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. . I' Wednesday, May 9: 1990 The Dai';s~:;~~~i'p~~e 4A Commentary Daily Sentinel editorials Trash decision .J so, more than 20 years worth of concerted ef- . fort, millions of dollars and the dreams of thousands of native Americans and oth- ers living in the Four Corners region are to be dashed for the mistaken purpose of at- tempting to preserve two doz- en known squawfish in the San Juan River in northern New Mexico. ~ The U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service's jeopardy opinion Tuesday that the Animas-La Plata water project should be shelved in order to preserve the San Juan River as a ha- ven for squawfish and per- haps other endangered fish effectively scuttles the . project, ' " ' ... Make no mistake about it. The U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service doesn't merely want to study the project's effects on endangered fish species like the squawfish, once con- sidered a "trash fish." Now the same agency that once spent thousands of dollars at- tempting to kill the squaw- fish is out to kill a water project that allegedly threat- ens the same fish's continued existence. It means little to federal . wildlife officers that the San Juan is not the only waterway in which the" squawfish ex- ists.; It means little to federal aut40rities that the species is bejl)g successfully bred in fish hatcheries'. It also nieans little that the multimillion- dollar project would, bring' precious water to thirsty' fields and municipalities in the Four Corners area. And, more so than anything else, it means little to the theocrats that the projeet would redeem nearly a century, of the federal government's failed responsibility to pro- vide water to the Ute Indian tribes in southern Colorado. In the name of an ecologi- cal fundamentalism as rigid as it is shortsighted, Animas- La Plata is to be abandoned. This is not a matter of making a difficult decision in a last- ditch effort to save a rare fish species from extinction. Nor is it a" matter of saving a peer- less natural resource such as the South Platte River Can- yon from destruction. But rather, the questionable val- ue of maintaining one partic- ular fish in one particular place is being given a higher priority than the desire of human beings to enjoy the amenity of running water. Such skewed logic cannot go unchallenged. Gov. Roy Romer says he may seek an exemption from the jeopardy ruling from a special federal appeals panel. The governor should follow through on that. The squawfish isn't threatened with extinction. Common sense is.