Efforts To Update ESA Continue In D.C.

The Endangered Species Act is currently under review by the House Natural Resources Committee, with new legislation aimed at updating a law that has seen few significant changes since its passage in 1973.  House Natural Resources Committee member, Montana Republic, Troy Downing said reform is long overdue.

“One of the problems with the Endangered Species Act, as I understand, none of us want to see any threatened species going extinct, but it's become the Hotel California," Downing said.  "You can check in any time you want, but you can never leave.  And so, we've really seen that in Montana with the grizzly population. We've seen it reach its numbers. We've seen it exceed that numbers. We've continued to see so many issues. And nobody's saying that we want to eliminate protections where protections are due, but that's reached that number. The scientists all that.  We 've gone past that so let's give the states the power to do the right thing and manage those in the state.”

Nobody's Throwing The ESA Away

The goal of revisiting the Endangered Species Act, Downing noted, is not to change the legislation, but to meet the needs of its intentions.

“You know, nobody's saying throw the program away. We just need to be open to revising it so that it's actually meeting the needs of its original intentions and not creating undue stress, loss, damage, harm to our farmers and ranchers," he said.  "So I'm really happy that we're going to see this get to the floor, and I'm very hopeful that we get it passed and get it to the president's desk.” 

The new legislation does have bipartisan support in the House Natural Resources Committee, with hopes of carrying that momentum into the Senate.

“We expect to see it on the House floor shortly. We had a couple of Democrats sign on to this in committee," Downing said.  "So, if we can get this passed with some bipartisanship in the House, that's a good indication that we can get the 60 votes we need in the Senate and get this to the president's desk.” 

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