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Butler’s Garter Snake to Remain Protected
Species
On November 28, the Joint Committee for the
Review of Administrative Rules (JCRAR) overturned previous delisting
motions, keeping endangered species protections in place for the
Butler's garter snake. In rescinding its earlier votes, the JCRAR
also eliminated the implications of this potentially
precedent setting delisting of a protected species for any economic
or political reasons.
On July 18, JCRAR held a little-publicized hearing at which they
voted to suspend the rule that gives protection to Butler’s
garter snake as a State Threatened Species (see
the 7/18 motion here) unless the Department of Natural Resources
met certain conditions set by the committee. At a follow-up
hearing on September 27, the committee revised their earlier
motion while keeping the original intent (see
the 9/27 motion here). As a result of this second hearing,
the species was scheduled to be removed from the list at the
end of November unless the Department of Natural Resources
returned to the committee with a revised—and watered-down—protection
plan by that time.
This snake, which occurs in Southeastern
Wisconsin, has had protected status in Wisconsin since 1997.
No experts believe that there is any scientific basis for removing
it from the State Threatened Species list; thus, the recent
move by the legislature was motivated purely by politics and
economics. If the species had been delisted, it would have been
the first time that any state legislature in the country had
overturned a protective listing of a state environmental agency.
Because it set such a critical precedent, and
because several land trusts were very actively involved in
fighting the delisting, Gathering Waters Conservancy sent a
letter to the committee opposing the delisting of Butler’s
garter snake on behalf of Wisconsin’s land trust community.
Gathering Waters Conservancy would like to thank
all those individuals who contacted their
JCRAR members on behalf of this important issue.
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