PUBLIC SUBMISSION | As of: February 14, 2009 Tracking No. 8060a221 Comments Due: June 16, 2008 |
Docket: FWS-R4-ES-2008-0041
Designation of Critical Habitat for the Wintering Population of Piping Plover in North Carolina
Comment On: FWS-R4-ES-2008-0041-0001
Endangered and Threatened Wildlife and Plants; Revised Designation of Critical Habitat for the Wintering Population of the Piping Plover in North Carolina
Document: FWS-R4-ES-2008-0041-0056
Comment on FR Doc # E8-10887
Darlington, SC, 29532
Government Agency Type: RegionalEndangered Species Act.
Perhaps more than any other single law, the ESA has impacted private property
and resource providers, especially in the rural West. The over-zealous
preservationists movement has used this law to close businesses, stop resource
development across whole regions, and even to "take" private property. They seek
to remove PEOPLE from the environmental equation and to remove humanity from
the land, placing us in the concrete jungles only.
These new areas you want to take should be a protected area for generations to
come for the fisherman. The birds love us so much ,that they like to nest nest to
us for protection. NO JOKE
These areas are the only areas that produce fish consistently for the
fisherman.
The National Park Service today closed down three popular areas on the Cape
Hatteras National Seashore to off-road vehicles.
They are the first major closures under the terms of a consent decree that was
signed last week by U.S. District Court Judge Terrence W. Boyle and that ended
a contentious legal battle over ORV access on the seashore.
The areas that have been closed to ORV traffic are Bodie Island spit, Cape Point,
and the South Point of Ocracoke. All three are especially popular with fishermen,
and the closures couldn’t come at a worse time for surf anglers. The spring
fishing season has just shifted into high gear, with catches of drum and big
bluefish and the promise of cobia fishing later this month and next.
At Cape Point, Park Service rangers told fishermen mid-afternoon that they had to
leave the area, and then signs were erected closing the beach just west of Ramp
44, effectively closing off access to what is probably the most famous area for surf
fishing on the East Coast. Access to the Point from the west, from Ramp 49 in
Frisco, is already closed.
On Ocracoke, Alan Sutton of Tradewinds Tackle Shop said a park ranger came by
about mid-afternoon to tell him that access to the South Point was closed just
west of Ramp 72.
“I don’t know why they couldn’t have waited until 6 a.m. to close the beach,” said
Bob Eakes, owner of Red Drum Tackle Shop in Buxton. Eakes noted that, under
the consent decree, the beaches are closed to ORVs from 10 p.m. until 6 a.m.
Park officials, he said, could have let the fishermen finish their day and close the
beach overnight.
Eakes is just one of several ORV access advocates who are unhappy with the
consent decree. They say they had no choice but to go along with the
settlement. The alternative may well have been closing all the seashore beaches,
which Boyle indicated on more than one occasion he was willing to do.
“I’m so tired of the Park Service acting like everyone is so happy about the
consent decree,” said Eakes. “My community was forced to go along.”
The consent decree is essentially a settlement among the parties involved in a
lawsuit filed last October by Defenders of Wildlife and the National Audubon
Society against the National Park Service and others.
The plaintiffs claimed that ORV use on the seashore is illegal, since the Park
Service does not have a special rule to regulate it, as has been required since
1972. Also, they claimed that the interim plan that the Park Service was
operating under until a long-range plan is formulated by a negotiated rulemaking
committee does not go far enough to protect wildlife in the park, especially
shorebirds and sea turtles. In addition, the plaintiffs asked Boyle in February for a
temporary injunction to prohibit ORV use until the suit was settled on six popular
areas of the seashore.
The defendants were the National Park Service, the U.S. Fish and Wildlife
Service, and others, including the director of the National Park Service and the
superintendent of the Cape Hatteras National Seashore. Boyle allowed Dare and
Hyde counties and the Cape Hatteras Access Preservation Alliance to become
defendant/intervenors in the lawsuit to represent the interests of the public.
