http://www.humanesociety.org/n...s-online-access.html



October 18, 2018

Lawsuit seeks online access to federal elephant, lion trophy import records
Wildlife agency secretly issuing import permits despite President’s opposition

Humane Society International

Media Contacts:
HSUS: Rodi Rosensweig, 203-270-8929, RRosensweig@humanesociety.org
HSI: Alison Shapiro, 301-721-6472, ashapiro@humanesociety.org
Center for Biological Diversity: Tanya Sanerib, 206-379-7363, tsanerib@biologicaldiversity.org
Born Free USA: Garrett Johnson, 202-368-6833, garrett@bornfreeusa.org

(RICHMOND, Virginia) —The Humane Society of the United States, Humane Society International, Center for Biological Diversity, and Born Free USA sued the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service today for violating the law by failing to post online elephant and lion trophy permitting records as required by the Freedom of Information Act.

Under 1996 amendments to the Freedom of Information Act, agencies are obligated to post their decisions — including orders, policies and interpretations — online for public inspection. The same obligation applies to certain types of records that are frequently requested and that have been released in the past. FWS’ FOIA log demonstrates that conservationists, journalists, and others request elephant and lion trophy import records often enough that this information should be posted online automatically as soon as the agency receives it.

Despite immense public interest in the government’s decision of whether to allow the import of hunting trophies from imperiled species, and despite repeated attempts by conservation organizations to shed light on this important conservation issue, the Fish and Wildlife Service is covertly conducting this Endangered Species Act permitting program.

“Although it is unlawful for an American to import an elephant or lion trophy without first obtaining a permit, the public has been systemically deprived of contributing relevant scientific information to influence the federal government’s implementation of these critical elephant and lion conservation measures,” said Anna Frostic, managing wildlife attorney with the Humane Society of the United States. “FWS is openly flouting its statutory mandate to proactively post frequently requested material online.”

Today’s lawsuit asks a federal district court in Virginia to order the Fish and Wildlife Service to routinely post elephant and lion trophy permit applications, the agency’s permitting decisions, and related findings regarding the sustainability of hunting species threatened with extinction.

“The Fish and Wildlife Service needs to come clean and let the public know how many elephants and lions are killed to decorate rich Americans’ living rooms,” said Tanya Sanerib, the legal director of the Center for Biological Diversity’s international program. “With huge threats facing Africa’s imperiled wildlife, the unlawful secrecy about these bloody imports is totally unacceptable.”

For most of the past decade, according to tallies from the CITES trade database, U.S. trophy hunters killed and imported the parts of approximately 500 African lions and 500 African elephants each year. Both species are now listed as threatened with extinction under the Endangered Species Act.

Since Ryan Zinke became Interior Secretary, FWS has approved elephant and lion trophy imports from countries such as Zimbabwe, Zambia, Namibia and South Africa to the delight of trophy hunters. President Trump, meanwhile, has blasted trophy hunting as a “horror show.”

According to Angela Grimes, Born Free USA Acting CEO, “We have seen an alarming increase of attacks on the Endangered Species Act and the imperiled species it protects from both Congress and this Administration. By conducting this permitting program under the veil of secrecy, the FWS is further attempting to weaken and degrade the effectiveness of the ESA. To fully understand the impacts to threatened African lions and elephants, this information must be accessible to the public. Only then can we effectively protect these animals and the integrity of the ESA.”

Today’s lawsuit follows a pending court case filed by the same plaintiffs contesting the merits of the administration’s decision last November to lift an import ban on Zimbabwe elephant trophy imports and to allow imports of lion trophies from Zimbabwe to the U.S., and its March 1 decision to shift to a “case-by-case” process for making trophy import findings.

Plaintiffs are represented in the case on a pro bono basis by Paul Hastings LLP.

Background information:

· African elephants and African lions are listed as threatened in the U.S. Endangered Species Act. A hunter must submit an application to the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service if they wish to import an elephant or lion hunting trophy, demonstrating that the import enhances the survival of the species. The Service makes a “positive” or “negative” enhancement finding on the trophy hunting of the species in the country of origin.

· The United States is the world’s largest importer of elephant and lion hunting trophies, according to trade data from the Convention on International Trade of Endangered Species.

· Wildlife biologists have warned that trophy hunting of elephants and lions contributes to their population decline.

