New Wetlands Rules Unveiled by White House

The Clinton Administration, breaking new ground on a long-running environmental debate, on Tuesday outlined a package of initiatives designed to stem and eventually reverse the loss of the nation’s wetlands to agriculture and development.

Seeking to balance the rights of private landowners with the concerns of environmentalists, the Administration moved to protect 1.7 million acres of Alaskan wetlands threatened by development and to close loopholes in federal regulations that have allowed builders to drain and damage other wetlands throughout the country.

At the same time, however, the proposal would exempt from further regulation 53 million acres of farmland that once were wetlands, and would allow some developers to build on wetlands if they contribute to the creation or restoration of such land elsewhere.

The new federal blueprint comes a day after Gov. Pete Wilson unveiled a statewide plan to increase the amount of California wetlands by as much as 50%. In its plan, the Clinton Administration would seek to expand roles for state and local governments in protecting and restoring wetlands--a bid that won plaudits from state officials.

Doug Wheeler, California’s secretary for resources, on Tuesday praised that and other aspects of the Clinton plan, including the Administration’s commitment to the development of a clear definition of wetlands. “We see the President’s policies as affirmation of the tack we’ve chosen to take, including the need to build consensus between federal, state and local governments and private landowners,” Wheeler said Tuesday. “We’re pleased to have farmers and builders as our allies because they can help build support for our goals.”

One of the most direct effects of Clinton’s plan on California comes with its definition of vernal pools as wetlands requiring protection. Vernal pools--small depressions in which fresh water stands--are most common in Southern and Central California, where 4.2 million acres of such wetlands were once thought to have existed. As federal, state and local agencies have debated whether the pools qualify as genuine wetlands, all but an estimated 30,000 to 40,000 acres have been filled or destroyed. They now will be subject to full federal protection, officials said.

At stake in the overall debate is whether and how to protect swamps, marshes and pools that help purify water supplies and provide a habitat for a third of the nation’s endangered species and half of its migratory birds. Lawmakers and experts have come to regard wetlands as the cornerstone in efforts to improve water quality, foster ecological diversity and blunt the impact of such natural disasters as floods.

In a 1985 inventory of the nation’s wetlands--the most recent available--the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service estimated that 103.3 million acres of wetlands existed in the Lower 48 states, and warned that roughly 290,000 acres are disappearing yearly.

The package unveiled Tuesday continues a pattern in which the Clinton Administration has stepped in to settle fractious disputes pitting environmentalists against those arguing for unrestricted economic development of the nation’s resources. In his first effort to reconcile jobs with environmental protection, Clinton allowed timber harvesting on federal lands in the Pacific Northwest to proceed but imposed new limits and environmental standards on the harvests.

The Administration also appeared to split the difference between feuding farmers and environmentalists in its plan to restore the Everglades ecosystem in southern Florida, and between ranchers and environmentalists in its plan to improve the health of federal grasslands.

The wetland protection effort, unveiled after 10 weeks of work with less fanfare than the other initiatives, was touted by White House officials Tuesday as “the most ambitious set of wetland improvements” since the federal government began regulating the use of such lands in the early 1970s. But environmental groups responded with greater caution, saying the Administration’s package does too much to accommodate farmers and private developers.

Chief among the environmentalists’ complaints is a provision that would allow private landowners, but not environmental activists, the right to appeal--out of court--the federal government’s determination that an area is a wetland.

Administration officials countered that since 75% of the continental United States’ remaining wetlands are now privately owned, any effort to protect these areas must draw the support of landowners and address their concerns that the regulatory process is slow, inaccurate, inconsistent and unfairly stacked against them. The introduction of a streamlined permit process, which would include the possibility of an administrative appeal by a landowner, increases the fairness and flexibility of federal regulatory programs, the Administration argued.

Robert Adler, an attorney for the Natural Resources Defense Council, characterized the Clinton Administration’s proposals as a “complex dance with some steps forward, some steps back and a lot of sidestepping.”

NRDC praised Clinton’s efforts to close loopholes that have permitted building on wetlands, as well as his decision to protect Alaskan wetlands. But the organization was highly critical of the plan’s emphasis on “mitigation banking”--the practice of allowing a developer to build on wetlands and contribute to the development of wetlands elsewhere.

The National Wildlife Federation charged the plan would result in a net loss of wetlands.

In a statement released with the Administration’s 26-page plan, Kathleen McGinty, director of the White House’s environmental policy office, defended the plan as “balanced and fair.”