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OOi3;i~ PREBLE'S MEADOW JUMPING MOUSE COLLABORA TIYE PLANNING PROCESS <-"")o"''? ./f'o 6o/l,~_ Summary prepared for November 14, 1997 ESA Conference The Preble's meadow jumping mouse (PMJM) has been proposed by the US Fish and Wildlife Service (US FWS) for listing as an endangered species under the federal Endangered Species Act (ESA), From Colorado Springs, Colorado north to Cheyenne, Wyoming, the PMJM inhabits riparian areas associated with the many large and small streams that emerge from the Front Range to flow out onto the plains, Roughly 80% percent of Colorado residents live in this same geographic area, Once relatively abundant, PMJM populations have declined significantly, This decline is probably due to habitat degradation and fragmentation resulting from all manner of land use changes and mineral and water development activities within the mouse's historic range. The proposed rule to list the PMJM cites numerous activities potentially subject to regulation should the listing proposal be made final. These activities include everything from grazing to gravel mining, recreational trail construction to highway development, and home-building to golf course construction, With limited resources within the US FWS's Colorado Field Office, listing and the subsequent regulation of these and other activities could lead to delay, high permitting costs, and inevitable and non-productive conflict between wildlife conservation and the economic and leisure activities of two million people, In November, 1995, Governor Roy Romer and Interior Secretary Bruce Babbitt signed a Memorandum of Agreement Concerning Colorado's Declining Native Species (MOA). This MOA commits state and federal wildlife and habitat management agencies to work in a coordinated fashion to conserve Colorado's declining native species, including both species that have been listed under the ESA and species whose populations are declining but which have not yet been added to the endangered species list. The MOA also commits state and federal agencies to establish a cooperative framework within which local governments and people in the private sector can voluntarily contribute to the conservation of Colorado's declining native species, Within the framework established by the MOA, the Colorado Department of Natural Resources is working with the USFWS to foster a collaborative planning process regarding the PMJM before the USFWS is required to make a final listing decision, The goal of this process is to produce a plan and associate' entin agreements that will either obviate the need to list the PMJM in the first Rlace, or if listing occurs, provide the framework Wit -inWniCli various ESA - related regulatory reguirements can be met efficiently and in a broadly supported manner, The intent IS to protect the PMJM and its 'nabitat collaboratively and therebxrender the regulatory effects oflheliSting on private ente'l'rise and publiC decision-mllking..as_unobtrusive,as.possibk, In addition to $1 OO,O.O'Ocontributions each from the State of Colorado and local government / private sector collaborators, Congress has appropriated $400,000 to help fund the planning process. '\ Complex patterns of property ownership and political jurisdictions within the PMJM historic range make the collaborative planning effort both imperative as well as challenging. Two federal facilities in Colorado -- the Rocky Flats Environmental Technology Site and the Air Force Academy -- and one federal facility in Wyoming -- F,E. Warren Air Force Base -- are important features of this ownership and jurisdictional setting. These facilities will likely play an important role in the overall plan to conserve the PMJM and its habitat. With PMJM habitat secured on federal facilities, the planning process will have to determine how much habitat on other protected lands and on private lands is necessary, Then the planning process will have to determine how to equitably and efficiently secure this remaining habitat. Permits for individual actions that might affect the PMJM or its habitat would then be issued consistent with this plan.