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Thursday, July 28, 2011

House Committee Holds Legislative Hearing on Pierluisi Bill to Protect Marine Turtles in Danger of Extinction

WASHINGTON, DC- A Subcommittee of the House Committee on Natural Resources held a legislative hearing today on a bill introduced by Resident Commissioner Pedro Pierluisi, which would authorize the allocation of $5 million annually over each of the next six years to protect endangered marine turtles in Puerto Rico, other areas of the United States, and around the world.

“As Puerto Rico’s representative in Congress, I have a particularly keen interest in—and special appreciation for—marine turtles. At least four of the seven species of marine turtles are found in Puerto Rico’s waters or nest on our beaches. Those turtle species are: the Leatherback, the Hawksbill, the Green Turtle, and the Loggerhead. Indeed, all of the coastal waters surrounding Culebra Island and Mona Island in Puerto Rico are designated as ‘critical habitats’ by the federal government,” said Pierluisi in his opening statement before the Subcommittee.

There is currently a program administered by the U.S. Department of the Interior that supports partnerships and projects around the world to protect threatened marine turtles. This is because in 2004, in the face of declining marine turtle populations worldwide, Congress enacted the Marine Turtle Conservation Act. This Act, which expired at the end of 2009, authorized the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service to use a small amount of federal funding to support conservation efforts aimed at saving threatened marine turtles. The Resident Commissioner’s bill would reauthorize this program for an additional six years.

Since its inception in 2005, the program has been highly successful. Hundreds of applications have competed for $5.9 million in appropriated funds, which in turn helped secure an additional $8.6 million in non-federal funds. This program has served to position the United States as the world’s leader in marine turtle conservation.

“Mindful of the difficult fiscal environment, the bill I have introduced would reauthorize this program from 2012 to 2017 at current funding levels. Importantly, the bill would amend existing law to allow the Fish and Wildlife Service to award grants for conservation projects within the United States and its territories, a power the agency does not presently possess. This approach would ensure that federal support is available to conserve the six species of marine turtles listed under the Endangered Species Act, all of which nest on U.S. beaches or are found in U.S. waters,” said Pierluisi.

Testifying at the hearing was biologist Carlos E. Diez, representing Puerto Rico’s Department of Natural and Environmental Resources, who spoke in support of Pierluisi’s bill after observing that “all species of sea turtles are threatened or endangered due to direct and indirect impacts of human intervention.”

Federal funding has “allowed us to not only protect these species, but also to understand basic information such as age to sexual maturity, population genetics and migration. The last one is quite important, since it give us the data of where these turtles were going after nesting or from where this turtles came from in our feeding grounds (typically reefs or sea grass beds),” Diez explained in his written testimony.

The U.S. actor Ian Somerhalder, who appeared in the television series “Lost,” also testified in favor of Pierluisi’s legislation, at the invitation of the Wildlife Conservation Society.