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ORV Group Files Lawsuit Over Cape Hatteras National Seashore ORV Management Plan

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In a move not totally unexpected, the National Park Service has been sued over its plan for managing off-road vehicles at Cape Hatteras National Seashore.

The lawsuit, filed Thursday in Washington, D.C., by the Cape Hatteras Access Preservation Alliance, an arm of the Outer Banks Preservation Association, claims the seashore staff failed to fully consider proposals offered by the alliance that would meet their desires for ORV access to Cape Hatteras beaches while also protecting threatened and endangered species.

“The Park Service’s new ORV management plan and rules, if implemented, will have a devastating effect on our unique, local shore-oriented culture and economy,” said John Couch, the association's president.  “The OBPA and CHAPA have fought to keep the Cape Hatteras National Seashore Recreational Area beaches free and open to residents and visitors since 1977. 

"OBPA and CHAPA continuously have maintained that reasonable ORV access and bird and turtle species protection are not mutually exclusive," he said in a prepared statement. "Unfortunately, the Park Service overlooked reasonable recommendations and information that OBPA and CHAPA put forth during the planning process that would have resulted in an ORV management plan and rules that both protect wildlife resources and ensure reasonable ORV access to and over the area’s beaches.”

One of the recommendations Mr. Couch's group has made was to have the seashore use a bulldozer to create new habitat for plovers away from Cape Point, a highly popular and productive fishing area near Buxton.

"What we're saying is why can't we have a partnership with the environmentalists? We can improve this habitat," he said last summer. "They (the Park Service) have yet to do anything to improve the habitat for the birds.”

But the suggestion didn't seem prudent to the Park Service.

"Should we go out and bulldoze ponds in different locations? You've got to recognize that it'd be adverse modification of piping plover habitat," Cape Hatteras Superintendent Mike Murray said last summer. "If the habitat is naturally occurring there, you can't go mess it up in order to ensure access and then try to spend millions to create habitat further west. It is where it is."

The management plan, rules for which are scheduled to take effect next Wednesday, February 15, was developed after years of acrimonious debate over how to protect species such as the piping plover and five species of sea turtles from disturbance during their nesting seasons on Cape Hatteras. The plan was designed to meet both the Park Service's legal requirement to adopt an ORV management plan at the seashore, and its mandates under the Endangered Species Act to protect endangered and threatened species.

It was another lawsuit, brought in 2007 by the Southern Environmental Law Center on behalf of the National Audubon Society and Defenders of Wildlife over the lack of an ORV management plan, that forced the Park Service's hand to develop one.

Since 2008 the seashore has governed ORV use on the beaches under an interim plan approved as part of a consent decree reached in the wake of the lawsuit. Part of the interim plan allowed the Park Service to establish ORV buffers 1,000 meters wide to protect piping plover chicks; the buffer for pedestrians is 300 meters. Both buffers were retained in the management plan the Park Service wants to implement.

While Cape Hatteras Superintendent Murray tried to work with both sides in the matter to come up with a satisfactory ORV plan, one that would provide access and protect wildlife, that didn't go very well. For 18 months committees worked to find common ground, but couldn't.

“The committee worked really hard,” the superintendent said back in May 2010. “We had 11 formal meetings, which was 20 total meeting days. Every couple months there would be a two-day meeting. But we had seven subcommittees that worked on different parts of the plan. They had conference calls and subcommittee meetings and on and on and on.

“They made progress on stuff,” he went on, “but it kind of boiled down to, after all this effort, the parties on the committee were able to agree to the easy things, like speed limits, or vehicle requirements. They couldn’t agree to the hard things, like how are we going to manage ORV use in the real sensitive bird nesting areas?

“So, towards the end of the process, we created a special subcommittee, called the integration group - sort of three from each side and three sort of neutral parties - to try to work out the final recommendation for the committee to consider. And they couldn’t do it. They couldn’t agree to anything.”

