Ocean Sentry
The U.S. government failed to meet its legal deadline Wednesday for issuing a final rule providing additional protections for loggerhead sea turtles, whose populations have faced severe declines over the past decade. The rule is required as a result of 2007 legal petitions by Oceana, the Center for Biological Diversity and the Turtle Island Restoration Network urging the National Marine Fisheries Service and the Fish and Wildlife Service to change the status of North Pacific and northwest Atlantic loggerheads from “threatened” to the more protective “endangered” classification under the Endangered Species Act.
“It is disgraceful that after more than three years and in the face of overwhelming evidence the government has yet to address this critical issue,” said Eric Bilsky, assistant general counsel and senior litigator at Oceana.
On March 16, 2010, the government proposed to list loggerheads as endangered in response to a court-ordered settlement over prior delays. It has now failed to take timely action by missing the legal deadline to issue a final rule within one year…
Source: Center for Biological Diversity
