverse the trend toward species extinction, whatever the cost." The Act is administered by two federal agencies, the United States Fish and Wildlife Service (FWS) and the National Marine Fisheries Service (NMFS). FWS and NMFS have been delegated by the Act with the authority to promulgate any rules and guidelines within the Code of Federal Regulations (CFR) to implement its provisions.
Wildlife conservation refers to the practice of protecting wild species and their habitats in order to maintain healthy wildlife species or populations and to restore, protect or enhance natural ecosystems. Major threats to wildlife include habitat destruction, degradation, fragmentation, overexploitation, poaching, pollution, climate change, and the illegal wildlife trade. The IUCN estimates that 42,100 species of the ones assessed are at risk for extinction. Expanding to all existing species, a 2019 UN report on biodiversity put this estimate even higher at a million species. It is also being acknowledged that an increasing number of ecosystems on Earth containing endangered species are disappearing. To address these issues, there have been both national and international governmental efforts to preserve Earth's wildlife. Prominent conservation agreements include the 1973 Convention on International Trade in Endangered Species of Wild Fauna and Flora (CITES) and the 1992 Convention on Biological Diversity (CBD). There are also numerous nongovernmental organizations (NGO's) dedicated to conservation such as the Nature Conservancy, World Wildlife Fund, the Wild Animal Health Fund and Conservation International.
The delta smelt is an endangered slender-bodied smelt, about 5 to 7 cm long, in the family Osmeridae. Endemic to the upper Sacramento-San Joaquin Estuary of California, it mainly inhabits the freshwater-saltwater mixing zone of the estuary, except during its spawning season, when it migrates upstream to fresh water following winter "first flush" flow events. It functions as an indicator species for the overall health of the Delta's ecosystem.
The National Forest Management Act (NFMA) of 1976 is a United States federal law that is the primary statute governing the administration of national forests and was an amendment to the Forest and Rangeland Renewable Resources Planning Act of 1974, which called for the management of renewable resources on national forest lands. The law was a response to lawsuits involving various practices in the national forest, including timber harvesting., Zieske v Butz was the lawsuit brought by members of the Pt Baker Association on Prince of Wales Island against the US Forest Service's first environmental impact statement. The suit halted logging on the NW tip of the island which consisted of 400,000 acres and resulted in a call by the timber industry for Congressional action to undo the lawsuit. Representative Foley noted on the floor that six other suits were blocking logging with holdings similar to Zieske v Butz.
The northern spotted owl is one of three spotted owl subspecies. A western North American bird in the family Strigidae, genus Strix, it is a medium-sized dark brown owl native to the Pacific Northwest. An important indicator species, the northern spotted owl remains threatened due to continued population decline from human-caused habitat destruction and competition with invasive species, its main competitor being the barred owl.
Ironwood Forest National Monument is located in the Sonoran Desert of Arizona. Created by Bill Clinton by Presidential Proclamation 7320 on June 9, 2000, the monument is managed by the Bureau of Land Management, an agency within the United States Department of the Interior. The monument covers 129,055 acres (52,227 ha), of which 59,573 acres (24,108 ha) are non-federal and include private land holdings and Arizona State School Trust lands.
Umbrella species are species selected for making conservation-related decisions, typically because protecting these species indirectly protects the many other species that make up the ecological community of its habitat. Species conservation can be subjective because it is hard to determine the status of many species. The umbrella species is often either a flagship species whose conservation benefits other species or a keystone species which may be targeted for conservation due to its impact on an ecosystem. Umbrella species can be used to help select the locations of potential reserves, find the minimum size of these conservation areas or reserves, and to determine the composition, structure, and processes of ecosystems.
The Endangered Species Act (ESA) was first passed in 1973 and forms the basis of biodiversity and endangered species protection in the United States. The original purpose of the Endangered Species Act of 1973 was to prevent species endangerment and extinction due to the human impact on natural ecosystems. The three most powerful sections of the ESA are Sections 4, 7 and 9. Section 4 allows the Secretaries of Interior and Commerce to list species as threatened or endangered based on best available data. Section 7 requires federal agencies to consult with Fish and Wildlife Service (FWS) or National Marine Fisheries Service (NMFS) before taking any action that may threaten a listed species. Section 9 forbids the taking of an endangered species. The first amendment to the ESA was passed by the 95th United States Congress in 1978 to "introduce some flexibility into the Endangered Species Act".
The Northwest Forest Plan (NWFP) is a series of federal policies and guidelines governing land use on federal lands in the Pacific Northwest region of the United States. It covers 10 million hectares within Western Oregon and Washington, as well as a small part of Northern California.
The San Bernardino National Wildlife Refuge is located on the U.S.-Mexico border in Cochise County, Arizona. Situated at 3,720 to 3,920 feet (1,130–1,190 m) elevation in the bottom of a wide valley, the refuge encompasses a portion of the headwaters of the Yaqui River, which drains primarily western Chihuahua and eastern Sonora, Mexico. The 2,309-acre (9.34 km2) ranch was acquired by the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service in 1982 to protect the water resources and provide habitat for endangered native fishes.
The San Pedro Riparian National Conservation Area contains nearly 57,000 acres (23,000 ha) of public land in Cochise County, Arizona, between the international border with Mexico and St. David, Arizona. The riparian area, where some 40 miles (64 km) of the upper San Pedro River meanders, was, through the efforts of congressman Jim Kolbe, designated by Congress as a Riparian National Conservation Area on November 18, 1988, and assigned to the protection of the U.S. Bureau of Land Management (BLM).
The Kangaroo River Nature Reserve, part of the Kangaroo Valley Group of Nature Reserves, is a protected nature reserve that is located on the floor of the Kangaroo Valley in the Southern Highlands and South Coast regions of New South Wales in eastern Australia. The reserve is situated approximately 150 kilometres (93 mi) south of Sydney, 50 kilometres (31 mi) southwest of Wollongong and 16 kilometres (9.9 mi) northwest of Nowra. The reserve has a protective covenant placed upon it with purpose to ensure the protection of the natural heritage of this area. National parks in the area include the Morton National Park and the Budderoo National Park. Other nature reserves in the area include the Barren Grounds Nature Reserve, and the Cambewarra Range, Barrengarry and Rodway nature reserves – the latter three part of the Kangaroo Valley Group of Nature Reserves.
Kierán Suckling is one of the founders and the executive director of the Center for Biological Diversity, a nonprofit conservation group known for its innovative approaches to the protection of endangered species, wilderness, clean air and clean water.
Glenrock State Conservation Area is a protected conservation area located eight kilometres south of the central business district of Newcastle in the state of New South Wales, on the east coast of Australia. The park borders the coast and encompasses 534 hectares stretching from the residential suburbs of Merewether to Dudley within the Newcastle and Lake Macquarie Local Government Areas.
The environmental impacts of the Mexico–United States border are numerous, including the disposal of hazardous waste, increase of air pollution, threats to essential water resources, and ecosystem fragmentation.
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