In their lawsuit, the ORV interests contend that they have "advocated the protection and preservation of seashore beaches within a framework of responsible and meaningful access to the ocean beaches and sound for all users, including pedestrians and properly licensed drivers and their vehicles."

But the plan scheduled to take effect next week, they claim in their lawsuit, was “foreordained from the time that NPS began its planning process."  More so, the Park Service’s planning and environmental review process under the National Environmental Policy Act was plagued by a series of failures, the filing maintains.

Those failures, the group's press release states, include: a failure to give meaningful consideration to views, data, or information that were contrary to NPS’s desire to impose more severe restrictions on ORV access and use; a failure to look at reasonable alternatives, including smaller and more flexible buffer and closure areas; and a failure to properly assess impacts on the local economy. 

The complaint asks the court to determine that NPS acted improperly and to prevent NPS from implementing its final ORV management plan and rules.

Comments

crot,
good one, but i could say the same. if you think im having this conversation with you, the answer is no. sorry.
Lets get back to the discussion now...


We should define some terms:
Elitist:  Anybody who uses reason to solve problems rather than appeals to emotion.
Extreme environmental contingent: Anybody who thinks its reasonable to allow listed species to propogate unfettered by human disturbance and ORVs zipping through their "daycare centers".


I kind of hope CHAPA wins.  Because if they do and there is no ORV plan on the beach, all driving stops.  Per federal law driving on the beach is illegal unless there is a management plan in place.  So if they win the case, driving is banned.  Won't that be something!
After the last lawsuit, the so-called environmental extremists could have asked for a complete ban. They didn't.  All sides, including CHAPA, agreed that driving could continue with restrictions.  That plan has been in place for four years. The sky didn't fall.  Now there's an official, legally-required plan that allow driving by permits on more than half the seashore for most of the year and the usual suspects go berserk.  Seems they are the real extremists here.  


Samsdad1 I think the injunction by the ORV
organization legal arm "CHAPA" is really about ORV access not
pedestrian or alternative means of access. This has always been about ORV
access, not pedestrian access. A photo of NPS signs showing the beach closed to
vehicles and pedestrians are good spin for your side but have nothing to do
with promoting pedestrian access areas. Audubon is the real advocate of
pedestrian rights in CHNS, not the ORV access groups.

 

In the press release from OBPA where they
describe the injunction to their members "ORV" is referenced 12 times
and "pedestrian" only once. The so called access groups have always advocated
for more ORV access (never pedestrian or shuttle) near resource closures and have
at best proposed very limited, mostly seasonal, pedestrian areas in the Park.

 

Ron I've had a few discussions with Mr. Murray
and I'd say the final decision was a political decision made by Superintendent
Murray's bosses not some clandestine back room where the evil environmentalist
were twisting arms. Your sides’ views were well represented by the political
maneuverings they conducted.

 

You all (NCBBA) have never accepted that there are
other valid interests (individuals and organizations) with an agenda for this
park that encompasses more than recreational ORV access.  The
environmentalists have never denied that recreational activities or even ORV
access were not an integral part of this park. The trick and the difficulty
was/is finding a way to protect the resources and to manage CHNS like a
National Park, not like it was Dare county ORV/fishing Park. Not all of us want
to recreate in the middle of an ORV/fishing tailgate party on the beach. I
don't want you not to be able to have that experience if you choose but please
give us an equal opportunity to enjoy CHNS in a manner that we have legitimate
rights to. The proposed plan gives you the best parts of the Park and the
largest share. Why can't you all accept this?

 

And by the way I think the driving permit is:
not fair, expensive, confusing, and time consuming for anyone on vacation. I
would have rather it have been free and on line, where the driver signs that
they have read or watched the video on driving rules, have the necessary equipment,
will be responsible and agree to the rules. If the Park has to collect
money to make ends meet they should collect it from everyone and not single out
one user group. Put up an EZ pass gate at Whale Bone Junction, provide the
locals and service people year round passes and charge each vehicle a fee to
enter the Park.


