Boxer calls out Interior Department (Endangered Species Act)

[babylonsister]

Boxer calls out Interior Department
By J. Taylor Rushing
Posted: 08/15/08 05:08 PM


Sen. Barbara Boxer (D-Calif.) on Friday requested Interior Secretary Dirk Kempthorne attend Senate oversight hearings next month on the White House’s plans to relax parts of the Endangered Species Act.

Boxer wrote Kempthorne to ask the Bush administration drop its proposal to relax a requirement that federal agencies consult with the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service or the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration anytime before they undertake any action that could affect an endangered species. News of the administration’s proposal leaked out within the past week, prompting Interior officials to take a defensive posture.

Boxer asked Kempthorne to testify at a Sept. 24 Environment and Public Works Committee hearing, to schedule public hearings on the proposal, and to extend a period for public input from one month to six months. Boxer chairs the EPW committee.

“The proposed regulations greatly undermine the Act’s purpose to conserve endangered and threatened species and appear to contravene the plain language of the Act,” Boxer wrote Kempthorne. “I urge you to discontinue further action on this proposal.”

Boxer also accused the Interior Department of trying to push through the changes before the November election and without congressional approval.

“By proposing these considerable changes with only a short time remaining in the Administration’s term, your office appears to be attempting, in effect, to make changes to the Endangered Species Act that the Administration has been unable to achieve through legislation,” Boxer wrote.

more...

http://thehill.com/leading-the-news/boxer-calls-out-interior-department-2008-08-15.html

[texastoast]

1. Go Barbara!

And may you be our president one day.

:kick:

[G_j]

2. Thank you Barbara! n/t

[Muttocracy]

3. go Boxer! nt

[HCE SuiGeneris]

4. The looting continues.

A good use for all of the new prison camps springs to mind...

[Trillo]

5. It seems the entire per capita size of the Executive Branch

has vastly grown relative to the Legislative Branch versus a couple hundred years ago.

Edited to add that if increased regulation of corporations is the only way to go as most Democrats seem to say, then how can the Executive Branch be entrusted to enforce such Legislation?