Emergency Protection Sought for Gnatcatcher : Wildlife: Environmentalists fear that grading is about to begin for tollway in Laguna Greenbelt, so they ask for immediate listing of songbird as an endangered species in order to halt the work.

Fearing that Orange County road builders are about to begin bulldozing the Laguna Greenbelt for the San Joaquin Hills tollway, environmentalists on Thursday asked federal officials for emergency protection of the California gnatcatcher.

The U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service is due to decide whether to list the tiny songbird as endangered within six weeks. But environmentalists say that may be too late, so they want an immediate, emergency listing.

“We have reliable information that they are about to proceed with grading for the toll road from Laguna Canyon Road to Newport Coast Road,” said Joel Reynolds, a senior attorney with the Natural Resources Defense Council, a national environmental group that is leading efforts to protect the bird.

“That’s the entire length of the Laguna Greenbelt, through one of the best remaining areas of coastal sage scrub in Orange County, so we don’t think we have any choice but to file for an emergency listing.”

Mike Stockstill, a spokesman for the Transportation Corridor Agencies, the county agency planning Orange County’s tollways, called the latest action “a hysterical attempt to create fact from fiction” because the plans for the road were made a long time ago.

He said in a statement that construction of the actual road is scheduled to begin “by the end of the first quarter” of this year.

But when he was asked when grading would begin, Stockstill declined to say. “I’m not going to answer questions,” he said.

John Fay, chief of endangered species listing for the federal wildlife agency, told The Times on Thursday that the decision whether to grant emergency listing “could easily be made within a week.” If granted, it would provide immediate protection of the bird for up to 240 days.

Fay said his staff must decide whether grading for the six-lane tollway, combined with other recent construction, would pose a “significant risk to the well-being” of the gnatcatcher. If so, he said, “we are virtually required to take emergency action.”

The decision could go either way, since the law gives the wildlife service considerable leeway in determining whether the risk to a species is significant. Emergency listings are fairly rare; only 12 have been granted in the United States in the past 15 years.

Fay said the wildlife service’s Southern California supervisor will probably ask the tollway agency to provide details of when it plans to grade. “If left in the position of uncertainty, we’ll assume the worst,” he said.

The federal agency rejected a similar request for emergency listing of the gnatcatcher two years ago, but since then at least 2,000 acres of coastal sage scrub have been graded. Environmentalists also hope they have a better shot this time because the Clinton Administration seems more sympathetic to endangered species issues than the Bush Administration was.

The gnatcatcher, one of the smallest birds in North America, nests only in coastal sage scrub, a depleted mix of sagebrush and other plants that grows in Orange, San Diego, Riverside and San Bernardino counties as well as the Palos Verdes Peninsula.

Top officials within the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service have told The Times that they plan to declare the bird endangered, most likely in the final days before their March 17 deadline. Once listed, projects that damage its habitat are halted, and bulldozers cannot proceed without the federal agency’s approval.

Southern California developers and builders have waged an intense battle against the listing, saying that the scientific data on the bird is flawed. They say the bird is not imperiled because development has slowed considerably and large parcels of its habitat have already been protected in wilderness parks.

Federal as well as independent wildlife biologists say the Laguna Greenbelt, located in the coastal mountains between Laguna Beach, Newport Beach and Irvine, provides some of Southern California’s richest nesting grounds for the gnatcatcher.

The 17.5-mile San Joaquin Hills tollway would damage about 150 acres of coastal sage scrub occupied by about 40 gnatcatchers, according to a field study by Jones & Stokes Associates, a consulting firm hired by Orange County. An estimated 2,000 to 3,000 pairs of the birds exist.

The environmentalists say an emergency listing is also justified because the county agency has graded the path of another tollway, the Foothill Transportation Corridor. Last week, 10 to 15 acres of coastal sage scrub at O’Neill Regional Park near Mission Viejo were bulldozed for that road, which will cut through Orange County’s eastern foothills.

In its letter to the wildlife service’s Washington headquarters, the environmental group asked for emergency protection throughout the bird’s range in Southern California, or at least along the paths of the two Orange County tollway projects.

The San Joaquin tollway would link the Corona del Mar Freeway in Newport Beach with Interstate 5 in San Juan Capistrano, cutting through the coastal hills and canyons from Newport Coast Drive to Laguna Canyon Road.

County road builders say the $1-billion tollway is necessary to alleviate traffic jams along the San Diego Freeway, especially through Newport Beach, Aliso Viejo and Laguna Beach. They also say it will provide needed jobs for the area.

Environmentalist Terry Watt said a planning consultant working for the tollway agency told a source of hers that grading will begin in the next few weeks in order to remove gnatcatchers before the listing decision is made in March. In a letter filed Thursday with the federal agency, Watt said her two sources have asked to “remain anonymous.”

In a written statement, Stockstill said his tollway agency has already received county, state and federal approval to build both roads. It has agreed to spend $21 million on ecological improvements to try to compensate for the San Joaquin Hills tollway’s damage, including creation of some new coastal sage scrub.

“As required by law, the TCA will fully mitigate the impact of corridor construction. . . . In fact, plans for the corridor have been developed on the assumption that the gnatcatcher could be listed,” Stockstill wrote.

County Environmental Management Agency Director Mike Ruane also said the tollway agency has obtained all necessary environmental and grading permits for both tollways, so the work can legally begin at any time.

Reynolds, however, said the grading would show “flagrant bad faith” by the county tollway agency, since it comes so close to the federal agency’s decision. He contends that the county agency also needs an approved plan to control runoff before grading can begin.

The tollway is controversial not just because of its impact on gnatcatchers, but because it would bisect the large, lush greenbelt that has long inspired passionate emotions and protests, particularly in Laguna Beach.

After 7,500 people turned out in 1989 to protest a planned housing development in the greenbelt, city and county officials recently bought over 2,000 acres from the Irvine Co. for $78 million. It is now being turned into a large regional park named Laguna Coast Wilderness Park, through which the tollway would run.

Some animals and plants are granted emergency listing only when the entire species is in imminent danger of being wiped out, but Fay said that is not a requirement.

“It doesn’t have to pose a risk of imminent extinction. It’s much less rigorous than that,” Fay said. “We would be looking at what would happen in the next six weeks and whether anything is likely to happen that will seriously compromise our ability to preserve the species.”

Local builders accuse the environmentalists of just using the gnatcatcher as an excuse to stop the controversial tollway. Environmentalists have filed three lawsuits seeking to block its construction.

Times staff writer Jeffrey A. Perlman contributed to this report.

Tollway Vs. Gnatcatchers The proposed San Joaquin Hills tollway would damage about 150 acres of coastal sage scrub, the type of habitat in which the California gnatcatcher nests. This most controversial segment of the road is home to an estimated 43 gnatcatchers. The bird is under consideration for endangered species protection, with a decision due in six weeks. Source: Jones & Stokes Associates