What we got here is failure to communicate. And as long as judges like Boyle and whom  ever this new one will be continue to intervine we will continue to have failure to communicate. And a lot of wasted money. 


I am continuously amazed at the folks that feel a "need" to drive on the beach.  My god there is a paved road that runs parallel to the beach.  Get off your $%& #@% and walk to the beach.


SS1,
     You are always well versed and disgustingly polite. Makes it very difficult to have a decent argument with you.
     I must say that you completely lost me with your statement about "Your sides' views were well represented by the political maneuverings they conducted." If that is meant to say we won a round, i don't think we even got in a punch. I still remember hearing about the comment "How does it feel to lose, we got everything we wanted". I believe it is common knowledge that we were given the choice to except the dictates of the Southern Environmental Law Center (AS & DoW) or Judge Boyle would shut the beach down completely. Yes we did sign off on the Consent Decree. Nothing changed after that except we did not have to sign off on the final Decission.
     You state that we are getting the use of the best part of the park. Who has said you can't use the whole dang place. Not us. Shoot, you can pull up a chair next to me anytime and anywhere you want. I'll even go for a walk with you. Why do we need lines in the sand. Guess that's not good ? Sorry.
     I am pleased to see that we agree on at least one point. You state in your first paragraph to Samsdad that "This has always been about ORV access, not pedestrian access". That I agree with !00%. We were told it was about the birds. What ever happened to it being about "The Birds". It never was about the birds and everyone knows it. Audubon had to come up with something that was in one of those "Acts". As to the pedestrians, you are just wrong. My wife and I walk on the beach along with our grand children as much as we ride. We care about all pedestrians, except maybe those that don't like US. We are funny about that. It is difficult to spend much time advocating specifically for pedestrian access when we are devoting so much time to defending our promised "privilege" to drive on the beach. Please tell me of one instance when we have made a single comment in reference to limiting pedestrian access. Heck, we even had to walk in the ocean, carrying all our gear, if we wanted to get past one of the enclsures. while the NPS would drive right through it. Now, tell me that made sense. Don't even talk any more about wether we care about pedestrian access.
     As much as I would like to ask you about your take on the eradication of the hundreds of innocent wildlife, (especially when they are trying to see what effect orv and pedestrian activity have on the success of the birds), I will let that go. Some "science".
     It's been swell as usual.
     Ron (obxguys) 
 
     I


Ron,
I must say, I never understand these comments about "it's not about the birds" or "it's all about money."  When NPCA and Bluewater first petitioned a decade ago for ORV rules, it was partly about the species issues but mostly about the fact that ORV use was being allowed without proper management.  Those groups' main interest is in ensuring the protection of the parks and quality of vegetation.  When Defenders and Audubon got invovled, it was very much about the birds, some species of which had declined to extirpation at Hatteras.  As Crotalus put it above -- "piping plover pairs from 2001-2007 fledged an average of 2.3
chicks/year, since the year the Consent Decree began 2008-2011 they've
fledged an averaged of more than 9.5 chicks/year and the number of
breeding pairs has more than doubled. In 2010 fledged plover chicks
surpassed the most ever observed.

American Oystercatcher success has more than tripled and have set
equivilent records. Colonial waterbird nest numbers have increased as
well. So too sea turtle nest numbers. Odd the trends for these species
reversed at the exact time CD restrictions were put in to place."
Well, it's not odd.  Addressing this decline of nesting birds and turtles was clearly the intent and there was ample science to suggest that limiting vehicles would help.  The thing is, NPS is required to regulate ORVs not birds.  So when they make up a rule there was no way it was not going to include permits and other things that are typically part of an ORV rule, but which have at best secondary impacts on birds.  
The natural resource protection stuff, which is actually not in the rule itself that CHAPA is now challenging, is the same stuff that has been in place for the last four years.  I get that some people don't like this, but it annoys me no little bit to see motivations impugned without any basis.


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