Agency Sued for Issuing Permit to Harm, Kill Threatened Owl

The US Fish and Wildlife Service unlawfully issued a California landowner a permit to harm and kill northern spotted owls, the Environmental Protection Information Center alleged in a federal lawsuit.

The “incidental take permit” allows Sierra Pacific Industries, the nation’s largest private landowner, to harass, harm, or kill the threatened owl during logging operations on approximately 1.5 million acres in California over 50 years.

But EPIC says that the biological opinion supporting the permit was faulty because it concluded that the take permit wasn’t likely to jeopardize the existence of the northern spotted owl or harm its critical habitat. The ...