Bipartisan bill could provide money to help imperiled wildlife in New Mexico
The lesser prairie chicken could be put on the threatened list for the second time in eight years, and a U.S. senator from New Mexico thinks the bird is a prime example of a species whose severe decline could’ve been avoided if there had been money to intervene sooner.
Democratic Sen. Martin Heinrich believes a bipartisan bill he and Sen. Roy Blunt, R-Mo., are co-sponsoring would help a broad array of imperiled wildlife rebound before they approach the brink of extinction, when it becomes more costly and arduous to save them.
Earlier this year, the senators introduced the bill, Recovering America’s Wildlife Act, that each year would funnel $1.3 billion to states and $97.5 million to tribes for that purpose.
New Mexico would get $28 million yearly, which the state Game and Fish Department would administer for projects to aid the 235 species it determined have “the greatest conservation need.” Many are not yet listed as endangered or threatened by the federal government but are at risk of requiring federal protection.
Heinrich described the bill as a preventive measure.
“This is funding you can use to get wildlife on a positive track and head off an endangered species listing,” Heinrich said in an interview last week. “Because by the time you get to being listed as threatened or endangered, oftentimes you’re so far down the track that it’s hard to get those species back to really robust numbers.”
More broadly, the bill would fund recovery efforts for 12,000 types of wildlife and plants deemed to have the greatest conservation need across the country, as well as 1,600 already listed as threatened or endangered.
This would be the largest federal funding for species recovery in a generation and maybe a half a century, Heinrich said.
It would be a hefty gain for New Mexico, which now receives only about 5 percent of the money needed to carry out its wildlife action plan, he said.
The money would come from environmental fees and penalties. States would be required to chip in 25 percent in matching funds.
Heinrich said the bill stands a good chance of passing in 2022, an election year, because it’s the kind of conservation measure that draws bipartisan support, similar to the Great American Outdoors Act in 2020.
Including Blunt, the bill has gained 32 co-sponsors, evenly divided between Democrats and Republicans.
“Especially during COVID, everybody loves the outdoors, everybody loves their state’s wildlife,” Heinrich said. “So you can really find Republican partners.”
Conservation groups mostly applauded the proposal, which they noted is a companion bill to a similar House version.
“It’s a step forward in providing funding for species that need it,” said Michael Robinson, senior conservation advocate at the Center for Biological Diversity. “It’s not everything we would like, but then again, everything we would like won’t necessarily pass the U.S. Senate.”
Robinson credited Heinrich for sponsoring bills like these to aid imperiled species and the landscapes they depend on for survival.
“We hope it passes,” Robinson said.
He agreed helping a struggling species before it reaches protected status is important because by the time it’s listed, the population has usually shrunk to a small size, which makes regeneration tougher, and the habitat is often severely depleted.
“The earlier a species receives conservation attention, the better its prospects are,” Robinson said.
Another environmentalist said it’s not only more difficult ecologically and biologically to help a species that’s in deep decline, it’s more costly.
“Bringing a species back from the brink is immensely expensive,” said Chris Smith, Southwest wildlife advocate for Santa Fe-based WildEarth Guardians.
And concentrating on a species that’s nearly wiped out at the expense of other wildlife is a flawed way to manage an ecosystem, he said.
Smith said the concept of the bill is good, and it would channel money toward tackling the biodiversity crisis brought on by drought, habitat loss and mass extinction amid climate change.
But Game and Fish, which would handle the funds, must expand its oversight beyond its traditional role reflected in its name, he said, which means it must assist in the recovery of small mammals, amphibians, birds and invertebrates, and not just big animals that are hunted.
Heinrich said the plan is to have the agency fund projects that help all wildlife in need.
The agency has done a good job with its available funding to manage large game, such as elk, pronghorns and mule deer, and this would enable it to expand its oversight to more diverse species, from birds to bumblebees, Heinrich said.
“This would really give them the capacity to manage wildlife across the board,” Heinrich said. “Unlike in the past where really a vast majority of their resources only went to game species.”
Smith said state law limits the species the agency can manage, and a statutory change would be required to remove all barriers.
But agency spokeswoman Tristanna Bickford said Game and Fish has broad authority, including over all the species on its greatest-conservation-need list.
The agency oversees a wide range of wildlife, from elk and deer to burrowing owls and black-footed ferrets — and welcomes additional funding to assist the effort, she said.
The agency now receives about $15 million a year in federal funding through the Wildlife and Sport Fish Restoration program.
Those dollars are limited to strengthening the populations of wildlife that can be hunted or fished, Bickford said, so the money from Heinrich’s bill would be a big boost that could be applied more broadly.
“This would be a huge increase beyond our funding sources,” she said.
