Subject: SW BIODIVERSITY ALERT #55

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           SOUTHWEST BIODIVERSITY ALERT #54
                            3/16/97          

         SOUTHWEST CENTER FOR BIOLOGICAL DIVERSITY
          silver city, tucson, phoenix, san diego
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TWO CASES WON IN APPEALS COURT- FOREST SERVICE MUST GIVE ENVIROS
INFORMATION ON ENDANGERED AND SENSITIVE SPECIES

TIMBER SALE IN OLD GROWTH RESERVE APPEALED

4,000 ATTEND BENEFIT CONCERT FOR SOUTHWEST CENTER

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TWO CASES WON IN APPEALS COURT- FOREST SERVICE MUST GIVE ENVIROS
INFORMATION ON ENDANGERED AND SENSITIVE SPECIES
  The Southwest Center has won two cases before the 9th Circuit
Court of Appeals requiring the U.S. Forest Service to provide
information on where Mexican spotted owls and Northern
goshawks live. The Forest Service argued that such information
was exempt from the Freedom of Information Act, and that if
such sensitive information was given to environmentalists, it
would have to be given everyone. The appeals court ruled that
the agency has discretion to release or not release such
information on a case-by-case basis, and that environmentalists
are entitled to it.

Southwest Center Conservation Chair, Dr. Robin Silver
petitioned to list the Mexican spotted owl as a threatened species
in 1989. The Center is currently suing the U.S. Fish and Wildlife
Service for refusing to accept its petition to list the Northern
goshawk as an endangered species in the western U.S. It recently
won a lawsuit remanding a Fish and Wildlife Service decision
not to list the Queen Charlotte goshawk as an endangered
species in Southeast Alaska, British Columbia, western
Washington.

The FOIA case was argued by Matt Kenna (Durango), the
Northern goshawk case by Matt Kenna and Dan Rolf (Portland),
and the Queen Charlotte goshawk case by Kathy Meyer and Kim
Wally (Meyer and Glitzenstein, D.C.)


TIMBER SALE IN OLD GROWTH RESERVE APPEALED
  The Southwest Center and the Grand Canyon Chapter of the Sierra Club
have appealed the Gentry Timber Sale on the Apache-Sitgreaves
National Forest. The sale is the first to allow logging within old
growth reserves under a recently adopted EIS amending every Forest
Plan in the Southwest to adopt new guidelines for the Mexican
spotted owl and Northern goshawk. The guidelines, however, allow for
logging within reserves to "benefit" old growth. The EIS itself was
appealed in 1996 by the Southwest Forest Alliance. The Gentry sale
was also appealed by Forest Guardians.


4,000 ATTEND BENEFIT CONCERT FOR SOUTHWEST CENTER
  4,000 turned out in Phoenix for two Southwest Center for
Biological Diversity benefit shows by Don Henley and Timothy
B. Schmit of the Eagles, Stevie Nicks of the Fleetwood Mac,
Roger McGuinn of the Byrds, and Bruce Hornsby. 

"The work the Southwest Center does is absolutely crucial," said
Henley, "even by conservative estimates, we are losing here on
planet Earth 45 species a day, many of which haven't even been
discovered yet. The naysayers always say, 'Why should we care so
much about some bug or some snail that we've never seen?' And the
reason is because a great deal of our medicine, very important drugs
that keep people from dying, are derived from pants and animals.
Some things that are disappearing could very well hold the key to
cures for fatal and debilitating diseases."

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Kieran Suckling                                       [email protected]
Executive Director                                    phone:  520-733-1391
Southwest Center for Biological Diversity        fax:    520-733-1404
POB 17839, Tucson, AZ 85731                      www.envirolink.org/orgs/sw-center