June, 24 2009, 11:35am EDT

For Immediate Release
Contact:
Jeff Miller, Center for Biological Diversity, (510) 499-9185
California Proposes Logging Rules That Would Exterminate Coho Salmon
Inadequate Regulations Proposed in Critical Watersheds as Coho Salmon Spiral Toward Extinction
SACRAMENTO, Calif.
The California Board of Forestry this week is considering proposed state timber-harvest regulations
that would continue harmful logging adjacent to critical salmon
streams, prevent recovery of key salmon watersheds, and essentially
guarantee extinction of coho salmon (Oncorhynchus kisutch) from California. The Center for Biological Diversity sent comments
to the Board this week regarding the failure of the proposed rules to
protect coho and other salmon; the Center warned of the likelihood for
illegal take of salmon species listed under the federal and state
Endangered Species Acts if the rules are adopted. The Board will hold
hearings today and tomorrow in Sacramento on the proposed rules.
"For
a decade, the Board of Forestry has avoided taking the steps that are
necessary to protect California's salmon from the impacts of logging
activities, and meanwhile coho salmon have spiraled toward extinction,"
said Jeff Miller, conservation advocate with the Center for Biological
Diversity. "These unacceptable rules would continue business-as-usual
logging practices and facilitate the dismantling of the last shaded,
cold-water forest refuges for fish."
The Board is
updating its "threatened or impaired watershed" logging rules, state
forest practice rules originally adopted in 2000 that regulate
commercial timber harvesting on private land in watersheds harboring
threatened or endangered salmon species and in water bodies listed as
impaired under the federal Clean Water Act. Most remaining coho salmon
streams in northern and central California are within private
forestlands subject to California's Forest Practice Rules.
The
Board has proposed a smorgasbord of options for riparian timber-harvest
rule changes, almost all of which reduce critical riparian protection.
The rules would also: allow excessive road densities, near-stream roads
and road stream crossings that will result in degradation of salmon
habitat with sediment; approve logging and road building on unstable
slopes and soils; allow logging of critical headwaters refugia; and
prevent previously logged watersheds from adequately recovering.
"The
Board of Forestry should adopt stronger timber harvest regulations to
protect all salmon streams and should prohibit logging in key
watersheds in order to allow impaired areas to recover," said Justin
Augustine, a Center attorney. "The Board's proposed approach would
likely result in timber-harvest plans violating the Endangered Species
Act, causing illegal take of salmon, and undermining the recovery of
listed salmonids."
Coho salmon in the central California coast, from
Punta Gorda south to the San Lorenzo River in Santa Cruz, are listed as
endangered by both the state and federal governments. The central coast
spawning population had declined to about 56,000 fish by the mid-1960s;
in recent years only 500 to 1,000 wild coho have returned to the
central coast region to spawn. Coho in Northern California, from Punta Gorda to the Oregon border, are
listed as threatened by both the state and federal governments. Up to
half a million coho spawned in this region as late as the 1940s. By the
1990s, only about 7,000 coho spawned in Northern California. Coho have
been eliminated from more than half of their historical streams in
California, and most remaining populations are extremely isolated, with
fewer than 100 fish.
The effects of logging
activities on coho salmon habitat have been catastrophic. Coho spawn,
and the young rear, in cold-water streams with abundant protective
cover, mostly provided by fallen trees. For this reason, coho require
dense coastal forests for their survival. Removal of trees eliminates
shade for streams, increases water temperatures, and reduces the amount
of large woody debris that falls into streams to provide critical
habitat for rearing salmonids. Thousands of miles of temporary logging
roads create large-scale soil instability on the steep slopes in
coastal Northern California, eroding huge quantities of fine sediment
into streams, filling pools, degrading spawning gravels, and burying
coho habitat.
The Board of Forestry and the timber
industry often blame the loss of coho on factors other than logging,
such as ocean conditions. However, ocean conditions have been largely
favorable for coho salmon production since 1998, yet coho populations
continue to decline, a clear indication that lack of suitable
freshwater habitat is constraining coho salmon recovery.
