Resources Chairman James V. Hansen's Remarks for 02-16-02 Grand Island, NE Hearing

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STATE OF NEBRASKA Mike Johann Governor DEPARTMENT OF NATURAL RESOURCES Roger K. Patterson Director August 10, 2001 IN REPLY REFER TO: Nell McPhillips South Dakota Ecological Services Field Office U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service 420 South Garfield Avenue, Suite 400 Pierre, SD 57501 RE: Proposed Designation of Critical Habitat for the Northern Great Plains Breeding Population of the Piping Plover [66 Fed. Reg. 31760 (June 12, 2001)] Dear Ms. McPhillips: On June 12, 2001, the United States Fish and Wildlife Service ( USFWS) published in the Federal Register its "Proposed Designation of Critical Habitat for the Northern Great Plains Breeding Population of the Piping Plover" (Proposed Designation). According to the Federal Register Notice, the deadline for submitting comments on the proposal is August 13, 2001. The notice which was published in the Federal Register was inadequate in a number of ways. That notice included only a single large -scale map of Nebraska and legal descriptions of parcels proposed to be designated. It would be impossible for a land owner to know if they would be affected by the Proposed Designation based on the large scale and large tracts identified in the notice. Obviously critical habitat does not fit neatly into the rectangular grid system of land surveys. The notice attempts to cure this inadequacy by stating that the critical habitat does not include "developed areas" and "other lands ... unlikely to contain primary constituent elements." However the Proposed Designation provides no information as to the location of these excluded areas. In the absence of more precise information as to the actual and specific lands to be identified as critical habitat it is difficult to comment on the Proposed Designation. On Wednesday, July 18, 2001, a public informational meeting was held by USFWS staff in Grand Island, Nebraska regarding the Proposed Designation. At that meeting-there were numerous maps and aerial photographs delineating areas along the Platte, Loup and Niobrara Rivers in Nebraska as piping plover critical habitat. It was explained that all of the land lying within the general delineations would not be the actual critical habitat but only those which met certain criteria. Questions to your staff at the meeting were generally answered by pointing to a specific tract or island and saying "that could be critical habitat" and pointing to another and clrshare /patterson 301 Centennial Mall South, 4th Floor • P.O. Box 94676 • Lincoln, Nebraska 68509 -4676 • Phone (402) 471 -2363 a Telefax (402) 471 -2900 An Equal OpportunitplAffirmative Action Employer . & Printed with eoy ink on recycled paper