Judge orders feds to decide on California spotted owl protections by April

U.S. Fish and Wildlife can no longer delay its final listing determination for the bird species and must "do more with less," a federal judge ruled.SAN JOSE, Calif. (CN) — A federal judge ruled Monday that the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service has six months to make a final decision on listing the California spotted owl for protection under the Endangered Species Act, after several years of delays prompted the Center for Biological Diversity to sue the service.U.S. District Judge Eumi K. Lee considered a basic question in granting in part the center’s motion for summary judgment: “By what date should the court order [Fish and Wildlife] to satisfy its statutory duty to issue a final listing determination for the California spotted owl?” she noted in her 16-page ruling.Lee, a Joe Biden appointee, landed on April 30, 2027, far later than Nov. 19, 2026, the date the center, an environmental nonprofit that often sues government agencies to advance protections for vulnerable species, had originally suggested.“Whether FWS should be able to satisfy its statutory obligation in less than a month does not indicate that FWS is able to do so as a matter of fact,” Lee wrote. “Because there is no indication that a final rule submitted in less than thirty days from this order would withstand future judicial scrutiny, ordering such rapid relief may be self-defeating.”Still, the six-month deadline is sooner than the proposed date of May 10, 2028, the service argued was the soonest it would be able to make a final listing determination for the owl, citing budget constraints and a workload made heavier by a settlement with the center that requires the service to make final listing determinations for 76 species in the next four years.“FWS first contends that completing the final listing determination for the California spotted owl before May 10, 2028, is infeasible because of the agency’s resources and existing court-ordered deadlines,” Lee wrote. “The court is not persuaded.”As part of the settlement with the service, the center agreed not to sue the service over missed Endangered Species Act statutory deadlines for no more than two species per fiscal year, and only “if the center determines that the species faces an imminent risk of extinction.” The center sued the service over the California spotted owl’s final listing determination in November 2025.The California spotted owl is a raptor species that has been in need of protection for over two decades, the center said, because its habitat is old-growth forests in the Sierra Nevada and its small populations in Central and Southern California are threatened by human encroachment and logging.“The current administration has launched a full-scale attack on America’s national forests,” Greg Loarie, Earthjustice attorney representing the center, said in an email to Courthouse News. “This ruling gives us hope that the California spotted owl will receive the protection it so urgently needs to survive the assault and one day recover.”At a hearing for the motion on Oct. 28, the service said it would need more time to address 50 public comments made in 2023 about the owl’s proposed listing but didn’t say how much time it would need. Lee said in her order that six months should be enough time to go through the comments and complete an internal review for approval.An attorney representing the service did not immediately respond to a request for comment.Subscribe to our free newslettersOur weekly newsletter Closing Arguments offers the latest about ongoing trials, major litigation and rulings in courthouses around the U.S. and the world, while the monthly Under the Lights dishes the legal dirt from Hollywood, sports, Big Tech and the arts.Additional Reads