Archives of The Cold Blooded News

The Newsletter of the Colorado Herpetological Society

Volume 30, Number 9;   September, 2003

Off Road Vehicle Groups File Suit

by Desiree Wong

"Just because we drive an off-road vehicle doesn't mean we don't care. That's bunk," said Brian Hawthorne, director of Utah Shared Access Alliance (USA-ALL). Hawthorne's group has joined with the American Motorcycle Association District 37, the Off-Road Business Association, the California Off-Road Vehicle Association, and the San Diego Off-Road Coalition in filing a lawsuit Wednesday in U.S. District Court in Utah against the Department of Interior, the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service and the Bureau of Land Management.

David Hubbard, a California attorney for the off-road groups, says the federal agencies efforts to save the tortoise have been an "abject failure," and he is hoping the lawsuit will force a re-evaluation of the government's methods to restore tortoise populations, including the standard practice of closing off areas to livestock and humans. "Considering that tortoise populations have plummeted ever since habitat areas were closed off to humans, it stands to reason that humans were not the reason the tortoises were headed toward extinction in the first place," he said.

The lawsuit contends the main reason tortoise populations are falling is the government's failure to take reasonable steps to stop the spread of Upper Respiratory Tract Disease, the primary cause of the dramatic decline in the desert tortoise. And the second reason is that ravens eat baby tortoises, making it nigh impossible for the species to perpetuate itself.

"We hope the suit will shake them a bit," Hubbard said. "The Endangered Species Act is not effective at (species recovery). We think you can still have mountain biking, cattle and vehicles on the land because when you have these human activities it is easier to manage for the species," he added. "This will spark a debate." Conservationists got a chuckle out of the reasoning behind the legal strategy.

"I'd be willing to bet my next paycheck that the tortoise population certainly isn't going to benefit by getting run over by off-road vehicles or losing its food source to ORVs," said Heidi McIntosh, conservation director with Southern Utah Wilderness Alliance. "This is not a happy marriage." On the other hand, "I give them an A-plus for creativity," McIntosh said.

BLM officials were unavailable for comment.