On Monday, lawyers representing the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service argued before a federal appeals court in Denver, hoping to reverse a decision made by a federal judge in Utah striking down the Service’s jurisdiction to regulate Utah Prairie Dog populations on private land within the state.
People for the Ethical Treatment of Property Owners, a collection of Iron County interests, filed suit against the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service asserting that under the Endangered Species Act, the feds do not have jurisdiction to regulate the Utah Prairie Dog on private lands.
Damian Schiff of the Pacific Legal Foundation, who represented PETPO laid out the rationale:
“So we know that the federal government is a government of limited powers. We know that the Endangered Species Act is supposed to be a regulation of interstate commerce. So what that means is that species that are protected under that act, have to have some connection to interstate commerce. Meaning that they have to potential commodities or actual commodities that have value, and they have to travel across state lines. With the Utah Prairie Dog though, you have a species that’s only found in a few counties here in Utah, and more importantly does not have any economic value.”
In November U.S. District Judge Dee Benson, in a sixteen-page ruling, agreed. A decision on the appeal is expected later this fall.