Gnatcatcher Compromise Due Out Today : Environment: An advance draft of the decision says the bird will be protected but not listed as endangered. Some development will be allowed on its habitat.

Interior Secretary Bruce Babbitt is expected today to declare the California gnatcatcher a threatened species but also propose a new way to grant developers some leeway to build on the bird’s nesting grounds.

The long-awaited announcement will be made by Babbitt at the Interior Department’s Washington headquarters at 8:30 a.m. PST before an audience of national environmental activists, developers and the media.

Environmentalists had asked the Interior Department for a more severe “endangered” status for the tiny Southern California songbird. But an advance, undated copy of the Interior Department’s decision, obtained Wednesday night, shows the bird is “listed as threatened throughout its entire range.”

According to the document, Babbitt will protect the bird under the Endangered Species Act. But he is also proposing special rules that allow landowners and builders to avoid the delays and strict restraints of that law.

The special rules outlined in the document would exempt developers if they set aside large preserves for the bird and other rare species under a voluntary conservation program created by the Wilson Administration in 1991.

It is uncertain whether Babbitt has made any changes in the decision or proposed rules contained in the recent but undated document. But developers, environmentalists and state officials widely believe that the bird will be added to the nation’s list of protected species with those proposed special conditions.

Listing the gnatcatcher as threatened makes harming or harassing it, or damaging its nesting grounds, a violation of federal law. But it also allows Babbitt to adopt tailor-made conditions for how to protect it.

Those special rules must first be subjected to a 60-day review period in which they will be debated by the public. In the meantime, all of the bird’s habitat will be protected by the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service.

Interior Department spokesman Jay Ziegler refused to say what Babbitt will announce today. He said only that it will be “a sensible decision by both economic and environmental measures.”

Babbitt has advocated using the gnatcatcher as a national model for how entire ecosystems, rather than individual animals and plants, can be protected to avert the economic gridlock that occurs when numerous species are listed as endangered.

Developers and state officials have hoped that Babbitt’s decision on the gnatcatcher will incorporate the Wilson Administration’s conservation project. According to the document, it does.

In Wilson’s novel program, an alliance of developers, environmentalists, local planners and biologists are forming plans to create preserves of coastal sage scrub that ensure the survival of the gnatcatcher and other rare plants and animals that live there.

“The (U.S. Fish and Wildlife) Service recognizes the significant efforts undertaken by the state of California through the Natural Communities Conservation Planning Act of 1991,” the document says.

The document adds that “certain land-use activities . . . would not be a violation” of the act, as long as landowners have created a conservation plan under Wilson’s program.

About 3,000 pairs of the Southern California birds exist. They nest only in sage scrub, a mix of native shrubs found in Orange, San Diego, Riverside and San Bernardino counties and the Palos Verdes Peninsula.

Developers and environmentalists have fought over the gnatcatcher since the fall of 1990, when environmentalists petitioned the federal government to list the bird as endangered. Much of the bird’s nesting grounds are on prime, developable land.

The announcement by Babbitt is expected to be criticized by Southern California developers, since they believe any federal protection of the bird is unwarranted. But the special rules may address some of their concerns since they would have more flexibility in how they can get their building projects approved. They could avoid the long federal review of their projects.

Environmentalists are pleased that the bird will be protected as a threatened species, but they are a bit wary of the special conditions, since the Wilson Administration’s program has not yet succeeded in creating preserves.

“We’re going to have to look at it very closely and participate extensively in the public comment process,” said Joel Reynolds, senior attorney with the Natural Resources Defense Council, the environmental group seeking federal protection of the bird.

“We want to make sure that whatever special rule that is adopted complies with the law and that federal oversight is strict and effective,” he said. “If that can be accomplished, the process can be a very good one.”

Times staff writer Rudy Abrahamson contributed to this report from Washington.