Gnatcatcher Gets New Chance for Protection : Environment: A judge orders the Fish and Game Commission to provide better evidence on why the songbird should not be on the endangered species list.

In a victory for environmentalists, a Superior Court judge has ruled that the state Fish and Game Commission did not come up with good enough reasons for denying endangered-species protection to a rare Southern California songbird.

Sacramento County Superior Court Judge William R. Ridgeway ordered the state wildlife board to come up with legally defensible evidence for not naming the California gnatcatcher a candidate for the state’s endangered species list.

The commission gave “no hint of the reasoning used or the evidence relied upon” when it voted down the gnatcatcher request last year and must now “prepare and adopt (new) findings,” Ridgeway wrote.

The decision, which was issued Friday but did not reach the attorneys on the case until Monday, is the latest twist in a battle among environmentalists and powerful Southern California builders over the fate of a tiny bird that nests in canyon sagebrush in Orange, San Diego and western Riverside counties, as well as on the Palos Verdes Peninsula.

The ruling does not overturn the Fish and Game Commission’s controversial decision, made a year ago. But an attorney for the Natural Resources Defense Council, a national environmental group that sued the commission, hailed it as a major victory and predicted that it will ultimately force the panel to change its mind.

“If the commission is determined to be an outlaw, it will reach the same decision again,” said NRDC senior attorney Joel Reynolds. “But if it intends to comply with this order, it’s my view that it will have to accept the petition to list the gnatcatcher.”

But officials from the building industry said they did not necessarily consider the decision bad news.

“This decision is not a blow to us. I would have loved them to tell the NRDC to go packing, but this ruling is the next best thing,” said Laer Pearce, executive director of a coalition of 10 Southern California developers involved in gnatcatcher issues, including the Irvine Co., the Santa Margarita Co. and the Baldwin Co.

Pearce added that builders are confident the commission will stick with its decision, and simply file new, better-documented findings to support it.

“The court did not say the commission made the wrong decision; it just said they did not have good documentation,” he said. “The court wanted to see more documentation. . . . Given the strengths of our arguments, very strong findings can be written to justify it.”

Bob Treanor, the commission’s executive director, offered no comment Monday. He said he would not know until next week whether the commission, which next meets on Oct. 1, will schedule a new gnatcatcher hearing.

Environmentalists and wildlife biologists argue that rampant development has destroyed nearly all of the bird’s nesting grounds. They have petitioned both the state and U.S. Department of the Interior for endangered species protection.

But builders have been fighting to forestall such a listing on both levels of government, and they have enlisted the aid of the Wilson Administration.

The building industry maintains that the bird is not endangered because large swaths of coastal sage scrub--about 100 square miles--remain protected as parkland, especially in Orange County. They also say Baja California contains large numbers of gnatcatchers, although most ornithologists say the Mexican birds are not the same sub-species as the variety found in Southern California.

Developers say a listing would effectively cost billions of dollars in delays or ruined plans for hundreds of roads and housing developments.

Because the economic stakes are so high, the decision over the bird was among the most controversial species decisions that the state wildlife commission has faced in years.

The gnatcatcher fight came to a head last August, when the commission considered whether to recommend the bird for listing as an endangered species. The director of the state Department of Fish and Game and his staff of biologists recommended a yes vote.

Yet the commission went against its staff’s advice and voted 3 to 1 to reject the gnatcatcher as a candidate. The vote came after a Wilson Administration official pleaded with the panel to hold off and allow him to work on a new program that would encourage developers to set aside tracts of coastal sage scrub voluntarily.

If the board reconsiders and declares the gnatcatcher an endangered species candidate, its nesting grounds would be protected for at least one year while state officials further research the issue for a final decision.

Meanwhile, U.S. wildlife officials face a Sept. 17 deadline for deciding whether federal listing of the bird is warranted.

The California Gnatcatcher

The California gnatcatcher is found on sagebrush mesas and dry coastal slopes from Southern California to northern Baja California. It has a distinctive call, a rising and falling, kitten-like mew. Only about 4 1/2 inches in length, the gnatcatcher is brown on top, with lighter-colored feathers underneath and a long black tail. It has been considered for listing as an endangered species.

Source: County of Orange