Judge puts Nevada sage grouse back on track for threatened status

RENO — A U.S. judge has reinstated the proposed threatened species listing for a population of sage grouse in California and Nevada until a new review determines whether the bird is on the brink of extinction.

U.S. District Chief Magistrate Judge Joseph Spero in San Francisco also ordered on Friday reinstatement of the proposed designation of more than 2,800 square miles of critical habitat along the eastern Sierra Nevada.

Spero said in a ruling in May the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service ignored its own best scientific evidence when it reversed course three years ago on its 2013 proposal to declare the bi-state grouse as threatened under the Endangered Species Act.

His latest ruling gives the agency until Oct. 1, 2019, to publish a new final listing determination in the Federal Register.

There is a dwindling number of bi-state sage grouse along the California-Nevada line in the Mono Basin. They’re related to but distinct from the greater sage grouse, which lives in a dozen Western states and is at the center of a dispute over Trump administration efforts to roll back protections adopted under former President Barack Obama.

Leaders of three conservation groups who sued to protect the bi-state grouse said the ruling could help save the ground-dwelling bird as well as other species with distinct population segments isolated from larger, related populations.

“This important victory reinstates crucial protections for these beleaguered birds while a new listing decision is made,” said Lisa Belenky, senior attorney for the Center for Biological Diversity in Oakland, California.

The broader part of the new ruling rejects the agency’s view that federal listings are not warranted for subpopulations unless the whole species is threatened across “a significant portion of its range.”

A spokesman for the fish and wildlife service, Gavin Shire, said, “We are considering next steps in light of the court’s decision.”

Designating critical habitat for the bi-state sage grouse could eventually bring new restrictions on a wide variety of development in the Mono Basin, from Carson City to south of Tonopah and Bishop, California — an area bigger than the state of Delaware.

The state of Nevada, Nevada Association of Counties and Mono County of California had filed as defendant-intervenors in support of the agency’s decision to withdraw its listing proposal three years ago.

Monica Moazez, spokeswoman for Nevada Attorney General Adam Laxalt, said in an email they are “reviewing the judge’s order and evaluating our options.”