Protect the Indiana Bat! Stop this land swap!

[Dave Jackson]

Protect the federally endangered Indiana bat and gray bat! Say no to a land-for-land exchange between American Land Holdings of Illinois, LLC (i.e. Peabody Coal) and the Shawnee National Forest. Sign this easy-to-use petition created by the Illinois Chapter of the Sierra Club: https://secure.sierraclub.org/site/Advocacy?cmd=display&page=UserAction&id=7714

I'm posting this here in Everything Bats. If people think it's worthy of posting on the main forum, let me know and I'll put it up there.

Thanks,
Dave, the CaveSim dude

[wyandottecaver]

We certainly DO need to petition........Funny how they don't mention the size or quality of the parcel the FS is getting. Also, I think it entirely appropriate to let Peabody Coal be the suckers err conservators of this Indiana and Gray bat habitat at THEIR expense not ours. They will in fact probably have to protect additional land beyond their FS swap, and fund research to compensate for any habitat they might destroy. Win Win. They also didnt do their homework. The FS isnt violating the ESA, they are simply transferring the burden of compliance to Peabody.

*edit*
The FS would trade 384 acres for 831 acres. The new parcels include a 80 acre inholding inside the Lusk Creek Wilderness, and 270 acres abutting the Mississippi river and fountain bluff, a Hertiage Resource. The other 481 acre parcel lies along the Wild and Scenic corridor of Lusk Creek. These parcels will also connect currently isolated FS tracts and add to a 3000 acre block managed for interior forest species.

Again, not sure this is a bad trade......

[Dave Jackson]

I definitely understand where you're coming from on this, but here's the trouble, as I see it: being unconcerned about the swap (or even thinking that it's a good thing) assumes that Peabody Coal will act responsibly and comply with ESA, rather than skirting the law in every conceivable way. How many times has the general public assumed that because there are laws in place, companies will obey those laws, rather than breaking them and paying proportionately small fines after the fact? This is the reason that we are forced to resort to things like the Superfund. Here's a simple way to think about this: it is the job of Peabody Coal to do everything in their power to destroy whatever they need to destroy to earn money. It is their job to find every possible loophole in laws to enable them to earn as much as possible. To balance this massive force, it makes sense for people who care about bats to do what they can to prevent Peabody from having the chance to destroy endangered bats.

I'm also concerned about the idea that it will be a good thing for Peabody to "fund research to compensate for any habitat they might destroy." This looks like a Faustian bargain. This implies that it's fine to kill or further endanger endangered bats as long as money is provided to increase our human understanding. Very dangerous and flawed science, medicine and engineering are based on such ideas. In the past, species and artifacts have been entirely wiped out in the name of understanding them better. We often learn later that our methods and understanding at the time were primitive, and we are left with a weak understanding of an extinct species or destroyed artifact. It is my belief that we would benefit by thinking about the quote from medical ethics, "First, do no harm."

I should close by saying that I don't mean any offense with these comments, I'm just looking at this a little differently. Let me know what you think.

[wyandottecaver]

well I certainly see your argument. But even if Peabody screws that area up, we still have placed 2X the area into protected ownership. I am not happy about some aspects of the deal, and so maybe the deal could be better...(keeping the mineral rights and letting the FS log it first) but if the Sierra club is really that worried, perhaps they should be buying land to trade....