· As few as 20,000 wild lions remain in Africa. There has been an alarming decimation of African elephant populations with a loss of approximately 111,000 animals from 2006 to 2015 due to poaching for their tusks. Trophy hunting adds another layer of cruelty and threat to their survival.

They have no interest in the science or numbers of permits issued nor the circumstances under which they were issued.

Their sole goal is to weaponize the information and do damage through negative publicity to the recipients of these permits.

Jeff

And, by getting the information on the applications, to flood the USFWS with negative information, false statistics, and opposition to each and every one of those permits, in order to get them denied.

and to try and uncover who the hunters were as well.

quote:

Originally posted by Bwana Bunduki:
They have no interest in the science or numbers of permits issued nor the circumstances under which they were issued.

Their sole goal is to weaponize the information and do damage through negative publicity to the recipients of these permits.

Jeff

Even if they did, personal information is irrelevant. of course that's the real prize here...

They apparently already have the CITES data...do they need to go further?

https://www.theguardian.com/us...ret?CMP=share_btn_tw


Link has a copy of the confidential document.



Revealed: US moves to keep endangered species discussions secret


In a confidential document obtained by the Guardian, officials say releasing records could have a ‘chilling effect’ on their deliberations

Jimmy Tobias

Thu 18 Oct 2018 06.00 EDT Last modified on Thu 18 Oct 2018 13.27 EDT



The Trump administration is moving to restrict the release of information about its decisions on endangered species, according to a confidential internal document obtained by the Guardian.

It comes as wildlife advocates and scientists accuse the government of attempting to weaken protections for wildlife, including wolves, grizzly bears and sage grouse, while boosting domestic energy production and mining in crucial animal habitat.

In a private September guidance sent to offices around the country, the US Fish and Wildlife Service, or FWS, recommended that employees with its ecological services program – which administers the Endangered Species Act – take a less transparent approach when responding to certain Freedom of Information Act requests from the public.

The guidance contains a list of records that “should be considered for withholding in full or in part” from the public, including draft versions of policies and rules; internal PowerPoint presentations and webinars; deliberative email communications and meeting notes; and others.

Such records should be carefully reviewed and possibly withheld, the guidance suggests, if they might hamper the defense of the government’s decisions in certain court cases and cause “foreseeable harm” to the federal government by sowing “public confusion” or subjecting officials to public scrutiny and thereby creating a “chilling effect” on internal decision-making processes.


The Freedom of Information Act, or Foia, is the United States’ premier open government law, and empowers the public to obtain a wide variety of records from federal agencies, though it does allow agencies to withhold information under certain circumstances, including for national security, privacy, attorney-client privilege and other purposes.

Nate Jones, the director of the Foia Project at the National Security Archive, an open government group affiliated with George Washington University, said that the new FWS guidance is “the first time under the Trump administration that I have seen a paper trail from the government suggesting its employees release less under Foia.”

“It is disturbing,” he added, saying that the guidance is a departure from the previous administration’s official stance that “when in doubt, release information” under Foia.


“This guidance would effectively prevent the American people from standing up for science and endangered species,” said Meg Townsend, the open government staff attorney at the Center for Biological Diversity, a wildlife conservation group. “It would become much more difficult to challenge improper decisions that hurt imperiled animals.”

Townsend added that the new guidance would directly impact the work of her organization. In a recent lawsuit against both FWS and the state department, for instance, the center used internal FWS documents obtained under the Freedom of Information Act to support its argument that the agency had failed to adequately account for the Keystone XL pipeline’s potential harm to critically endangered whooping cranes when it signed off on the controversial project.

The center obtained emails and other records that, it says, helped show that the government did not sufficiently plan how to prevent whooping cranes from colliding with new power lines, a leading cause of death for the species. Under the agency’s new Foia guidance, Townsend said, the center would probably not have obtained some of the documents it relied on to make those arguments in its lawsuit.

In a written statement, a FWS spokesperson said the guidance is meant to ensure consistent application of existing Foia law.

“This guidance was drafted in response to direction from the Department of Justice regarding the production of administrative records in litigation,” the statement said. “This guidance aligns with all existing FOIA requirements and conforms with all applicable laws, rules and regulations.”

