ORANGE COUNTY PERSPECTIVE : Get Moving on the Gnatcatcher

When it was proposed last year, Gov. Pete Wilson’s plan to enlist developers and environmentalists in a cooperative effort to set aside tracts of land as habitat for the California gnatcatcher seemed like a good idea. But the plan, promised by state Undersecretary of Resources Michael Mantell, has been too slow in getting off the mark. Habitat is disappearing and supporters are jumping ship.

Last summer, Mantell persuaded the state Fish and Game Commission not to list the tiny songbird as an endangered species so that his program could have a chance to work. That seemed fair enough. A number of credible developers and environmentalists, including the Irvine Co. and the Nature Conservancy, were lending support.

And there was good reason to give the plan a try. It offered a sensible approach to habitat preservation. Instead of the tedious species-by-species listing, it proposed an innovative way of letting everybody know up front what land would be set aside and what would be open to development.

But in recent weeks, the plan has begun to come unglued.

The Natural Resources Defense Council, one of three environmental groups to sign on, resigned from a panel that was trying to agree on strategy. It expressed frustration that after nearly five months, no protections had been set in place or even proposed.

Then the Endangered Habitats League, a Southern California coalition of 30 environmental groups, petitioned the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service for immediate protection for the gnatcatcher on the ground that thousands of acres of habitat are at risk of being developed. In taking the petition under consideration, the service took note of “big pieces of gnatcatcher habitat that have gone or are going” in Southern California, even since last fall.

While the service has a hearing scheduled for today, the governor’s effort plods along. There are plans to begin distributing guidelines this week for studying the gnatcatcher. But time is wasting. The program will have to show real signs of progress soon or the pressure will continue to mount for endangered species listing for the gnatcatcher.