Turf Battle Waiting in Wings

First it was the Stephen’s kangaroo rat. Next came the California gnatcatcher. Now a tiny orange-and-black winged butterfly is casting a cloud of uncertainty over Southern California’s home-building industry.

When the Quino checkerspot butterfly was granted protection under the Endangered Species Act in 1997, experts knew of only six U.S. populations of Quinos--all in southwestern Riverside County and southern San Diego County.

But now federal officials have issued a new map that identifies much of the area from the San Diego border up through the Inland Empire and over into eastern Ventura County as potential Quino habitat.

The Quino’s dramatic resurgence--in government maps, if not always in the air--has frustrated home builders, who call the map overly broad and vague.

Consequently, they contend they are being forced to survey for host plants or butterflies or both in areas where the Quino hasn’t been spotted in decades to obtain key building and grading permits.

For example, officials with the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service included the Santa Clarita Valley--a hotbed of new home activity--on the map.

The area was shown not because of recent findings but due to historic occurrences of the butterfly in the valley’s Mint Canyon dating back to the 1920s and because the area has the potential to support Quino habitat.

“What’s bothering builders is the breadth and extent of the map and the lack of public information on it,” said Leonard Frank, vice president of governmental affairs for Pardee Homes.

Hoping to better pinpoint the Quino’s whereabouts, the National Assn. of Homebuilders has filed a Freedom of Information Act request with the Fish and Wildlife Service to obtain more specific information on Quino sightings. For their part, officials with the Fish and Wildlife Service contend they are trying to save the Quino, a species believed to have once been the most abundant butterfly in Southern California.

“We’re not anti-development,” Special Agent John Brooks said. “We’re just saying there’s a lot of animals here on the [endangered species] list and you need to work with us on making sure they’re not extinct.”

Jim Bartel, an assistant field supervisor for the Fish and Wildlife’s Carlsbad office, said surveying for the Quino and its host plants simply provides a degree of certainty that the butterfly does not exist on a given parcel of land before it’s developed.

And he stressed that his agency is open to working with affected home builders and property owners.

“I understand the frustrations from the development industry,” Bartel added. “I wish it were simpler.”

Delay in Survey Period Frustrates Developers

Adding to the uncertainty, Fish and Wildlife officials only recently opened the period when property owners can survey for butterflies--also known as the flight season--in San Bernardino County, northeast San Diego County and most importantly, Riverside County, a home-building hot spot and the very region where the Quino is believed to be most prevalent.

Fish and Wildlife officials declared a flight season in those areas last Wednesday, or roughly two and half weeks after the regular start date. However, they remain concerned that this year’s dry weather may result in an abbreviated flight season for the Quino and as a result they have warned property owners that their surveys may turn out to be inadequate.

“If there’s a shortened flight season, you may not be able to show the butterfly’s absence,” said Borre Winckel, executive director of the Riverside County chapter of the Building Industry Assn. “So in effect you could find yourself waiting for another year.”

A considerable amount of animousity materialized last year, according to attorney Rob Thornton, after the service rejected a number of surveys that came out negative for adult Quinos.

Property owners, he said, were told they would have to complete another round of surveys this year, but now it remains unclear whether the service will accept those surveys.

Consequently, the effected owners could end up having to wait another year during a good housing season, added Thornton, who has two clients who have had Quino spottings on their property.

Of the roughly 250 surveys his office received last year, Bartel said less than 10% were rejected, mostly due to problems with how the surveys were conducted.

“We’re not trying to be tyrants. . .we’re concerned that we can rely on the surveys,” Bartel said.

Some home builders, however, fear the Quino could turn out to be a bigger problem for their industry than the kangaroo rat and the gnatcatcher ever were.

In the case of the kangaroo rat, for example, properties were tied up for years while preserves were set up to save the rodent and its habitat--at a cost of millions of dollars to developers.

The Quino has the potential to be particularly disruptive because of its elusive lifestyle.

It spends much of the year as a tiny dormant caterpillar that hides under rocks. When it finally does sprout wings it usually flies for only a week or two before dying, and some believe its larvae can remain dormant for several years at a time or longer.

While it remains unclear how many projects will be delayed this year, one thing is certain: Everyone has an opinion about how the Fish and Wildlife Service is handling the situation.

Predictably, the service’s conservative approach is winning praise from environmentalists.

“I believe [the Fish and Wildlife Service] has tried to bend to accommodate the desires of the building industry, but I don’t think they should bend to ignore the law,” said Peter Kiriakos of the Sierra Club.

Dan Silver of the Endangered Habitats League also believes the service is on the right track.

“The survey requirements are a bit tough,” Silver said. “But if people had been thinking ahead and putting aside preserve habitats, we wouldn’t be in this situation.”

Perhaps just as predictable is the criticism from lawyers and consultants whom home builders rely on for help.

The Building Industry Assn.’s Winckel, who recently wrote an article titled “Going Postal Over Butterflies” for an industry newsletter, said recent events have caused members of his organization to renew what he described as a “deep mistrust” for the Fish and Wildlife Service.

“We feel betrayed time after time by the service,” Winckel said.

Attorney Hugh Hewitt described the handling of the Quino by the service as “a testament to the inefficiency and wrongheadedness of the service.”

A number of scientists who have worked with property owners on endangered species listing have also weighed in on the issue, contending that project-by-project surveying is bad for builders and butterflies.

Seeking a Long-Term, Regional Solution

Instead, they are calling on the Fish and Wildlife Service to quickly convene a task force of members from their community to develop a long-term recovery plan for the Quino, complete with potential habitat preserves in areas where the butterfly is most likely to survive.

Rudi Mattoni, a butterfly expert who teaches conservation biology at UCLA, said such an approach would provide Quinos with large, undisturbed areas and builders with a level of certainty as to where they can build.

“There’s no doubt in my mind that in some situations builders are being penalized because there is no plan in place,” Mattoni said.

Properties outside of the habitat preserves should also immediately be released from survey requirements, added Dennis Murphy, a biology professor at the University of Nevada, Reno, who petitioned to have the Quino listed as an endangered species.

“There’s a sense among the development community that the surveys are punitive in nature,” said Murphy, who has been designing survey strategies for a number of landowners. “In many ways I would have to agree.”

Bartel said he views a regional plan to protect habitats for the Quino and dozens of other species in Riverside County as a better solution.

“Our goal is that this species and all species are addressed in regional plans,” Bartel said.

Such large-scale conservation plans are already in place in parts of San Diego and Orange counties and one is underway in Riverside County, where government officials have been meeting with builders and environmentalists, among others.

But whether such planning is the best way to balance the needs of endangered plants and animals and home-building interests remains to be seen.

San Diego County’s conservation plan, for example, created a huge habitat preserve for 84 species, but the Quino was not one of them.

Bob Copper, the deputy chief administrative officer for land and environment for San Diego County, believes the Quino will be protected within key areas of the plan, which is formally referred to as the Multiple Species Conservation Program, and thus it should be covered.

But so far Copper said he has been unable to get the Fish and Wildlife Service to act on his contention despite what he described as months of discussions with agency officials.

“We are extremely frustrated because the MSCP promised there would be certainty and predictability about where things could and could not be developed,” Copper said.

“We now have a species that has thrown everything into disarray and if we can’t resolve this issue over the Quino then I think the future of the MSCP may be in doubt.”

Fish and Wildlife officials, however, contend they are simply waiting for the county to file a request to amend their permit to include the Quino in their plan.