The
proposed rules are not based on best science or good land-management
principles and are geared toward allowing more timber harvest in
critical coho watersheds. Even though the Board of Forestry's supposed
salmon protections to date have failed to protect coho, the agency is
now proposing rules that in some instances would further erode habitat
protections. The watersheds covered by the rules have been subjected to
unreasonable levels of logging well over acceptable limits to maintain
suitable conditions for salmon. Many of the sub-basins covered by the
rules have been altered more than 50 percent due to logging in the past
few decades, and logging road networks far exceed levels known to
increase sediment yield and alter hydrology. Intact functional patches
of salmonid habitat are extremely limited or have been completely
eliminated by logging in many of the watersheds, such as the Russian
and Gualala Rivers.
If prompt action is not taken to
reverse the decline in freshwater habitat quality for coho salmon
before predicted less favorable ocean productivity and climate cycles
occur between 2015 and 2025, coho salmon will likely go extinct
throughout the state. In 2008, renowned California native fish expert
Dr. Peter Moyle published a report for CalTrout, SOS: California's Native Fish Crisis, documenting
the unprecedented decline of California's native salmonids. Thirteen of
California's 21 native salmonids are in extreme danger of extinction,
including coho salmon. The National Marine Fisheries Service reported
in 2008 that coastal coho populations plunged 73 percent compared with
the previous spawning season. Severely reduced salmon populations
precipitated a moratorium on commercial and recreational salmon fishing
throughout the state in 2008 and 2009, expected to cause economic
losses of $255 million and 2,263 jobs.
The most
important factor for survival of California's coho is protecting and
enhancing the watersheds that still have the potential to support the
species, such as Scott and Waddell Creeks in San Mateo County and the
Garcia, Noyo, and Gualala rivers in Mendocino County.
At the Center for Biological Diversity, we believe that the welfare of human beings is deeply linked to nature — to the existence in our world of a vast diversity of wild animals and plants. Because diversity has intrinsic value, and because its loss impoverishes society, we work to secure a future for all species, great and small, hovering on the brink of extinction. We do so through science, law and creative media, with a focus on protecting the lands, waters and climate that species need to survive.
(520) 623-5252LATEST NEWS
US Bombs Syria Two Weeks After House Vote Against Withdrawing Troops
"We are at war in Syria, but American lawmakers haven't debated it and the public barely knows," said one foreign policy writer.
Mar 24, 2023
The U.S. launched airstrikes in Syria on Thursday after one American contractor was killed and five service members were injured in an attack by a drone that the Pentagon claims was of "Iranian origin."
The drone attack on a maintenance facility in northeast Syria and the U.S. response came two weeks after the House of Representatives voted down a bipartisan resolution that would have required President Joe Biden to withdraw all American troops from Syria within 180 days.
Around 900 U.S. troops and hundreds of contractors are currently stationed in Syria under a legal rationale that experts say is highly dubious at best.
Thursday's airstrikes in Syria were among several Biden has approved without congressional authorization since taking office. In a statement, U.S. Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin said that "at the direction of President Biden," the Pentagon "authorized U.S. Central Command forces to conduct precision airstrikes tonight in eastern Syria against facilities used by groups affiliated with Iran's Islamic Revolutionary Guards Corps (IRGC)."
"The airstrikes were conducted in response to today's attack as well as a series of recent attacks against coalition forces in Syria by groups affiliated with the IRGC," Austin added.
The strikes, which reportedly killed at least eight people described as "pro-Iran fighters," spurred another flurry of questions about the legal authority that the Biden administration is using to maintain the presence of U.S. troops and carry out military operations in Syria.
While Austin did not specifically invoke any legal authority in his statement, he did say the U.S. airstrikes were "intended to protect and defend U.S. personnel"—an apparent reference to Article II of the Constitution.
"We are at war in Syria, but American lawmakers haven't debated it and the public barely knows," Vox foreign policy writer Jonathan Guyer tweeted late Thursday. "One of the most significant and least discussed legacies of George W. Bush's 20-year-old invasion of Iraq is the way it's led to unauthorized forever wars we scarcely discuss."
Members of Congress have previously voiced alarm over the Biden administration's reliance on Article II to carry out military operations without congressional approval, something that was also done by previous administrations.
