Lawsuit Targets Utah Highway Through Protected Conservation Lands, Threatened Tortoise Habitat biologicaldiversity.org - get the latest breaking news, showbiz & celebrity photos, sport news & rumours, viral videos and top stories from biologicaldiversity.org Daily Mail and Mail on Sunday newspapers.
Seven environmental groups filed a lawsuit Thursday against the U.S. Department of the Interior and the Bureau of Land Management over St. George s Northern Corridor Highway project. The plan to pave a 4-lane, 4.5 mile road across land that had been designated as protected habitat for the Mojave desert tortoise was approved late in the Trump administration, in what environmentalists say was a rushed and illegal move.
The plaintiffs, led by the local nonprofit Conserve Southwest Utah, take issue with the BLM s assessment of how recent wildfires in the Red Cliffs National Conservation Area may have changed the level of risk of the project to tortoises, with what they say was illegal use of Land and Water Conservation Funds to facilitate the project and with a lack of serious consideration of highway alternatives.
ST. GEORGE An area in Washington County known for its higher density of the threatened Mojave Desert tortoises is expanding.
The Utah Division of Wildlife Resources announced Tuesday that about 23 acres of land were donated toward the Red Cliffs Desert Reserve. In addition to the donation, the agency reports that another 30 acres were acquired through an Endangered Species Mitigation Fund, giving the reserve an additional 53 acres.
The new land additions were acquired through the help of the Utah Department of Natural Resources, Washington County, and The Nature Conservancy a national land conservation nonprofit. The private property acquired was one of the largest remaining private properties within the reserve, according to DWR biologist Ann McLuckie.