Editorial: Protection or shell game?

Monday, Feb. 12, 2007 | 7:14 a.m.

Part of the Bush administration's 2007 Interior Department budget includes $22 million for wildlife habitat restoration in Nevada and other states that critics say is nothing more than a poorly veiled attempt to continue drilling for oil and gas throughout the West.

According to a story by the Las Vegas Sun on Thursday, the number of drilling permits issued on federal land has doubled under the Bush administration, which says increased production is necessary to wean the United States off of foreign oil.

Still, one public lands expert told the Sun's Lisa Mascaro, the $22 million in this current budget is too little and comes too late to make any real strides in habitat restoration. Wildlife experts contend that the $1.9 million going to Nevada, Oregon and western Idaho to restore 23,000 acres of habitat for the sage grouse, a ground-nesting bird that is being considered for endangered species designation, is disproportionate. In contrast, millions of acres of habitat for the sage grouse and other species are being drilled in other Western states, five of which would share just $13.1 million of the proposed restoration funding.

Nonetheless, Interior Department Secretary Dick Kempthorne is making grand public overtures about saving areas of the bird's habitat in Nevada, Oregon and Idaho. Critics, such as Erik Molvar, a wildlife biologist with the Biodiversity Conservation Alliance in Wyoming, say these declarations are designed to steer public attention away from widespread habitat degradation in other areas and help prevent the bird from being listed as an endangered species.

Oil and gas drilling is performed on 12 million acres across the West, while another 24 million acres have been approved for drilling, the Sun reports. Endangered species listing for the sage grouse could endanger future drilling in these remote areas - drilling that experts say segregates wildlife corridors and degrades air and water quality.

The Bush administration's proposal to restore only a fraction of the remote and fragile habitats that have been damaged won't cut it - especially because much of this land never should have been opened to drilling in the first place.