The Rocky Mountain Elk Foundation supports a bill recently passed by the House Natural Resources Committee that delists grizzly bears in the Greater Yellowstone Ecosystem.
House Bill 281 reinstates the original 2017 U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service (USFWS) rule placing the species under control of state management. The USFWS reaffirmed the ruling in 2018, and RMEF filed a judgement brief in support of the decision. However, a judge vacated the ruling and placed grizzlies back on the endangered species list.
In 2007, the Department of Interior first announced a rule to delist Yellowstone-area grizzly bears, a decision litigated by environmental groups and later overturned by a federal judge in 2009.
The new bill prohibits additional judicial review.
Yellowstone grizzly bears were listed as threatened under the Endangered Species Act in 1975 with an estimated population of less than 150. The population surpassed recovery goals three decades later. Today, the population numbers more than 1,000 and has expanded its range into locations not previously seen in modern times.
There is also a companion bill in the Senate.
Now that the House Natural Resources Committee passed the bill, it may go before the full House of Representatives for debate and then the Senate. If both approve, it will be sent to President Trump for his signature and enactment.
RMEF has long maintained that state wildlife agencies should manage grizzlies where they are recovered, just as they manage elk, black bears, deer, moose, mountain lions and other species in line with the North American Wildlife Conservation Model.
(Photo credit: U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service)