The interior department, to which the Fish and Wildlife Service belongs, hopes to change the way it implements the Endangered Species Act. Among other things, the department wants to revoke regulatory language that prohibits FWS officials from considering economic impacts when determining whether to protect a species, which conservationists say will inject business concerns into what should be scientific decisions.

“I think what you are seeing right now from interior department political leadership and by extension Fish and Wildlife Service leadership,” said Yogin Kothari, a staffer at the Union of Concerned Scientists’ Center for Science and Democracy, “is an attempt to leave no stone unturned to undermine the implementation of the Endangered Species Act.”

quote:

Originally posted by BaxterB:

quote:

Originally posted by Bwana Bunduki:
They have no interest in the science or numbers of permits issued nor the circumstances under which they were issued.

Their sole goal is to weaponize the information and do damage through negative publicity to the recipients of these permits.

Jeff

Even if they did, personal information is irrelevant. of course that's the real prize here...

They apparently already have the CITES data...do they need to go further?

The personal information is most relevant to HSUS and PETA. They want to use this information to name and shame individual hunters.

Jeff

DSC and/or SCI should play the same game. Request:

All tax records
All employment data
All travel data and expenses
All shelter information to include monies taken in and spent; animals taken in; care given; any and all animals that were killed in their shelters
Safety Record for any and all OSHA and EPA incidents
All Human Resource complaints and actions taken
Records of drugs purchased, used and disposed
Etc.; Etc.

Sometimes one needs to take the attitude “be careful what standards you set, someone mayhold you to them.”

FOIA goes both ways.

quote:

Originally posted by SFRanger7GP:
DSC and/or SCI should play the same game. Request:

All tax records
All employment data
All travel data and expenses
All shelter information to include monies taken in and spent; animals taken in; care given; any and all animals that were killed in their shelters
Safety Record for any and all OSHA and EPA incidents
All Human Resource complaints and actions taken
Records of drugs purchased, used and disposed
Etc.; Etc.

Sometimes one needs to take the attitude “be careful what standards you set, someone mayhold you to them.”

FOIA goes both ways.

You are kidding, right?

Do you really expect SCI to do anything useful?

What you suggest should be a start, but we need organizations which are run by actualy hunters.

Not self glorifying nut cases!

DSC, can you start the ball rolling, and get these stupid nut cases on the defensive rather than try to defend ourselves against their clueless claims?

quote:

Originally posted by Bwana Bunduki:

quote:

Originally posted by BaxterB:

quote:

Originally posted by Bwana Bunduki:
They have no interest in the science or numbers of permits issued nor the circumstances under which they were issued.

Their sole goal is to weaponize the information and do damage through negative publicity to the recipients of these permits.

Jeff

Even if they did, personal information is irrelevant. of course that's the real prize here...

They apparently already have the CITES data...do they need to go further?

The personal information is most relevant to HSUS and PETA. They want to use this information to name and shame individual hunters.

Jeff

Right. Which is harassment and why the info should not be released. What if someone petitioned USFW to NOT release their info because of that potential and they did it anyway. If they were harassed, could they sue USFW? I always thought FOI stuff allowed ONlY relevant information, no more, no digging for gold, so to speak.

I have fought this exact battle once personally with HSUS. They weren’t after any fucking data.

quote:

Originally posted by Saeed:

quote:

Originally posted by SFRanger7GP:
DSC and/or SCI should play the same game. Request:

All tax records
All employment data
All travel data and expenses
All shelter information to include monies taken in and spent; animals taken in; care given; any and all animals that were killed in their shelters
Safety Record for any and all OSHA and EPA incidents
All Human Resource complaints and actions taken
Records of drugs purchased, used and disposed
Etc.; Etc.

Sometimes one needs to take the attitude “be careful what standards you set, someone mayhold you to them.”

FOIA goes both ways.

You are kidding, right?

Do you really expect SCI to do anything useful?

What you suggest should be a start, but we need organizations which are run by actualy hunters.

Not self glorifying nut cases!

DSC, can you start the ball rolling, and get these stupid nut cases on the defensive rather than try to defend ourselves against their clueless claims?

.....and HSUS doesn't maintain any shelters. Don't confuse them with the American Humane Society that shelters dogs & cats. HSUS is strictly a political activist organization that preys on ignorant donors who think they are giving money to save pets. They in fact are against ownership of any animals.