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Fur flies in lynx survey investigation
By
Mike Soraghan
Denver Post Washington
Bureau
Thursday,
March 07, 2002 - WASHINGTON - Federal biologists were not trying to
block access to national forest land when they sent fake lynx fur to a lab as
part of a survey to protect the cats' habitat, according to investigators and
agency heads.
But
one group of investigators said the scientists' behavior showed "bad judgment,
an absence of scientific rigor and several troubling policy issues."
Still, congressional Republicans aren't accepting the biologists' explanation
that they were simply trying to test the lab.
"That's like Mohammed Atta saying he was trying to test airline security,"
Rep. Greg Walden, R-Ore., said during a House Resources Committee hearing on the
lynx survey.
And Rep. Scott McInnis, R-Colo., who has led the investigation into what he
calls the "Lynx Survey Seven," still wants to know why the employees weren't
punished more severely
"I'm still bewildered that these employees received a bonus and a pay
increase," McInnis said.
The Canada lynx has been deemed threatened in 16 Western states, including
Colorado. In 1999, an interagency task force including the Forest Service, Fish
and Wildlife Service and state wildlife officials began a survey to figure out
where the tuft-eared cats live and how to protect them. In areas where lynx are
found, logging and snowmobiling could be banned.
But a handful of biologists working on the survey in national forests in
Washington state sent the lab tufts of hair from captive lynx, essentially
"planting" samples.
The biologists say they were submitting "control samples" to determine
whether the lab hired for the survey could detect lynx. The "unauthorized
samples" were discovered after a Forest Service employee called the lab on his
last day on the job. The biologists involved were taken off the survey and
"counseled" by their agencies.
But that wasn't enough for some Westerners. McInnis has called for the
biologists to be fired. And the case has reinforced the beliefs of Western
critics of federal land agencies, for whom it proves the long-held suspicion
that green-oriented federal scientists have an agenda to run people and industry
off public lands.
Some environmental groups countered that the scientists were justified
because the Forest Service has been ignoring evidence of lynx. Congressional
Democrats say the scientists showed bad judgment but say the problem is not
widespread.
Investigators said the biologists likely would have deceived the lab, but
Mark Rey, the Bush administration's top official overseeing the Forest Service,
said that would have simply led to another survey done by different scientists.
"If their intent was to expand the range of the lynx, what they did would not
have gotten them there," said Rey.
Rey said that his agency is still investigating the case and that it's
premature to draw firm conclusions.
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