In 2021, following two rounds of U.S. airstrikes in Syria, more than 30 House lawmakers led by Reps. Peter Defazio (D-Ore.), Nancy Mace (R-S.C.), and Jamaal Bowman (D-N.Y.) sent a letter criticizing the Biden administration's "dangerous claim that Article II of the Constitution permits you to bypass congressional authorization to perform strikes inside Syria."
The lawmakers also rebuked the administration's insistence that "the wide range of activities" it has "undertaken as part of the ongoing U.S. occupation of a large swath of Syrian territory is justified by the Authorization for Use of Military Force (AUMF) of 2001," the measure Congress passed in the wake of the September 11 attacks.
That AUMF has been used by several administrations to justify military operations in Afghanistan, Iraq, Libya, Yemen, Somalia, Syria, and other countries. Opponents of the war powers resolution aimed at withdrawing U.S. forces from Syria invoked the 2001 AUMF to justify the continued occupation.
Congress has never specifically authorized the U.S. military to combat "Iran-backed forces" in Syria.
Earlier this week, as Congress moved to repeal the separate 2002 Iraq War AUMF, Sen. Lindsey Graham (R-S.C.) attempted to pass an amendment to change the language of the authorization to greenlight operations "against Iranian-backed militias operating in Iraq."
The Graham amendment was soundly defeated, with 60 senators voting no.
Keep ReadingShow Less
As Ramadan Begins, Ilhan Omar Introduces House Resolution to Condemn Islamophobia
"In order to confront the evils of religious bigotry and hatred, we must come to understand that all our destinies are linked," said Omar, a former refugee from Somalia and one of two Muslim women in Congress.
Mar 23, 2023
Joined by Democratic House colleagues and activists outside the U.S. Capitol on Thursday—the first full day of Ramadan—Minnesota Congresswoman Ilhan Omar announced a new resolution condemning Islamophobia and commemorating the recent anniversary of the 2019 Christchurch, New Zealand mosque massacre.
Omar's office said the resolution—which is co-sponsored by more than 20 House Democrats—"comes after continued violence and threats made against religious minorities, particularly Muslims," while adding that the March 15, 2019 murder of 51 Muslim worshippers at the Al Noor Mosque in Christchurch by an Australian white supremacist "was a stated source of inspiration for mass shootings in the United States."
These include the deadly synagogue shooting in Poway, California; the massacre of 23 people, most of them of Mexican origin, at a Walmart in El Paso, Texas; and the murder of 10 people by a white supremacist in a Buffalo, New York grocery store.
Omar said:
As we begin the holy month of Ramadan, we must reaffirm that all people of faith should have the right to worship without fear. According to the Council on American-Islamic Relations, anti-Muslim hate crimes and attacks are at an all-time high. The attack in Christchurch, motivated by an extremist ideology of white supremacy, anti-Muslim hate, and the so-called replacement theory resonates deeply for Muslims in nearly every corner of the globe.
We also know that this increase in hate is not isolated to only Muslims. Church bombings, synagogue attacks, and racial hate crimes are also on the rise.
"In order to confront the evils of religious bigotry and hatred, we must come to understand that all our destinies are linked," Omar added. "That's why I'm proud to lead my colleagues in condemning the rise in Islamophobia and affirming the rights of religious minorities in the United States and around the world."
Robert McCaw, director of government relations at the Council on American-Islamic Relations, also spoke at Thursday's event, saying that "it is with a heavy heart that CAIR welcomes Omar's resolution," which "recognizes the threat posed by rising global Islamophobia to American Muslims and Muslims in other countries across the world, as well as the threat white supremacism poses to all people."
"It is incredibly important for Congress to lead the way in rejecting these hateful and dangerous ideologies, and CAIR calls on both sides of the aisle to co-sponsor and adopt this resolution," McCaw added. "As we remember the lives lost in Christchurch, we must continue to work towards a world where everyone is treated with humanity and dignity, regardless of their faith, ethnicity, or background."
In 2021, the Democratic-controlled House narrowly passed a resolution introduced by Omar aimed at combating Islamophobia after Rep. Lauren Boebert (R-Col.) referred to her and Rep. Rashida Tlaib (D-Mich.)—the only two Muslim women in Congress—as the "jihad squad."
