Bye Bye Birdie

phainopepla

The Trump Administration will no longer enforce the Migratory Bird Treaty Act in case of incidental avian mortality. Of course they won't. 

This act helps to protect birds from large scale acts of industrial malfeasance and negligence. 

The MBTA was passed in 1918 in response to public outcry over the mass slaughter of birds, which threatened egrets and other species with extirpation.
The law prohibits killing or harming birds except under certain conditions, including managed hunting seasons for game species.
And the law protects more than 1,000 bird species in part because it requires industries implement best management practices — like covering tar pits and marking transmission lines.

I found this information on the Wisconsin Gazette website.

• Power lines kill up to 175 million birds per year.
• Communication towers kill up to 50 million birds per year.
• Oil waste pits kill 500,000 to 1 million birds per year.
• Gas flares: Audubon says there are no reliable mortality estimates, but just one incident, in 2013 in Canada, resulted in the incineration of an estimated 7,500 birds.

Of course not all deaths can be avoided and many are accidental. I am sure that very few people are happy about killing birds. But industry doesn't want to have any rules apply apparently until a species is facing extinction. Figures.

 ...Kathleen Sgamma, president of Western Energy Alliance, said her organization applauded the Department of the Interior’s decision overturning "a last-minute maneuver by the Obama Administration just 10 days before President Trump took office.
She said in a statement that the decision restored the rule of law and "the MBTA was abused by the Obama administration, in this case to apply Endangered Species Act-type liability for impacts to birds that are not listed as threatened or endangered. Those restrictions that reduce jobs and economic opportunity are justified when birds are truly threatened or endangered and any impact can threaten their survival, but not for species that are not."

Once again this administration surrenders to the industrial lobby and against preserving the environment.