SAVE Right Whales Act (H.R. 1568) Draws Praise, Along with Concerns
North Atlantic right whale #2743, a 22 year old male, was photographed 27 nautical miles off Nassau Sound in Florida on February 8, 2019. The white marks at the base of his flukes are scars caused by entanglement in fishing ropes, making him part of the 83% of North Atlantic right whales that have been entangled in fishing rope at least once in their lives. credit: Florida Fish and Wildlife Conservation Commission, NOAA permit #20556-01
The Scientific Assistance for Very Endangered North Atlantic Right Whales Act of 2019 or the 'SAVE Right Whales Act' (H.R. 1568) has been reintroduced in the 116th Congress. The bill calls for the funding of projects and inventions designed to help protect North Atlantic right whales from fishing rope entanglements and ship strikes and would also authorize funding for plankton surveys to gauge the food supply of North Atlantic right whales. We support the idea of more funding for projects that could help protect these whales but we are also concerned about some parts of the law. The bill states, "Subject to the availability of funds and in consultation with other Federal officials, the Secretary of Commerce (in this title referred to as the "Secretary") shall provide competitive financial assistance, including multi-year grants, for projects for the conservation of North Atlantic right whales for which project proposals are approved by the Secretary in accordance with this section." "Shall provide" appears to mean that they must provide the grants, which is better than wording like "May provide" which would mean they could or should provide the funds, but it's overshadowed by the "Subject to the availability of funds" piece. This means that the availability of funds is subject to the amount of money appropriated to the Commerce Department (the department that the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) is under) during Congressional budget negotiations. It's our understanding that this authorizes money to be given to them but doesn't ensure that it will be. The individual that would be in charge of administering this program were it to somehow to pass and be funded by Congress, Wilbur Ross - the current Commerce Secretary - has already lied to Congress on a separate issue and is under much scrutiny from government ethics groups and members of Congress for his repeated and widespread ethical problems. He was also the one overseeing the National Marine Fisheries Service (NMFS) - which is under NOAA and therefore under the Commerce Department - when they made the absurd, illegal decision to allow seismic blasting on the east coast of the US. Their decision to allow the blasting violates the Endangered Species Act, the Marine Mammal Protection Act and the National Environmental Policy Act and is being challenged in federal court by multiple environmental and animal protection groups along with 16 coastal communities in South Carolina and the South Carolina Small Business Chamber of Commerce with the support of ten East Coast attorneys general. We are concerned about the Secretary and his office possibly refusing to follow H.R. 1568 at all in light of the fact that an agency that he is supposed to be overseeing is violating three federal laws in their approval of seismic blasting.
Scientific research on endangered species conducted by the NMFS is also being repressed at the urging of pesticide industry lobbyists, undermining the credibility of anything released by the agency at this time and causing the public to question if there is anything else being repressed regarding any other issues. The newly proposed NOAA budget for fiscal year 2020 [PDF] that the Commerce Department has just released also makes us seriously question how the Commerce Department can claim to care about the protection of endangered species as the budget cuts many crucial programs for them.
$4,000,000 is slated to be cut from the John H. Prescott Marine Mammal Rescue Assistance Grant Program, eliminating it entirely, about $2,600,000 from the Endangered Species Act and Marine Mammal Protection Act permitting process and $1,000,000 in funding for research and monitoring of North Atlantic right whales and the threats they face from the fishing and shipping industries.
Also, in the PDF of the budget we linked to, the amounts being cut for these programs are listed in the thousands, possibly in attempt to lessen the impact it will have on readers to make people think they're not cutting as much (similar to saying something costs $99.99 to try to lessen the impact that a $100 price tag might have). For example, if only $1,000 was being cut from a program then it would say $1 is being cut as in one set of $1,000. The right whale research section says only $1,000 is being cut but $1,000 x $1,000 = $1,000,000.
Our full report on this legislation can be found on our website: Protect Right Whales: SAVE Right Whales Act (H.R. 1568) Draws Praise, Along with Concerns