The House GOP, which now narrowly controls the chamber, voted last month to remove Omar from the foreign affairs panel. Just before the vote, the congresswoman said that Republicans "are not OK with having a Muslim have a voice on that committee."
Omar's new federal resolution stood in stark contrast with Texas state Rep. Tony Tinderholt's (R-94) vote against a legislative resolution celebrating Ramadan.
"As a combat veteran, I served beside many local translators who were Muslims and good people," the Iraq War veteran explained. "I can also attest that Ramadan was routinely the most violent period during every deployment."
"Texas and America were founded on Christian principles and my faith as a Christian prevents me from celebrating Ramadan," Tinderholt added.
Responding to Tinderholt's statement, CAIR tweeted: "Every elected official has the right to express their own sincerely held religious beliefs—and we welcome that. But to insult another religion is uncalled for and harmful."
Keep ReadingShow Less
Cancer Patients Challenge Biden Admin's Refusal to Lower Price of Lifesaving Drug
"We request HHS to consider this appeal directly... because the NIH has repeatedly demonstrated its unwillingness to even acknowledge that the Bayh-Dole Act includes an obligation to make products invented with federal funds 'available to the public on reasonable terms.'"
Mar 23, 2023
Two days after President Joe Biden's administration rejected a petition asking federal regulators to use their authority to lower the astronomical price of a lifesaving prostate cancer drug developed entirely with public funds, petitioners on Thursday filed an administrative appeal.
At issue is enzalutamide, a drug the Japanese pharmaceutical giant Astellas and its U.S. counterpart Pfizer sell under the brand name Xtandi. Although Xtandi owes its existence to U.S. taxpayers, who bankrolled 100% of its development, an annual supply of the drug costs $189,900 in the United States—three to six times more than its list price in other wealthy nations.
In late 2021, prostate cancer patients Robert Sachs, Clare Love, and Eric Sawyer petitioned the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) to exercise its "march-in rights" against Xtandi. Under the Bayh-Dole Act, the federal government can reclaim and redistribute patents for inventions created with public funding—enabling generic competitors to produce cheaper versions—when "action is necessary to alleviate health or safety needs" or when an invention's benefits are not being made "available to the public on reasonable terms."
HHS Secretary Xavier Becerra referred the petition to the National Institutes of Health (NIH), whose acting Director Lawrence Tabak argued in a Tuesday letter that "Xtandi is widely available to the public on the market," citing Astellas' estimate that "more than 200,000 patients were treated with Xtandi from 2012 to 2021."
Even with insurance, co-pays for Xtandi are sky-high. Medicare recipients, for example, are expected to pay roughly $10,000 per year for the medicine. Especially for the millions of uninsured and underinsured people in the U.S., Xtandi remains completely out of reach.
Tabak's letter went on to say that Xtandi's "practical application is evidenced by the 'manufacture, practice, and operation' of the invention and the invention's 'availability to and use by the public….'" As Knowledge Ecology International executive director James Love lamented, the NIH completely elided any mention of "reasonable terms," editing out that key phrase from Bayh-Dole.
In their appeal, the petitioners wrote: "The petition focused on a single issue: the reasonableness of charging U.S. cancer patients three to six times more than residents of other high-income countries for the drug Xtandi."
"There is no dispute about the following facts," the appeal continues. "Xtandi was invented on grants from the U.S. Army and the NIH at UCLA, a public university. The patents were licensed eventually to Astellas, a Japanese drug company, with a partnership share now held by Pfizer, following its 2016 $14 billion acquisition of Medivation, UCLA's original licensee, that occurred just after the NIH rejected an earlier march-in request on Xtandi. The prices in the United States have consistently been far higher than the prices in other high-income countries."
Prior to the 2021 petition, Clare Love and prostate cancer patient David Reed filed a petition, later joined by Sachs, with the U.S. Department of Defense (DOD) after the Senate Armed Services Committee instructed the Pentagon to initiate march-in proceedings when the price of a drug created with a DOD grant exceeds the median price in seven large high-income nations. The Pentagon, however, has yet to acknowledge or act on the petition submitted to it in February 2019.
