Real Estate/Development
May 30, 2001
Home Improvement?
As suggested in the title of his article, "Habitat Hindrance: Mushrooming Federal Interference Dooms Development in State," (Forum, Feb. 14), Robert Thornton fears that the "federalization" of local land uses will doom California's ability to provide affordable housing to meet the needs of a growing population.
As suggested in the title of his article, "Habitat Hindrance: Mushrooming Federal Interference Dooms Development in State," (Forum, Feb. 14), Robert Thornton fears that the "federalization" of local land uses will doom California's ability to provide affordable housing to meet the needs of a growing population.
The main culprit, in his view, is the rising number of "critical-habitat" designations under the Endangered Species Act.
"If current trends continue," he warns, "the critical-habitat designations will doom any hope of providing adequate and affordable housing for the state's growing population." Adding insult to injury, he states that this new federal assault is "the product of a well-financed environmental litigation strategy."
Thornton informs us that California's home-ownership rate is only 56 percent of the national average. There is no reason to doubt the validity of that figure, and there are certainly those who cannot afford to purchase homes of their own. However, what is the value of a statistic that compares a national home-ownership rate to that which exists in California?
Comparing home-ownership rates in California to those of Wyoming or Montana or North Dakota does next to nothing to advance our knowledge or understanding of the housing crisis in California. The reality and severity of the existing and looming housing shortage in California is beyond dispute. Government and community leaders throughout the state have been sounding the alarm for years.
In joining the fray, Thornton should be commended for his civic-minded concerns about the plight of Californians who are unable to obtain decent, affordable housing. Unfortunately, however, his focus is too narrow, and the target of his attack implicates an even more important crisis facing the people of California, along with the rest of the world.
Specifically, Thornton objects to the implementation of what he claims to be a new and unreasonable standard of protection with regard to what constitutes an "adverse modification" to critical habitat. To demonstrate his point, Thornton states, with a palpable degree of outrage, that California has the most federally protected endangered species, 275 in all, of any state in the nation, with the exception of Hawaii.
Taken out of context, or in this case, taken with no context at all, that number could be considered high. On the other hand, California is one of the richest and most biologically diverse regions on the planet, containing within its borders at least four major types of ecological systems. It also is the nation's third-largest state in land mass, behind only Alaska and Texas. California also is the most populous state in the nation.
In such a vast, biologically rich and highly populated area, it should come as no surprise that California is home to a disproportionate number of plant and animal species and that the many species and the habitats in which they live are under greater pressure than in many other parts of the country.
A quick search on the Internet shows that 5,000 species of plants are native to California. That number exceeds the number of plants you will find in the entire northeastern United States and all of Canada combined, an area 10 times larger than California. Approximately one-third of those plants are found nowhere else in the world.
There are also 961 invertebrates that are native to California, 65 percent of which are found nowhere else on the planet. Those figures notwithstanding, assuming for a moment that Thornton is right and that 275 is just too many, what course of action would he propose? A "one state, one endangered species" policy? Perhaps that would satisfy Thornton's sense of fairness and proportionality.
Next, maybe the states could trade "endangered species" credits with one another, and if enough credits are accumulated, a state may eliminate all restrictions relating to endangered species within its borders. One final side note on California's report card on preserving the environment: wetlands once covered five million acres in California. Today, that number is 529,000.
With respect to Thornton's point of reference, the state of Hawaii, unofficially known among biologists as the "endangered species capital of the world," has, as of Jan. 1999, already witnessed the extinction of 24 different species of birds, 97 different types of plants and 74 different types of insects (which does not include 72 different types of snails alone).
Who cares about the disappearance of a bunch of snails? I am no scientist, but I would guess that the tremendous variety of species is the reflection of an extraordinarily rich and complex ecosystem. Around the world, ecosystems like those in Hawaii that have taken millions of years to evolve are being decimated in a matter of mere centuries and soon will be destroyed in mere decades.
Thornton finds the acts of the federal government alarming. His concerns, however, seem insignificant when compared to the astounding rate at which our natural environment is being destroyed. In the history of our planet, there have been five "mass" extinctions, wherein some catastrophic event caused the extinction of a major percentage of the planet's species, the last one being caused by a meteor that ended the reign of the dinosaurs 65 million years ago.
In a survey released in 1999 that was commissioned by New York's American Museum of Natural History, seven out of 10 of the scientists polled said they believed that a sixth "mass" extinction was under way. More alarming yet is that current extinction rates rival and may exceed those of the five prior mass extinctions. According to one scientist, the speed at which species are being lost today is "much faster than any we've seen in the past - including those [extinctions] related to meteor collisions."
The current extinction rate is approaching 1,000 times greater than the background rate during the last 65 million years, and scientists fear that during the next century that figure may climb to 10,000 times the background rate. Distinguishing the present mass extinction from those of the past is the fact that today's extinctions are entirely due to the activities of a single species. As one environmental consultant points out, in the history of life on this planet, human beings are the sole species to have the capacity to cause the mass extinction of other species in such a fashion.
Thornton is concerned about housing, and no one is suggesting that he should not be. We should all be concerned about it. If current trends, like the designation of critical habitat, continue, he warns, housing prices and rents will rise, commutes will lengthen and development will be forced into prime agricultural land. His conclusions are troubling.
But in attacking the statutory designation of critical habitat, Thornton disregards an even more startling trend, one having implications and consequences that are global in scale. According to a paper released in 1999 by the International Botanical Congress, if the depletion of tropical forests continues at current rates, only 5 percent will remain within 50 years. As a result, one-third to two-thirds of all species of plants, animals and other organisms will be lost in the second half of the 21st century, a loss that would "easily equal those of past [mass] extinctions."
Granted, we are not talking about tropical forests in California, but we are talking about the same process of destroying species and habitat, of which California is home to an unusual abundance and variety.
The current housing crisis demands attention. Any solution to the problem, however, must be conceived within the framework of a balancing of interests that recognizes the historic imbalance that has been heavily weighted in favor of development at the expense of the environment.
"Housing" must be viewed from a broader perspective. Forgive the tree-hugging sentimentality, but earth is our only home. As pointed out by a noted biologist, the types of organisms that most benefit from the destruction of natural habitat and ecosystems are weeds, rats and insects. It stands to reason that if we continue to destroy the natural environment at current rates, decent housing will not be available anywhere and we will have to begin looking for another planet to destroy.
Proposed as a step to ameliorate the current housing shortage, Thornton's attack on the designation of critical habitat is misplaced, lacking in creativity and woefully out of step with the opinions of a majority of Americans who increasingly place greater priority on the preservation of the environment.
With respect to the Endangered Species Act, according to a poll conducted in 1999 by the University of Arizona, 84 percent of Americans supported the act. Of that number, 35 percent believed that the law, as it then existed, should stay the same. An even larger percentage, 49 percent, thought that the act should be strengthened.
Thornton is fighting a good fight, but he has chosen the wrong opponent.
Steven Korbin is a Los Angeles real estate attorney.
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