The settlement stops short of closing six popular recreational areas year round –
Bodie Island spit, Cape Point and South Beach, Hatteras Inlet, and the north and
south points of Ocracoke. Beaches, or some of them, will remain open to beach
driving, but the restrictions will go beyond what most are used to and what the
interim plan required.
Those increased restrictions became a reality today for islanders who were out to
enjoy some good fishing days after a long winter and for visitors who were
enjoying their spring surf-fishing vacations.
These are the areas closed, according to a Park Service media release:
1) Bodie Island Spit – A 150-meter buffer is required for an American
oystercatcher breeding area located approximately 50 meters from the ocean in a
narrow section of beach north of the spit. The buffer will preclude ORV and
pedestrian access along the ocean shoreline. NPS is evaluating an option for a
pedestrian bypass, outside the buffer, through the interior of the spit to reach
sections of the spit/shoreline that are otherwise open to recreational use, but
currently an appropriate option does not exist due to flooded conditions. NPS will
continue to work on the pedestrian bypass option. Ramp 4 north to Ramp 2 is
open for 2 miles to ORV and pedestrian access until May 15 when the seasonal
closure in front of Coquina Beach goes into effect.
2) Cape Point – A 100-meter buffer is required for a least tern breeding area that
is occurring approximately 80-90 meters from the ocean near the eastern edge of
the Cape Point pre-nesting area, adjacent to the ORV corridor on the northeast
side of the Point. The 100-meter buffer will preclude access along the shoreline.
There currently is not an alternative access option around the buffer; however,
NPS will continue to evaluate the situation daily.
3) South Ocracoke – A 50-meter buffer is required for breeding adult piping
plovers that are foraging on the northeast side of the pre-nesting area. A piping
plover nest has been established nearby (within the pre-nesting area). Adult
piping plover are repeatedly foraging on the adjacent shoreline in the 100-foot ORV
corridor. There currently is not an alternate route option available. However, NPS
will continue to evaluate the situation daily. Ramp 72 north to Ramp 70 is open
for approximately 1.8 miles to ORV and pedestrian access.
Sutton of Tradewinds Tackle says he has asked the Park Service to provide him
with maps to explain to visitors who come into his store exactly what is open and
what is not.
“It’s hard to talk to people who come in here,” Sutton said. “They are so upset,
and you don’t know what to tell them.”
And, under the best of circumstances, understanding the closures and beach
access and what’s open to pedestrians and what’s open to ORVs isn’t easy.
It will be a challenge this summer.
For instance, apparently Cape Point is open, but you can’t get there – not from
the east and not from the west. Right now, you apparently can’t even walk there.
Eakes said that he figures that when the piping plover nest just southwest of the
Point hatches, and the 1,000-meter buffer comes into play, that only about a mile
and a half of the South Beach will be accessible from Ramp 49 to the Point.
“We don’t expect to see the Point open again until mid-September,” Eakes said.
Frank Folb of Frank and Fran’s tackle shop in Avon agreed.
“It’s going to go up and not down,” Folb said of the miles of beach closed to ORVs.
“I feel this is a travesty,” said Rob Alderman of Buxton, who runs the Hatteras
Island Fishing Militia Web site (www.fishmilitia.com) and who organized rallies
earlier this spring to support ORV access.
“Everything we have done with the agreement and negotiated rulemaking has been
futile, useless…The environmental groups are still going to get what they want.”
Folb, on the other hand, says today’s closures “may have been the best thing that
could have happened.”
“It will turn the burners up. We must have help from our Congressmen.”
These areas closed are not on any critical habitat list and the birds
they used to closed the beaches are not on the endangered species list. How
could this happen?
Need help Thanks:
Gary Coe
2714 dewitt cir.
Darlington,S.C.29532
843-395-2585
Besides the land was given to the national park service for the
enjoyment for all.
This is just another way of taking away form the people by the
Government. This is just a way for the areas to be closed permently,not for any
bird protection.