"If you consider both of these requests together, a petition to exercise the government's march-in or other rights in the Xtandi patents has been pending before the federal government for more than four years," Thursday's appeal states. "The HHS petition was filed 16 months ago."
It continues:
The petitions were filed with the DOD and HHS instead of the NIH because the NIH has repeatedly demonstrated its unwillingness to even acknowledge that the Bayh-Dole Act includes an obligation to make products invented with federal funds 'available to the public on reasonable terms.' This is demonstrated by a track record of dismissing multiple requests to use the government's Bayh-Dole safeguard to address pricing abuses and access restrictions, including those concerning the federal government's march-in rights under 35 USC § 203, and the federal government's global royalty-free license, under 35 USC § 202(c)(4). There are also extensive email records between Mark Rohrbaugh, currently NIH special adviser for technology transfer who is a long-time agency official, and lobbyists for drug companies and university rights holders, obtained through Freedom of Information Act requests, which not only express opposition to any safeguards regarding unreasonable pricing but organize public relations efforts against using a march-in request to address the pricing of products.
"HHS chose to assign to the NIH the evaluation of our petition regarding Xtandi," says the appeal. "We request HHS to consider this appeal directly, and not assign NIH to review its own decision. The latter would be tantamount to no review at all."
Since Bayh-Dole was enacted in 1980, "march-in rights have never been used... and NIH has repeatedly rejected the idea that affordability is a reasonable term," The American Prospectreported Wednesday. With Xtandi, "advocates thought they found the perfect test case for a new administration that paid lip service to lowering prescription drug costs."
As The Levernoted on Wednesday, the NIH's decision this week was consistent with Biden's track record:
Biden was vice president when the Obama administration rejected congressional Democrats' demand that the government use the same power to lower the skyrocketing prices of medicine in America.
As a senator in 2000, Biden was one of just eight Democrats who helped pharmaceutical lobbyists kill a measure spearheaded by Sen. Paul Wellstone (D-Minn.) and then-Rep. Bernie Sanders (I-Vt.) that would have reinstated the Reagan-era requirement that drug companies sell medicines developed with public money at a reasonable price.
That requirement was repealed by the Clinton administration in 1995, following pressure by drugmakers.
But Becerra's acquiescence to Big Pharma was more surprising. Prior to joining the Biden administration, the HHS secretary had expressed support for wielding the executive branch's authority to rein in soaring drug prices.
As the attorney general of California in the summer of 2020, "Becerra demanded the Trump administration use existing law to lower the price of medicines that were originally developed at taxpayer expense," The Lever reported. "As a member of Congress in 2016, Becerra signed on to a letter to the Obama Department of Health and Human Services calling on officials to broadly use 'march-in rights' to lower the cost of prescription drugs—including 'specialty drugs, like those to treat cancer, which are frequently developed with taxpayer funds.'"
Despite pressure from numerous members of Congress and medicine affordability advocacy groups, the NIH declared Tuesday that it "does not believe that use of the march-in authority would be an effective means of lowering the price of the drug."
Instead, the agency vowed to "pursue a whole-of-government approach informed by public input to ensure the use of march-in authority is consistent with the policy and objective of the Bayh-Dole Act," a move that progressive advocates denounced as a "pathetic" attempt to deflect criticism of its failure to use or threaten to use its legal power.
“This is a drug that was invented with taxpayer dollars by scientists at UCLA and can be purchased in Canada for one-fifth the U.S. price," Sanders said Tuesday. "The Japanese drugmaker Astellas, which made $1 billion in profits in 2021, has raised the price of this drug by more than 75%."
"How many prostate cancer patients will die because they cannot afford this unacceptable price?" asked Sanders, chair of the Senate Committee on Health, Education, Labor, and Pensions.
During a Wednesday hearing, Sanders made the case for changing "the current culture of greed into a culture which understands that science and medical breakthroughs should work for ordinary people, and not just enrich large corporations and CEOs."
Keep ReadingShow Less
Most Popular
SUPPORT OUR WORK.
We are independent, non-profit, advertising-free and 100%
reader supported.
reader supported.