Florida Republicans Are Killing Panthers For Money

Sadly, this week a panther was hit and killed by an automobile in Collier County, Florida. In this year alone, 17 panthers have been killed by Florida drivers. If this isn’t morbid enough, the fact is that an estimated 100 to 180 wild panthers are left, and Florida motorists are responsible for ten percent of big cat deaths.

In 2014, drivers in Florida killed 24 wild panthers, according to statistics maintained by the Florida Fish & Wildlife Conservation Commission. The number one cause of panther death is presently auto collisions, and, to bring us all the way down, Florida drivers are responsible for about two-thirds of all panther deaths, every single year. This is a growing phenomenon.

WILL ANYONE SAVE THE PANTHERS?

The Conservation Commission isn’t even worried about this growing statistic, mayhaps because that’s all this amounts to in the bureaucratic maze such organizations usually devolve into. A Growing Statistic.

Of similar persuasion, the Conservation Commission is presently considering a proposal introduced by a member who happens to own a cattle ranch settled amidst panther country, and it is slated to reduce measures taken to protect these beautiful felines.

“Panther populations are straining and currently exceed the tolerance of landowners, residents and recreationists in the region,” the woman’s memo reads. The memo even goes so far as to reconsider panthers’ current designation as “endangered,” under the federal Endangered Species Act.

WHY ARE WE LETTING PANTHERS DIE

However, per present law, there must be a minimum of three healthy panther populations of 240 individuals each for the government to legally reconsider the status of panthers apropos endangered. This problem in setting up two more panther populations seems to also be the very reason the Conservation Commission is quitting on the panthers.

“The current recovery criteria are aspirational rather than practical in nature,” announced the Commission. “Under this federal recovery plan, Florida will never be able to accomplish the goals necessary to recover panther populations to a point where the subspecies can be delisted.” This proposal asks the state of Florida to cease its supply of additional staff and funding to the greater conservation plan.

THE PUBLIC RESPONSE TO ENDANGERED ANIMALS’ DEATHS

The public outrage has become rather vociferous as of late. The Tampa Bay Times point out that the proposal’s claim that panther populations have “exceeded carrying capacity” for their effective conservation range was openly mocked by scientists. The Times quoted a panther biologist named Darryl Land, who opined that “there is no science supporting the statement about ‘exceeding carrying capacity.’”

SHAMELESS INDIVIDUALISM

Liesa Priddy, the rancher behind the anti-panther proposal, was appointed to the Conservation Commission by Republican Governor Rick Scott just two years ago, in 2012. Her defense is that her ranch lost 10 calves to panthers over the last few years, collectively a $10,000 investment down the panthers’ collective hatches. Yet she oddly claims that there’s no conflict in interest between Nature Conservation and her desire to rescind panther protection regulations. “I don’t see anything in policy that’s going to benefit me personally,” admitted Priddy to the Tampa Bay Times.

Priddy has twice as many cattle (400!) on her ranch as there are panthers in the entire state of Florida. If this is not enough to trigger scowls, the state of Florida already has a plan to compensate ranchers for any losses sustained by big cat appetite. If completed, the plan would pay each rancher a yearly stipend based on the amount of acreage they own and the costs of land management practice.

Contra these significant steps seem to be passing over Priddy and the Conservation Commission’s collective heads in Preterite fashion, for now they’re proposing to abandon the present federal conservation strategy before the state’s compensation plan can even be tested. Perhaps out of an ironically politically conservative madness, a few commission members even suggest that the panther population is swelling, that they must be cut down, that their reign must be stopped; “[w]e are not talking about having a hunt,” Commission Director Nick Wiley attempted to acquiesce to the Wall Street Journal. But “we might have to euthanize an animal from time to time.”


 

PERHAPS REPUBLICANS WILL BE SATED WITH THIS: