Source: s3://data.kl3m.ai/documents/govinfo/USCOURTS/USCOURTS-caDC-11-05128/USCOURTS-caDC-11-05128-0/pdf.json

Nature of Suit Code: 893
Nature of Suit: Environmental Matters
Cause of Action: 

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United States Court of Appeals

FOR THE DISTRICT OF COLUMBIA CIRCUIT

Argued January 24, 2012 Decided August 17, 2012

No. 11-5128

FRIENDS OF BLACKWATER, ET AL.,

APPELLEES

v.

KENNETH LEE SALAZAR, SECRETARY, U.S. DEPARTMENT OF 

THE INTERIOR, AND DANIEL M. ASHE, DIRECTOR, U.S. FISH 

AND WILDLIFE SERVICE,

APPELLANTS

Appeal from the United States District Court

for the District of Columbia

(No. 1:09-cv-02122)

Robert J. Lundman, Attorney, U.S. Department of 

Justice, argued the cause for appellants. With him on the 

briefs were Ellen J. Durkee and Matthew Littleton, Attorneys. 

M. Reed Hopper was on the brief for amicus curiae 

Pacific Legal Foundation in support of appellant.

Jessica Almy argued the cause for appellees. With her on 

the brief were Eric R. Glitzenstein and Howard M. Crystal.

Before: ROGERS and KAVANAUGH, Circuit Judges, and 

GINSBURG, Senior Circuit Judge.

USCA Case #11-5128 Document #1389720 Filed: 08/17/2012 Page 1 of 47
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Opinion for the Court filed by Senior Circuit Judge 

GINSBURG.

Dissenting opinion filed by Circuit Judge ROGERS.

GINSBURG, Senior Circuit Judge: The Secretary of the 

Interior appeals the district court’s grant of summary 

judgment to the Friends of Blackwater et al. The district court 

held the Fish and Wildlife Service, an agency in the 

Department of the Interior, violated the Endangered Species 

Act by removing the West Virginia Northern Flying Squirrel 

from the list of endangered species when several criteria in

the agency’s Recovery Plan for the species had not been 

satisfied. We hold the district court erred by interpreting the 

Recovery Plan as binding the Secretary in his delisting 

decision. Because we also reject the Friends’ alternative 

arguments that the Service’s action was arbitrary, capricious,

and contrary to law, we reverse the judgment of the district 

court.

I. Background

The West Virginia 

Northern Flying 

Squirrel (Glaucomys 

sabrinus fuscus) is one 

of 25 distinct 

subspecies of the 

Northern Flying 

Squirrel. It is a 

“small, nocturnal, 

gliding mammal[]” 

with a “long, broad, 

flattened tail ..., prominent eyes, and dense, silky fur” that

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lives in West Virginia and Virginia. U.S. FISH AND WILDLIFE 

SERVICE, APPALACHIAN NORTHERN FLYING SQUIRRELS 

RECOVERY PLAN 1–3 (Sept. 24, 1990). Despite its name, the 

flying squirrel cannot fly; but the patagia, or folds of skin, that 

stretch between its arms and legs allow it to glide for a 

distance when it leaps from a tree branch. Historically, its 

habitat consisted of the spruce-fir and northern hardwood 

forests of the southern Appalachian Mountains. Id. at 2, 6. In 

1985, when scientists had documented only ten living

squirrels, the Fish and Wildlife Service concluded it was 

endangered*

 * Section 4(a)(1) of the Endangered Species Act states the 

“Secretary [of the Interior] shall” make a determination a species 

(or subspecies, see 16 U.S.C. § 1532(16)) is endangered “because 

of any of the following factors”: 

and suggested that, although the squirrels’

(A) the present or threatened destruction, modification, or 

curtailment of its habitat or range; 

(B) overutilization for commercial, recreational, scientific, 

or educational purposes; 

(C) disease or predation; 

(D) the inadequacy of existing regulatory mechanisms; or 

(E) other natural or manmade factors affecting its continued 

existence. 

16 U.S.C. § 1533(a)(1). The Act requires the Secretary to make his 

determination “solely on the basis of the best scientific and 

commercial data available to him.” Id. § 1533(b)(1)(A). In 

addition, the Secretary “shall ... determine on the basis of [a 

quinquennial] review whether any such species should ... be 

removed from [the list of endangered species] ... in accordance with 

the provisions of subsections (a) and (b) of this section.” Id. §

1533(c)(2)(B). The Secretary has delegated his responsibilities 

under the Act, as relevant here, to the Fish and Wildlife Service, 50 

C.F.R. § 402.01(b), and so we refer to the Secretary and the agency 

interchangeably.

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population “may have been declining since the Pleistocene, ... 

[t]heir decline ha[d] probably been accelerated through 

clearing of forests and other disturbances by people.” 50 Fed. 

Reg. 26,999, 26,999 (July 1, 1985).

As required by § 4(f) of the Endangered Species Act, 16 

U.S.C. § 1533(f), the Service created a recovery plan for the 

“conservation and survival” of the squirrel,

* enumerating the 

following “criteria which, when met, would result in a 

determination ... that the species be removed from the list” of 

endangered species, id. § 1533(f)(1)(B)(ii): 

1. [S]quirrel populations are stable or 

expanding ... in a minimum of 80% of all 

Geographic Recovery Areas [GRAs]

designated for the subspecies, 

2. [S]ufficient ecological data and timber 

management data have been accumulated 

to assure future protection and 

management ...

3. GRAs are managed in perpetuity to ensure:

(a) sufficient habitat ... and (b) habitat 

corridors ... [and] 

 * Section 4(f)(1) provides: “The Secretary, in developing and 

implementing recovery plans, shall, to the maximum extent 

practicable ... incorporate in each plan ... objective, measurable 

criteria which, when met, would result in a determination, in 

accordance with the provisions of this section, that the species be 

removed from the list.” Id. § 1533(f)(1). Relatedly, § 4(f)(4) 

provides the “Secretary shall ... provide public notice and an 

opportunity for public review and comment” on any new plan or 

revision to an existing plan. Id. § 1533(f)(4).

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4. [T]he existence of the high elevation 

forests on which the squirrels depend is not 

itself threatened by introduced pests ... or 

by environmental pollutants .... 

Recovery Plan at 18.

In 2002, the Service hired a biologist to investigate the 

possibility of removing the squirrel from the list of 

endangered species, and the next year began to draft its fiveyear review of the squirrel’s status. In the review, published 

in 2006, the Service concluded the Recovery Plan, which had 

been created in 1990, “d[id] not have up to date recovery 

criteria,” and the squirrel did “not meet the definition of 

endangered or threatened” because it “persist[ed] throughout 

its historic range.” U.S. FISH AND WILDLIFE SERVICE, WEST 

VIRGINIA NORTHERN FLYING SQUIRREL 5-YEAR REVIEW:

SUMMARY AND EVALUATION 5, 20 (April 2006). Whereas 

only ten squirrels had been sighted at the time of the original 

listing in 1985, by 2006 scientists had captured 1,063 

individual squirrels at 107 sites, id. at 7, which suggested to 

the Secretary the population was robust, see U.S. FISH AND 

WILDLIFE SERVICE, ANALYSIS OF RECOVERY PLAN CRITERIA 

FOR THE WEST VIRGINIA NORTHERN FLYING SQUIRREL 3

(Dec. 18, 2007).

Later in 2006 the Service proposed to remove the squirrel 

from the list of endangered species. See 71 Fed. Reg. 75,924

(Dec. 19, 2006). The agency explained the squirrel no longer 

faced any of the threats listed in § 4(a)(1) of the Act so as to 

warrant its continued designation as either endangered or 

threatened. Id. at 75,925–29. With regard to the 1990 

Recovery Plan, it said that because the “recovery criteria do 

not specifically address the five threat factors used for ... 

delisting a species,” the plan “does not provide an explicit 

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reference point for determining the appropriate legal status 

of” the squirrel. Id. at 75,925. In any event, such plans “are 

not regulatory documents and are instead intended to provide 

guidance to the Service, States, and other partners on methods 

of minimizing threats to listed species and on criteria that may 

be used to determine when recovery is achieved.” Id. at 

75,924–25. The Service emphasized its view that delisting 

the squirrel was appropriate because, among other things, 

“long-term nest box monitoring data provide[d] strong 

evidence of [its] continued presence throughout its range,” id. 

at 75,926, and “habitat trends [were] moving in a positive 

direction in terms of forest regeneration and conservation,” id.

at 75,927.

Various scientists and conservation groups filed 

comments criticizing the Service’s use of “persistence,”

which it defined as “continuing captures of [a species or 

subspecies] over multiple generations at previously 

documented sites throughout the historical range,” 73 Fed. 

Reg. 50,226, 50,227 (Aug. 26, 2008) (“Delisting Rule”), to

gauge the squirrel’s recovery; the measure could not provide 

estimates of population levels or trends and, they pointed out,

persistence so defined could not rule out the possibility the 

squirrel’s population was declining.

In its final rule delisting the squirrel the Service 

responded to these comments as follows: The data showing 

persistence across 80 percent of the squirrel’s historic range 

were simply “not indicative of a declining population.” Id. at 

50,227. Data for the remaining 20 percent need not indicate a 

lack of persistence because the squirrels are “elusive and hard 

to capture.” Id.

The Friends of Blackwater filed a complaint in the 

district court claiming (1) promulgation of the Delisting Rule 

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violated the Endangered Species Act by ignoring the 

objective, measurable criteria in the Recovery Plan and (2) the 

Rule itself was arbitrary and capricious because it was not 

based upon the best available science. The district court 

entered summary judgment for the plaintiff, Friends of 

Blackwater v. Salazar, 772 F. Supp. 2d 232 (D.D.C. 2011), on 

the ground the Service was bound by the criteria in the 

Recovery Plan and its decision to delist the squirrel without 

following those criteria therefore constituted a revision to that 

plan, made without going through notice and comment

rulemaking as required by the Act, id. at 241–42. In a 

footnote, the court also directed the agency on remand to 

modify its analysis of the statutory factors relevant to 

delisiting “to the extent the agency’s decision [to delist] was 

based on an analysis that did not separately assess the 

adequacy of existing regulatory mechanisms,” as required by 

§ 4(a)(1)(D) of the Act. Id. at 245 n.17. The district court 

vacated the Delisting Rule, id. at 245, and the Service

appealed to this court.

II. Analysis

In a case like the present one, “where the district court 

was reviewing an agency rulemaking under the 

Administrative Procedure Act ... we review the administrative 

record directly.” Troy Corp. v. Browner, 120 F.3d 277, 281 

(D.C. Cir. 1997) (internal quotation marks and citation 

omitted). We review the Secretary’s interpretation of the 

statute under the familiar two-step framework from Chevron 

U.S.A. Inc. v. Natural Resources Defense Council, Inc., 467 

U.S. 837 (1984). At Step One, the court asks “if the statute 

unambiguously forecloses the agency’s interpretation,” Nat’l 

Cable & Telecomms. Ass’n v. FCC, 567 F.3d 659, 663 (D.C. 

Cir. 2009); if it does not, then at Step Two “we defer to the 

administering agency’s interpretation as long as it reflects ‘a 

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permissible construction of the statute,’” Sherley v. Sebelius, 

644 F.3d 388, 393 (D.C. Cir. 2011) (quoting Chevron, 467 

U.S. at 843). 

A. The Legal Effect of the Recovery Plan

The Friends claim the statutory requirement that for each 

endangered species the Service draft a recovery plan with

“objective, measurable criteria” unambiguously means those 

criteria must be met before a species may be delisted. In 

response, the Service argues the criteria in the Recovery Plan, 

unlike the factors in § 4(a)(1) of the Act, are not binding upon 

the agency in deciding whether a species is no longer 

endangered and therefore should be delisted.

 

To resolve this dispute, we “begin[] with the words of the 

statute.” Pharm. Research & Mfrs. of Am. v. Thompson, 251 

F.3d 219, 224 (D.C. Cir. 2001). Section 4(a)(1) of the Act 

provides the Secretary “shall” consider the five statutory 

factors when determining whether a species is endangered, 

and § 4(c) makes clear that a decision to delist “shall be made 

in accordance” with the same five factors. 16 U.S.C. §

1533(a), (c). Although § 4(f) states the Secretary “shall 

develop and implement” a recovery plan and “shall ... 

incorporate in [the recovery] plan ... objective, measurable 

criteria,” id. § 1533(f), the Act does not similarly say the 

Secretary “shall” consult those criteria in making a delisting 

decision. Rather, § 4(f)(1)(B)(ii) states simply that the criteria 

in the recovery plan should be those “which, when met, would 

result in a determination, in accordance with the provisions of 

this section, that the species be removed from the list.” This 

provision is ambiguous in a relevant respect: It can be read, as 

the Friends suggest, to place a binding constraint upon the 

Secretary’s delisting analysis, but it can also be read as the 

Secretary suggests, based in part upon the absence of the 

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word “shall,” to indicate the “objective, measureable criteria” 

are predictive of the Service’s delisting analysis rather than

controlling that analysis. See Russello v. United States, 464 

U.S. 16, 23 (1983) (“Where Congress includes particular 

language in one section of a statute but omits it in another 

section of the same Act, it is generally presumed that 

Congress acts intentionally and purposely in the disparate 

inclusion or exclusion” (internal quotation marks and 

alteration omitted)). On the Secretary’s reading, the criteria 

would serve as proxies, tailored to what is known about the 

particular species, standing in for the statutory factors of § 

4(a)(1) that ultimately control the Secretary’s delisting 

decisions for all species.

*

 

 The ambiguity is magnified 

because § 4(f) of the Endangered Species Act qualifies the 

Secretary’s duty to incorporate “objective, measurable 

criteria” in “developing and implementing recovery plans” 

with the phrase “to the maximum extent practicable.” 16 

U.S.C. § 1533(f). Cf. Oceana, Inc. v. Locke, 670 F.3d 1238, 

1242–43 (D.C. Cir. 2011) (reading statutory provision as 

mandatory where, in contrast to a neighboring provision, duty 

imposed was not modified by phrase “to the extent 

practicable”); Biodiversity Legal Found. v. Babbitt, 146 F.3d 

1249, 1253–54 (10th Cir. 1998) (phrase “to the maximum 

extent practicable” in § 4(b)(3)(A) of Endangered Species Act 

indicates non-mandatory character of provision).

Other “traditional tools of statutory construction,”

Chevron, 467 U.S. at 843 n.9, do not reveal any more clearly 

the intent of the Congress on this question. The Friends argue 

the legislative history indicates the criteria in the recovery 

 * Although § 4(f) read in isolation might also be taken to mean the 

criteria in the recovery plan are sufficient but not necessary for 

delisting, that interpretation would conflict with § 4(c), which 

clearly requires the Secretary to apply to a delisting decision the 

five statutory factors in § 4(a). 

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plan must be binding because the Congress added the call for

“objective, measureable criteria” specifically in order to 

“improve the development, implementation and review of 

plans for the recovery of listed species.” S. REP. NO. 100-240 

(1987), reprinted in 1988 U.S.C.C.A.N. 2700, 2700. The 

Friends also argue the structure of the Act confirms their view 

because the Secretary’s interpretation would render the 

requirement of “objective, measurable criteria” meaningless.

These arguments from legislative history and structure 

come down to the single claim that interpreting the Recovery 

Plan as non-binding would render § 4(f) of the Act a nullity. 

That is not correct. With an exception not relevant here, § 

4(f) obliges the Secretary to “develop and implement plans”

for the recovery of any species designated as endangered. 16 

U.S.C. § 1533(f)(1). If the Secretary wants to change the 

plan, then he first must let the public comment. Id. § 

1533(f)(4). It does not follow, however, that with each 

criterion he includes in a recovery plan the Secretary places a

further obligation upon the Service. A plan is a statement of 

intention, not a contract. If the plan is overtaken by events, 

then there is no need to change the plan; it may simply be 

irrelevant. If someone said he would see me in Cleveland

while on his way to Chicago and would let me know before 

changing his plan, it would hardly be sensible to say he must 

“revise” his plan before he can tell me that he no longer needs

to make the trip.

Nor is there anything unusual about a statute that requires 

an agency to publish a non-binding document. See Norton v. 

S. Utah Wilderness Alliance, 542 U.S. 55, 69, 72 (2004) 

(statute required BLM to promulgate land use plan, but plan 

itself was “designed to guide” BLM, not to be legally 

enforceable). Contrary to the Friends’ argument, the 

Secretary’s interpretation of the plan as non-binding does not 

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render meaningless the Secretary’s statutory obligations to 

create and to implement a recovery plan and to use notice and

comment in order to revise such a plan. On the contrary, a

recovery plan, even if not binding, so long as the species is 

endangered provides “objective, measurable criteria” by 

which to evaluate the Service’s progress toward its goal of 

conserving the species. 

It is a short hop from here to conclude under Step Two of 

Chevron that the Secretary’s interpretation is a “permissible” 

one. The Service fairly analogizes a recovery plan to a map

or a set of directions that provides objective and measurable 

steps to guide a traveler to his destination. Cf. Fund for 

Animals, Inc. v. Rice, 85 F.3d 535, 547 (11th Cir. 1996) 

(holding “recovery plans are for guidance purposes only”). 

Although a map may help a traveler chart his course, it is the 

sign at the end of the road, here the five statutory factors

indicating recovery, and not a mark on the map that tells him 

his journey is over. Moreover, as with a map, it is possible to 

reach one’s destination — recovery of the species — by a 

pathway neither contemplated by the traveler setting out nor 

indicated on the map.

B. The Measure of “Persistence” 

The Friends of Blackwater contend in the alternative the 

Service (1), by using data on the species’ “persistence” rather 

than data on its population and population trends, violated the 

statutory requirement that it use the “best ... data available,”

16 U.S.C. § 1533(b)(1)(A), and (2), by failing adequately to 

explain its departure from the population-based criterion in 

the Recovery Plan, rendered its decision arbitrary and 

capricious within the meaning of the Administrative 

Procedure Act, 5 U.S.C. § 706(2)(A), see Motor Vehicle Mfrs. 

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Ass’n v. State Farm Mut. Auto. Ins. Co., 463 U.S. 29, 42 

(1983).

*

The Friends’ first argument runs afoul of Southwest 

Center for Biological Diversity v. Babbitt, in which we 

explained that under the “best ... data available” standard, “the 

Secretary has no obligation to conduct independent studies”;

the Service is entitled to rely upon the best data available to it, 

which in that case were existing scientific estimates of the

species’ population, rather than conducting its own population 

count in order to determine whether a species is endangered. 

215 F.3d 58, 60–61 (D.C. Cir. 2000). In this case, where it is 

undisputed the “best ... data available” related to the 

persistence of the species, the Service was entitled to rely 

upon those data in its delisting analysis, just as it was entitled 

to list the squirrel in the first place even though no estimate of 

the squirrel’s population was then available. See id. 

(requirement of best data available “merely prohibits the 

Secretary from disregarding available scientific evidence that 

is in some way better than the evidence he relies on” (internal 

 * Although the district court did not reach the question whether the 

agency was arbitrary and capricious, we see no reason here to 

follow our general practice of remanding the case to the district 

court to consider that question in the first instance. See Piersall v. 

Winter, 435 F.3d 319, 325 (D.C. Cir. 2006). The agency record is 

before us now just as it would be before the district court on 

remand and the district court has no comparative advantage in 

reviewing agency action for arbitrariness and capriciousness. 

Moreover, “a remand to the District Court, which inevitably would 

result in a future appeal to this court, would be a waste of judicial 

resources,” Grace v. Burger, 665 F.2d 1193, 1197 n.9 (D.C. Cir. 

1981) (internal quotation marks and citation omitted), aff’d in part 

and vacated in part on other grounds sub nom. United States v. 

Grace, 461 U.S. 171 (1983), where, as here, the merits of the 

question are clear.

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quotation marks and citation omitted)). Moreover, the 

Service reasonably determined the data on persistence, which 

showed the squirrel “persist[ed] throughout its historic range,”

5-Year Review at 20, were “not indicative of a declining 

population,” 73 Fed. Reg. at 50,227; hence it could 

reasonably find the species’ survival was no longer threatened 

by loss of habitat. 

This would end the matter were it not for the Service’s 

statement in the Recovery Plan that it would look to estimates 

of population trends. See Recovery Plan at 18 (saying it could 

delist the squirrel when “squirrel populations are stable or 

expanding” in at least 80 percent of certain designated areas). 

Although, as we explained above, that plan was not binding 

upon the agency, the Friends maintain the Service had an 

obligation adequately to account for any departures from the 

guidelines described in the plan, citing Motor Vehicle Mfrs. 

Ass’n, 463 U.S. at 42 (“an agency changing its course ... 

[must] supply a reasoned analysis”). Whether an agency must 

account for a departure from a prior non-binding statement of 

intent is not entirely clear. Compare Sitka Sound Seafoods, 

Inc. v. NLRB, 206 F.3d 1175, 1182 (D.C. Cir. 2000) (“Manual 

does not bind the Board ... [and so] the relevant question is 

whether, quite apart from the Manual, the Board acted 

unreasonably”), with Edison Elec. Institute v. EPA, 391 F.3d 

1267, 1269 & n.3 (D.C. Cir. 2004) (“[report] is not strictly 

binding upon EPA and any deviation from the Report is not 

per se arbitrary and capricious”; “real question is whether 

EPA adequately accounted for any departures” from factors 

described in report). We need not resolve this question today 

because the Service adequately explained that population data 

were not available whereas data on persistence were. Still, 

the Friends contend the Service’s stated reason for not itself 

estimating the population, viz., the cost and difficulty of doing 

so, fails because the Service knew of the difficulty of 

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estimating the squirrel population when it adopted the 

population criterion in the Recovery Plan. See Recovery Plan 

at 11 (noting the squirrels were “extremely difficult to collect 

and study”).

Though not illogical, neither does the Friends’ argument 

show the Service was arbitrary and capricious. The agency

did realize when it put the population-based criterion into the 

Recovery Plan in 1990 that the squirrels were difficult to 

monitor. After more than 15 years of gathering more data and 

capturing more squirrels, however, the Service could 

reasonably conclude, and the Friends do not dispute, that 

“[a]n adequate monitoring scheme to estimate population 

numbers across a representative sample of the entire range of 

the [squirrel] would require many thousands of nest boxes and 

traps,” Analysis of Recovery Plan Criteria at 1. The Friends 

have not shown the Service’s judgment that a project of that 

magnitude was simply too difficult and too costly for the 

agency to undertake was arbitrary and capricious. Therefore, 

we conclude the Service has met any burden it may have to 

account for its departure from the criterion it contemplated 

when it developed the Recovery Plan in 1990. 

C. Inadequacy of Regulatory Mechanisms

Finally, the Friends argue the Service failed to conduct an 

independent analysis of the fourth statutory factor, “the 

inadequacy of existing regulatory mechanisms,” 16 U.S.C. § 

1533(a)(1)(D), which factor they claim must be analyzed 

without regard to whether there are any threats arising under 

the other provisions of § 4(a)(1). The Service did consider the 

adequacy of existing regulatory mechanisms, but it did not do 

so in isolation. On the contrary, having considered all the 

other types of threats listed in § 4(a)(1) and found no existing 

conditions such as disease or destruction of habitat threatened 

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the subspecies, the Service could reasonably, indeed readily,

conclude the squirrel did not require additional regulatory 

protection. See Delisting Rule, 73 Fed. Reg. at 50,237.

Under the Friends’ approach to § 4(a)(1)(D), the Service

would have to assess the adequacy of regulatory mechanisms 

without regard to its analysis of the threats listed in clauses A, 

B, C, and E of the same section. This contention is most 

peculiar. If the adequacy or “inadequacy of existing

regulat[ion]” is to be judged without considering the level, or 

even the existence, of any threat the regulation is designed to 

meet, then it would follow that the Service could never delist 

a species unless some regulatory mechanism was in place to 

protect it — whether needed or not. Moreover, because the 

Service is to apply the same factors to listing as to delisting

decisions, 16 U.S.C. § 1533(c), it would follow that every

species (except pests, see id. § 1532(6)) must either (1) be 

protected by regulations of some sort or (2) be classified as 

endangered or threatened. Absent compelling evidence, we 

will not attribute to the Congress the intent to create such an 

absurd overabundance of regulation — and a further

abundance of, for example, white-tailed deer, which have

long since moved into metropolitan areas in search of better 

forage and fewer predators, including hunters. See Steeve D. 

Côté et al., Ecological Impacts of Deer Overabundance, 35 

ANN. REV. ECOLOGY EVOLUTION & SYSTEMATICS 113, 116 

(2004); Robert K. Swihart et al., Ecology of Urban and 

Suburban White-Tailed Deer, in URBAN DEER: A

MANAGEABLE RESOURCE? 35, 35, 42 (Jay B. McAninch ed. 

1993). By considering the adequacy or inadequacy of 

regulations in light of other threats to the species, the 

Secretary’s interpretation of § 4(a)(1)(D) is certainly 

reasonable, and the Friends therefore have failed to 

demonstrate the Service violated the Act by acting upon that 

interpretation. 

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III. Conclusion

We hold the Secretary reasonably interpreted the 

Endangered Species Act as not requiring that the criteria in a 

recovery plan be satisfied before a species may be delisted

pursuant to the factors in the Act itself. Because the 

Secretary’s determination the West Virginia Northern Flying 

Squirrel was no longer endangered was neither arbitrary and 

capricious nor in violation of the Act, the judgment of the 

district court is

Reversed.

Appendix: Notes on the Dissent

Our dissenting colleague labors at length to prove “shall” 

indicates an action is mandatory and “to implement” means to 

give practical effect, see Dissent at 4–5, two points we 

nowhere dispute. Nor do we doubt § 4(f)(1) of the Act 

imposes mandatory obligations upon the Secretary. The 

Secretary shall, for example, develop a recovery plan for an 

endangered species, 16 U.S.C. § 1533(f)(1), which plan shall 

include “objective, measurable criteria,” id. § 

1533(f)(1)(B)(ii). The Secretary, moreover, must implement 

the plan. Id. § 1533(f)(1). That is, as long as a species is 

listed as endangered, the agency is obligated to work toward 

the goals set in its recovery plan. None of this, however, 

implies the objective, measurable criteria in the plan limit the 

agency when it is deciding whether to delist a species.

 

The foregoing interpretation of § 4(f)(1) does not render 

the notice and comment requirement of § 4(f)(4) 

“superfluous.” Cf. Dissent at 12–13. If the Service believes 

the goals in the recovery plan for a species are outdated but 

the species is still endangered, then the Secretary must either 

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continue to pursue those goals or, more sensibly, update the 

plan, which requires notice and comment.

The dissent’s claim (at 5) that our interpretation “erases 

‘(f)(1)’ from ‘(f)(1)(B)(ii)’” ignores our reading of those 

provisions (at 8) as together indicating the Secretary “shall ... 

incorporate in [the recovery] plan ... objective, measurable 

criteria.” Accordingly, we agree with the dissent to the extent 

that subsection (B)(ii) imposes upon the Secretary a 

mandatory duty to incorporate criteria in a recovery plan but, 

the dissent’s insistence to the contrary notwithstanding, that 

understanding alone does not clarify how such criteria relate 

to the Secretary’s delisting decision. Our dissenting colleague 

correctly identifies (at 5) the “future conditional tense” in § 

4(f)(1)(B)(ii), but misstates the logical relation in that 

statement, and thereby mistakenly reads the provision as 

unambiguous. As we note (at 9 n.*), the phrase “which, when 

met, would result” most plainly expresses a sufficient, not a 

necessary, condition: It says what must happen when the 

criteria are met, but is silent — and therefore ambiguous —

with respect to what may or must happen when the criteria are 

not met. Although one could read the word “only” into the 

statute so that it states a necessary condition (“which, [only] 

when met, would result”), one can as well ― as the 

Secretary’s interpretation suggests ― read the conditional 

“would” as referring to the agency’s likely delisting analysis 

pursuant to the factors prescribed in § 4(a)(1). See Knight v. 

Comm’r, 552 U.S. 181, 192 (2008) (“In the context of making 

... a prediction, ... the word ‘would’ is best read as expressing 

concepts such as ... probability” (internal quotation marks, 

alteration, and citation omitted)). Hence the ambiguity.

The “context and structure of the statute,” Dissent at 6, 

only underscore this ambiguity and therefore support our 

deferring under Chevron to the Secretary’s interpretation. 

USCA Case #11-5128 Document #1389720 Filed: 08/17/2012 Page 17 of 47
18

Section 4(c) of the Act, which describes the Secretary’s 

delisting analysis, provides: “Each determination [that a 

species be delisted] shall be made in accordance with the 

provisions of subsections (a) and (b) of this section.” 16 

U.S.C. § 1533(c). Section 4(c), however, makes no mention 

of subsection (f) or its requirement of a recovery plan. When 

the Congress amended the Act to add the requirement of 

“objective, measurable criteria,” see Pub. L. No. 100-478, 102 

Stat. 2306 (1988), it could have, but did not, revise § 4(c) to 

require a delisting determination also be made in accordance 

with the recovery plan criteria adopted pursuant to § 4(f).*

The dissent suggests (at 6–8) the legal effect of the 

qualifying phrase “to the maximum extent practicable,” 16 

U.S.C. § 1533(f)(1), insofar as it applies to the Secretary’s 

 * As usual, legislative history does not “definitively resolve[] the 

debate,” Dissent at 6 (internal quotation marks and citation 

omitted). Senate Report No. 100-240, which accompanied the 

Senate version of the bill that became the 1988 amendment, 

suggests the primary purpose of having “objective, measurable 

criteria” in recovery plans is to provide a means by which the 

public can measure progress in the Secretary’s efforts at recovery of 

a species, see S. REP. NO. 100-240, at 4 (“most [past recovery 

plans] ... provide[d] no criteria by which to judge their success”); 

id. at 9 (“Section 4(f) of the Act is amended to require that each 

recovery plan incorporate ... criteria by which to judge success of 

the plan”); it simply does not speak to the question whether meeting 

those criteria is a precondition to the Secretary’s deciding to delist a 

species. Indeed, the latter part of the very sentence quoted in the 

dissent, see Dissent at 6, quoting S. REP. NO. 100-240, at 9–10 

(“[t]he requirement that plans contain objective, measurable criteria 

for removal of a species from the Act’s lists”), says a purpose of the 

objective criteria requirement is to “provide a means by which to 

judge the progress being made toward recovery,” S. REP. NO. 100-

240, at 9, but makes no mention of limiting the Secretary’s delisting 

analysis.

USCA Case #11-5128 Document #1389720 Filed: 08/17/2012 Page 18 of 47
19

duty to “incorporate in each plan ... objective, measurable 

criteria,” id. § 1533(f)(1)(B)(ii), runs out once the Secretary 

has included such criteria in a plan. The statute, however, 

applies this qualification to the Secretary’s actions both “in 

developing and [in] implementing recovery plans.” Id. § 

1533(f)(1) (emphasis added). The dissent says 

“implementing” can have no reference to subsection (B) of § 

4(f)(1) because “incorporat[ing]” something in a plan occurs 

solely in the course of “developing” the plan, but we are not 

so quick to abandon the plain text of the statute. Although 

“implementing” has a more obvious connection to subsection 

(A), with respect to subsection (B) it at least tells us the 

Secretary must incorporate criteria that are practicable to 

implement. The dissent’s interpretation would have the 

Secretary measure the practicability of incorporating criteria 

in a recovery plan without respect to the practicability of their 

implementation, but that cannot be correct. If the 

practicability of incorporating criteria is to be determined 

without a view to the practicability of their implementation, 

then any imaginable criterion may be incorporated so long as 

the agency has the wit to place the requisite words upon a 

page. (Why not when the cow jumps over the moon? Or 

when Birnam Wood be come to Dunsinane?) Following a 

more reasonable interpretation, it would be “impracticable” 

for the Secretary to adopt criteria that by their nature could 

never be met and hence would preclude delisting a species so 

long as those criteria remain in effect. Similarly, if the 

Secretary foresees that adopting certain criteria would unduly 

restrict his delisting analysis, then he may decide it is 

practicable only to adopt criteria that guide but do not 

constrain that analysis.*

 * It is irrelevant whether the Service in fact interpreted the recovery 

plan criteria as binding when it published them in 1990, see Dissent 

at 8, because the Service later adopted through notice and comment 

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20

Our dissenting colleague next offers (at 10) her “flight 

plan” analogy in an effort to show certain administrative plans 

may not be “discarded” even if “overtaken by events,” but the 

analogy in fact supports our interpretation. As the dissent 

notes, a portion of the regulation regarding flight plans allows 

a pilot to deviate from a flight plan if “an emergency exists,” 

14 C.F.R. § 91.123(a), which the pilot may declare in his 

discretion, id. §§ 91.123(c), 91.3(b), but the dissent misses the 

significance of this exception. An emergency negates the 

need for a fixed flight plan much as the recovery of a species 

negates the need for a plan designed to bring about that 

recovery; in either event, the formal revision of such a plan 

would not be useful and therefore, unsurprisingly, is not 

required by law.

The dissent addresses (at 19–21) a facially plausible 

“logical outgrowth” argument that appears nowhere in the

Friends’ brief, was not raised in the district court, and 

therefore is not properly before us. See United States v. 

Southerland, 486 F.3d 1355, 1360 (D.C. Cir. 2007) 

(“argument ... raised for the first time at oral argument ... is 

forfeited”); Benoit v. Dep’t of Agric., 608 F.3d 17, 21 (D.C. 

Cir. 2010) (argument not raised in district court is forfeited). 

As part of their argument that the statute unambiguously 

requires the Secretary either to meet the criteria in the 

recovery plan or to modify them through notice and comment 

prior to delisting, the Friends did argue the notice and 

comment process the Secretary used to delist the Squirrel did 

 

an interpretation of those criteria as non-binding, see Delisting 

Rule, 73 Fed. Reg. at 50,226 ("Recovery plans are not regulatory 

documents and are instead intended to provide guidance to the 

Service, States, and other partners on methods of minimizing 

threats to listed species and on criteria that may be used to 

determine when recovery is achieved"); 71 Fed. Reg. at 75,924–25 

(same).

USCA Case #11-5128 Document #1389720 Filed: 08/17/2012 Page 20 of 47
21

not constitute a revision of the recovery plan. See Br. of 

Appellees at 35–40. Because we rejected the Friends’ mustmeet-or-modify premise, however, there is no need to address 

that dependent argument. In the Friends’ “alternative 

argument that the Secretary violated the Administrative 

Procedure Act,” Dissent at 17, they alleged the delisting 

process was arbitrary and capricious and not based upon the 

best data available, see Br. of Appellees at 45–51, not that the 

final rule was not a logical outgrowth of the proposed rule. 

With respect to the Friends’ argument that the Act 

precludes the Secretary from relying upon data concerning 

persistence, the dissent suggests (at 22–23) the Secretary must 

have data on the population of a species before he may decide 

to delist it. What § 4(b)(1)(A) and § 4(c) of the statute 

require, however, is that the Secretary use the “best ... data 

available” when, respectively, listing or delisting a species. 

16 U.S.C. § 1533(b)(1)(A), (c). Population data were not 

available when the Secretary listed the squirrel as endangered. 

Nor were such data available when he delisted the squirrel. 

To require the Secretary before acting to obtain such data as 

are not then “available” is clearly foreclosed by the statute. 

See id.; Am. Wildlands v. Kempthorne, 530 F.3d 991, 1001 

(D.C. Cir. 2008) (“in the absence of available evidence, 

Congress does not require the agency to conduct its own 

studies”).

The dissent compounds the error by claiming (at 22) data 

on persistence do not “answer the relevant question,” and 

asserts upon this basis the Secretary relied upon “no data.” 

Evidence is relevant to a particular question of fact if “it has 

any tendency to make [that] fact more or less probable.” FED.

R. EVID. 401(a). The question at issue here is whether the 

squirrel is an “endangered species,” which the Act defines as 

“any species which is in danger of extinction throughout all or 

USCA Case #11-5128 Document #1389720 Filed: 08/17/2012 Page 21 of 47
22

a significant portion of its range ....” 16 U.S.C. § 1532(6).

Because extinction is less likely where there is widespread 

persistence than where there is not, persistence is relevant to a 

determination whether a species is endangered; and if the only 

data available concern persistence, then they are quite clearly 

the “best” data available. To be sure, data on persistence 

would also be relevant to the question of a species’ 

“survival,” see Dissent at 21, 23–25, a term with a meaning 

distinct from “recovery,” see 50 C.F.R. § 402.02 (defining 

“[r]ecovery” as “improvement in the status of listed species to 

the point at which listing is no longer appropriate under the 

criteria set out in section 4(a)(1) of the Act”), but that is 

neither here nor there. Evidence may be relevant to two 

distinct legal questions, and therefore its relevance to a 

question not at issue (survival), does not imply or even 

suggest its irrelevance to the question that is at issue 

(recovery).

USCA Case #11-5128 Document #1389720 Filed: 08/17/2012 Page 22 of 47
ROGERS, Circuit Judge, dissenting: Because Congress “has

directly spoken to the precise question at issue,” Chevron USA

Inc. v. Natural Res. Def. Council, Inc., 467 U.S. 837, 842

(1984), the court’s job is done. Instead, the court defers to the

Secretary’s interpretation, contrary to the plain text of the

Endangered Species Act (“ESA”), 16 U.S.C. §§ 1531-1544, that

the West Virginia Northern Flying Squirrel (“Squirrel”), an

endangered species, loses all protections even though the

recovery criteria in its recovery plan have not been met and

those criteria are revised, while the Squirrel was listed as

endangered, without required notice and prior consideration of

public comments. But even assuming, as the court concludes,

the ESA is ambiguous, the Secretary was arbitrary and

capricious in delisting the Squirrel based in material part on an

analysis revising the recovery plan criteria that was not

publically noticed until the final delisting rule, and then only on

the basis of available scientific and commercial evidence

showing the Squirrel persists (i.e., is not yet extinct) as distinct

from recovered so as no longer to require ESA’s protections. 

Accordingly, I respectfully dissent.

I.

“As in all statutory construction cases,” the court must

“begin with the language of the statute.” Barnhart v. Sigmon

Coal Co., Inc., 534 U.S. 438, 450 (2002). “[C]ourts must

presume that a legislature says in a statute what it means and

means in a statute what it says there. When the words of a

statute are unambiguous, then, this first canon is also the last:

judicial inquiry is complete.” Id. at 461-62 (quoting Connecticut

Nat. Bank v. Germain, 503 U.S. 249, 253-54 (1992) (internal

quotation marks and citation omitted)). Congress’s

requirements in the ESA for delisting an endangered species for

which the Secretary of the Interior has developed a recovery

plan are unambiguous with respect to when that species is

USCA Case #11-5128 Document #1389720 Filed: 08/17/2012 Page 23 of 47
2

eligible for delisting and to the procedure for revising

announced recovery plan criteria. 

Section 4(f) provides:

(1) The Secretary shall develop and implement

[recovery plans] for the conservation and survival of

endangered species and threatened species . . . . The

Secretary, in developing and implementing recovery

plans, shall, to the maximum extent practicable--

. . .

(B) incorporate in each plan--

. . .

(ii) objective, measurable criteria which, when

met, would result in a determination, in

accordance with the provisions of this section, that

the species be removed from the list.

. . .

(4) The Secretary shall, prior to final approval of a

new or revised recovery plan, provide public notice

and opportunity for public review and comment on

such plan. The Secretary shall consider all information

presented during the public comment period prior to

approval of the plan.

16 U.S.C. § 1533(f) (emphases added). These substantive and

procedural requirements reflect Congress’s finding that “various

species of . . . wildlife,” such as the Squirrel, “are of esthetic,

ecological, educational, historical, recreational, and scientific

value to the Nation and its people,” id. § 1531(a)(3), and

adoption of a policy of conservation, id. § 1531(c), which is

defined as use of the “methods and procedures which are

necessary to bring any endangered species or threatened species

to the point at which the measures provided pursuant to [the

USCA Case #11-5128 Document #1389720 Filed: 08/17/2012 Page 24 of 47
3

ESA] are no longer necessary,” id. § 1532(3). Applying the

traditional, well-settled standards for statutory interpretation,1

 it

is difficult to imagine how Congress could have spoken more

clearly and directly when it strengthened the ESA in 1988, see

Pub. L. No. 100-478, 102 Stat. 2306, by mandating both

development and implementation, prior to delisting, of recovery

plans that include “objective, measurable criteria,” 16 U.S.C.

§ 1533(f)(1)(B)(ii), and the procedures for their amendment, id.

§ 1533(f)(4). See S. REP. NO. 100-240, at 4 (1987), reprinted in

1988 U.S.C.C.A.N. 2700, 2703 (noting that “far too many

recovery plans for listed species have not been implemented . . .

[and] recovery plans have failed to include consistently criteria,

time frames and estimated costs for recovery”). 

1

 Under Chevron, 467 U.S. at 842-43, the first step requires

a determination of “whether Congress has directly spoken to the

precise question at issue. If the intent of Congress is clear, that is the

end of the mater; for the court, as well as the agency, must give effect

to the unambiguously expressed intent of Congress.” 

The judiciary is the final authority on issues of statutory

construction and must reject administrative constructions

which are contrary to clear congressional intent. If a court,

employing traditional tools of statutory construction,

ascertains that Congress had an intention on the precise

question at issue, that intention is the law and must be given

effect. 

Id. at 843 n.9 (citations omitted). If, after applying traditional tools of

statutory construction, the court determines “the statute is silent or

ambiguous with respect to the specific issue,” then, under step two, the

court will defer to an agency’s statutory interpretation if it “is based

on a permissible construction of the statute.” Chevron, 467 U.S. at

843. 

USCA Case #11-5128 Document #1389720 Filed: 08/17/2012 Page 25 of 47
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The plain text of section 4(f) answers the questions of

whether recovery plans are discretionary, what they must

contain, what process must be followed for their adoption and

revision, and whether recovery plan criteria must be met before

delisting procedures are initiated. First, section 4 provides that

the Secretary “shall” implement recovery plans. When Congress

uses the word “shall,” it intends to communicate a mandatory

action. See Gonzalez v. Thaler, 132 S. Ct. 641, 651 (2012). “It

is fixed law that words of statutes or regulations must be given

their ordinary, contemporary, common meaning. It is also fixed

usage that ‘shall’ means something on the order of ‘must’ or

‘will.’” FTC v. Tarriff, 584 F.3d 1088, 1090 (D.C. Cir. 2009)

(internal quotation marks and citations omitted). Looking to the

usual understanding of the words used by Congress, to

“implement” is “to give practical effect to and ensure of actual

fulfillment by concrete measures.” MERRIAM WEBSTER’S

COLLEGIATE DICTIONARY 583 (10th ed. 1993). Thus, section

4(f)(1) “is not at all ambiguous, but instead is exquisitely clear,”

Ctr. for Biological Diversity v. Norton, 254 F.3d 833, 837 (9th

Cir. 2001) (interpreting ESA section 4(b), 16 U.S.C.

§ 1533(b)(3)(A)), in requiring the Secretary to ensure the actual

fulfillment of species’ recovery plans prior to delisting. Where,

as here, the Secretary seeks to delist a species whose initial

recovery plan criteria have not been met, section 4(f)(4)’s

procedures for revising the recovery plan must be followed. This

is the only reading of section 4 of the ESA that does not render

the mandatory requirements of subsections (f)(1) and (f)(4)

superfluous. See Corley v. United States, 556 U.S. 303, 314

(2009).

Eschewing the plain text, the court finds ambiguity for three

reasons. First, the court notes that the word “shall” does not

appear in section 4(f)(1)(B)(ii) with respect to whether the

“objective, measurable criteria” to be included in the recovery

plan control delisting. See Op. at 8–9. Second, this purported

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5

ambiguity is “magnified,” the court states, because the

Secretary’s obligation to include such criteria in a recovery plan

is qualified by the phase “to the maximum extent practicable.” 

See id at 9. Third, the court asserts that other “‘traditional tools

of statutory construction,’ Chevron, 467 U.S. at 843 n.9, do not

reveal any more clearly the intent of Congress on this question.” 

Id. These reasons do not withstand examination. 

The first reason erases “(f)(1)” from “(f)(1)(B)(ii)” and

ignores English grammar. The court blinds itself to the

introductory provision, which provides that the Secretary “shall

develop and implement” recovery plans, which “shall . . .

incorporate” the criteria in (B)(ii), 16 U.S.C. §§ 1533(f)(1) &

(f)(1)(B). Subsection (B)(ii) cannot exist dissected from its

introductory text in (f)(1); (B)(ii) is not even a complete sentence

without (f)(1). At some point Congress surely is permitted to

avoid being duplicative (triplicative?). Likewise, the

grammatical structure of subsection (f)(1)(B)(ii) is in a simple

future conditional tense. Plans that shall contain “objective,

measurable criteria which, when met, would result in a

determination . . . that the species be removed from the list,” id.

§ (f)(1)(B)(ii) (emphasis added), shall be implemented. The

condition – the time at which the recovery criteria are met — is

followed by the consequence — a determination to delist the

species.2

 Adding a third “shall” to this sentence does not change

its plain meaning, nor would it make sense given the simple

condition-consequence structure of the sentence. The court

agrees the Secretary has mandatory duties, Op. at 16-17, but then

disregards the import of its agreement finding ambiguity when

there is none. As a further example, the court suggests the

2 See THE CHICAGO MANUAL OF STYLE ¶ 5.150 (16th ed.

2010) (“Would sometimes expresses a condition {I would slide down

the hill if you lent me your sled}”). Likewise, here a species would be

delisted when the recovery criteria are met.

USCA Case #11-5128 Document #1389720 Filed: 08/17/2012 Page 27 of 47
6

possibility that the phrase “would result” could mean “a

sufficient, not a necessary” condition. Id. at 17. But “the sort of

ambiguity giving rise to Chevron deference is a creature not of

definitional possibilities, but of statutory context.” New York v.

EPA, 443 F.3d 880, 884 (D.C. Cir. 2006), and a court “must not

‘confine [itself] to examining a particular statutory provision in

isolation.’” Am. Bankers Ass’n v. Nat. Credit Union Admin., 271

F.3d 262, 267 (D.C. Cir. 2001). It hardly would make sense for

Congress to mandate implementation, and formal procedures for

revision, of criteria in recovery plans that “would result” in “the

species be[ing] removed from the list” if Congress intended that

other unadopted recovery criteria could suffice, and need not be

formally adopted pursuant to the procedures Congress mandated,

to determine delisting. The context and structure of the statute

are clear that the recovery criteria must be “met” or revised prior

to delisting. And, upon “exhausting the traditional tools of

statutory construction, including examining the statute’s

legislative history,” id., that history “definitively resolves the

debate,” id., the court creates over the word “would” for 

Congress stated that the 1988 amendments added “[t]he

requirement that plans contain objective, measurable criteria for

removal of a species from the Act’s lists.” S.REP. NO. 100-240,

at 9-10 (emphasis added); see infra n.4.

Next, the court attempts to find ambiguity in the phrase “to

the maximum extent practicable.” Section 4(f)(1) provides that

“[t]he Secretary, in developing and implementing recovery plans,

shall, to the maximum extent practicable . . . incorporate in each

plan . . . objective, measurable criteria.” 16 U.S.C.

§ 1533(f)(1)(B)(ii) (emphasis added). Any potential ambiguity

evaporates where, as here, the Secretary has incorporated

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7

objective criteria in the Squirrel’s recovery plan.3 It obviously

was practicable to do so here. Having done so, the Secretary is

not free to ignore Congress’s mandates to “implement” plans and

to delist only “when” the objective criteria are “met,” particularly

given his determination, in developing the recovery plan, that the

plan “will . . . promote the conservation,” 16 U.S.C. § 1533(f)(1),

of the Squirrel. The court protests ambiguity remains because

the word “implementing” means “the Secretary must incorporate

criteria that are practicable to implement.” The court explains,

otherwise “any imaginable criterion may be incorporated so long

as the agency has the wit to place the requisite words upon a

page. . . . [I]t would be ‘impracticable’ for the Secretary to adopt

criteria that by their nature could never be met and hence would

preclude delisting a species so long as those criteria remain in

effect.” Op. at 19. This is word play, not statutory analysis. As

Congress crafted the ESA, the Secretary’s chosen criteria, once

“incorporate[d] in each plan,” remain “incorporate[d] in each

plan,” however “practicable” their adoption might once have

been, or their implementation might later become, and Congress

provided a remedy for the latter possibility — revision pursuant

to public notice-and-comment. See 16 U.S.C. § 1533(f)(4). The

recovery criteria, therefore, plainly cannot “preclude delisting a

3

 The Squirrel Recovery Plan lists four criteria to delist the

Squirrel: (1) realization of “stable or expanding” populations over a

ten year period in 80% of the designated geographic recovery areas

(“GRAs”) (based on biennial sampling); (2) accumulation of

“sufficient ecological data and timber management data . . . to assure

future protection and management”; (3) perpetual management of

geographic recovery areas to ensure sufficient habitat and habitat

corridors for migration; and (4) “existence of high elevation forests on

which the [S]quirrel[] depend[s] is not itself threatened by introduced

pests . . . or by environmental pollutants.” U.S. FISH & WILDLIFE

SERVICE, APPALACHIAN NORTHERN FLYING SQUIRRELS RECOVERY

PLAN 18 (Sept. 24, 1990) (“Recovery Plan”).

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8

species” because they can be changed, with notice-and-comment,

if the Secretary determines “they could never be met” or no

longer accurately measure recovery. The court either overlooks

section 4(f)(4)’s revision process or drains it of purpose. 

Furthermore, even if the Secretary could “decide it is practicable

only to adopt criteria that guide but do not constrain [the

delisting] analysis,” Op. at 19, that is not what happened here. 

The Squirrel’s recovery plan states that “[r]ecovery plans

delineate reasonable actions believed to be required to recover

and/or protect listed species,” and notes that recovery plans are

subject to amendment — which is consistent with section 4(f)(4). 

Recovery Plan, Executive Summary (emphasis added). Indeed,

the Secretary specified that the first three criteria were required

for down-listing the Squirrel to “threatened” status, while the

fourth, in combination with the first three, were required for

delisting. Id. The court’s search for ambiguity here is in vain.

The third reason the court finds ambiguity, which it

collapses into a denial that its deference to the Secretary’s

interpretation of sections 4(a) and (f) renders (f) a nullity, see

Op. at 9-10, overrides Congress’s repeated use of “shall” in

identifying the Secretary’s obligations and allows the Secretary

to end run section 4(f)’s requirements. Rather than confront

Congress’s plain mandatory text, or the supportive legislative

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9

history,4 the court turns to a travel planning analogy that distorts

what happened here. The court posits:

4

 The legislative history of the 1988 ESA Amendments

confirms the conclusion that section 4(f)’s meaning is unambiguous. 

“[T]he Act is amended to require . . . site-specific management actions

to achieve recovery [and] criteria by which to judge success of the

plan. . . . Incorporation of this information will ensure that plans are

explicit as possible in describing the steps to be taken in the recovery

of a species.” S. REP. NO. 100-240, at 9 (emphases added). “The

requirement that plans contain objective, measurable criteria for

removal of a species from the Act’s lists . . . will provide a means by

which to judge the progress being made toward recovery.” Id. at 9-10.

The Secretary latches onto the word “a,” suggesting it implies other

means by which to judge recovery progress. See Appellant’s Br. at

32. This observation does not make the recovery plan’s criteria any

less mandatory, and the ESA requires a specific method for adopting

those other criteria should the Secretary find it appropriate, see 16

U.S.C. § 1533(f)(4).

The notice-and-comment provision of section 4(f)(4) was an

amendment offered by Senator McClure, who explained on the Senate

floor that “this amendment will require the Secretary to solicit

comments and additional information for consideration from local

communities prior to final approval of new recovery plans, or before

approval of revisions to existing plans.” 134 Cong. Rec. 19,270

(1988) (statement of Sen. Jim McClure) (emphases added). The

amendment was not intended to make the Secretary “responsible for

gathering the information. It [instead] allow[s] those most directly

affected by a proposal to provide additional information to the

Secretary that might otherwise be overlooked.” Id. The final

Conference Report reflects the sponsor’s view of the amendment:

Although section 4(f)(4) “does not necessitate a rulemaking

procedure,” it does “require[]” the Secretary to “consider the public

comments before approving the plan.” H.R.CONF.REP.NO. 100-928,

at 21(1988), reprinted in 1988 U.S.C.C.A.N. 2738, 2739 (emphasis

added).

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10

If someone said he would see me in Cleveland while on

his way to Chicago and would let me know before

changing his plan, it would hardly be sensible to say he

must “revise” his plan before he can tell me that he no

longer needs to make the trip.

Op. at 10. Here, the Secretary in fact went to Chicago — he

declared the Squirrel recovered and delisted it. He just avoided

Cleveland altogether (i.e., several of the recovery criteria), and

stopped in Detroit instead (i.e., the covertly revised criteria),

without telling anyone, despite saying he “would let me know

before changing his plan” (i.e., comply with section 4(f)(4)). 

The court’s analogy begs the key question of how it is to be

determined that the stop in Cleveland (i.e., meeting the recovery

criteria) no longer needs to occur — as Congress directed, or as

the Secretary would prefer? A better analogy, grounded in

administrative law, is of an airline pilot who determines midflight, due to changed circumstances (e.g., turbulence), that the

approved flight plan should be revised. Although “overtaken by

events,” Op. at 10, under the regulations, in the absence of an

emergency, the flight plan may not be discarded by the pilot —

instead the pilot must follow the revision process set forth by

regulations. See 14 C.F.R. § 91.123 (“[N]o pilot in command

may deviate from [a] clearance unless an amended clearance is

obtained . . . .”). Congress provided no comparable “emergency”

exception in the ESA whereby the Secretary may disregard the

recovery plan criteria if he decides, insulated from public input,

that the species has in fact recovered despite not satisfying the

official plan criteria for recovery. Instead, Congress specified

in the ESA the process for revising recovery plans.

Furthermore, the court altogether ignores that the Secretary,

acting through the Fish and Wildlife Service (“FWS”), revised

the recovery plan, while the Squirrel was still listed as

endangered, without following the notice and comment

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11

procedures required by ESA section 4(f)(4). In December 2007,

nearly a year before promulgating the Final Rule Removing the

Squirrel from the Endangered Species List, 73 Fed. Reg. 50,226

(Aug. 26, 2008) (“Final Rule”), the FWS revised two of the four

criteria in the Squirrel’s recovery plan. In an unpublished,

publically-unavailable analysis, the FWS concluded that the

second and fourth recovery criteria had been met, while the

“intent” of the first and third criteria had been met under revised

criteria. See U.S. FISH & WILDLIFE SERVICE, ANALYSIS OF

RECOVERY PLAN CRITERIA FOR THE WEST VIRGINIA NORTHERN

FLYING SQUIRREL 13 (Dec. 18, 2007) (“2007 Analysis”). 

Specifically, the FWS revised the first criterion from one

measuring Squirrel populations in five geographic areas to one

measuring “persistence,” that is, whether the Squirrel was

present (without regard to quantity) or absent, in 3-5 year

intervals, in different areas.5 See id. at 2. The FWS revised the

third criterion to eliminate its core provision that the geographic

5

 The 2007 Analysis stated that the Secretary, acting through

the FWS,

now know[s] that it is not practicable or necessary to measure

actual [Squirrel] population numbers in GRAs. Sampling this

widely dispersed, cryptic species is labor intensive and highly

inefficient. . . . [The FWS] now considers persistence to be

the best indicator of successfully reproducing populations for

this subspecies. [The FWS] defines persistence as continuing

captures of [Squirrels] over multiple (3-5) generations at

previously documented sites throughout the historic range.

Id. at 1-2 (emphasis added). The FWS concluded, in view of this new

criterion and non-public definition of “persistence,” that the “intent of

this criterion [as revised] has been met.” Id. at 3. 

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12

recovery area (“GRA”) be managed in perpetuity.6 It is

undisputed the FWS made these revisions without providing

notice or opportunity for comment, and that the 2007 Analysis

was publically mentioned for the first time in the Final Rule, 73

Fed. Reg. at 50,227. Even were the court correct that the

purported ambiguity of section 4 permits the Secretary’s

interpretation of recovery plans as discretionary and mere

guidance (contrary to the ESA’s plain text) and that the Secretary

did not need to revise the recovery plan if its criteria could not be

met, see Op. at 10, where the Secretary does revise the plan, the

court has no explanation for why the requirements of section

4(f)(4) can be ignored, other than to invoke its inapt travel plan

analogy.

The circularity of the court’s reasoning demonstrates how its

reading renders section 4(f) superfluous: According to the court:

“[A]s long as a species is listed as endangered, the agency is

obligated to work toward the goals set in its recovery plan,” but

the “criteria in the plan [do not] limit the agency when it is 

deciding whether to delist a species.” Op. at 16. If a species is

delisted on the basis of recovery, without regard to whether the

recovery plan criteria have been “met,” then there is nothing left

6

 The 2007 Analysis stated that 

the original goal of permanent habitat protection of a few

small areas is no longer necessary. . . . There are sufficient

numbers of occurrences represented within the core areas such

that the threat of a single or widespread catastrophic event

eliminating a significant portion of occurrences is

substantially reduced. Therefore not all of the GRAs need to

be protected in perpetuity.

Id. at 5 (emphases added). The FWS concluded that “the intent of this

recovery criterion has been met.” Id. at 10. 

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13

to section 4(f)(4)’s mandatory requirement that revisions to the

criteria by which recovery is evaluated be subject to notice and

comment prior to their adoption. Under the court’s

interpretation, the FWS, on the Secretary’s behalf, can dispense

with the revision plan criteria by not labeling its changes a

“revision,” and proceed to delist a protected species pursuant to 

section 4(a) without regard to the requirements of sections

4(f)(1) and (4). That the FWS would never have an incentive to

follow the revision process of section 4(f)(4), because recovery

plans could be ignored without consequence, is aptly

demonstrated by the facts here: while the Squirrel was still listed

as endangered, the FWS covertly changed its recovery plan

criteria without following the requirements of section 4(f)(4). 

Required procedures are a vital part of the protections

afforded by the ESA, in which Congress employed mandatory

language regarding the Secretary’s obligations. See, e.g., 16

U.S.C. § 1533(a)(3)(A) & (B) (setting procedures for designating

and revising critical habitat); id. § (b)(3)(A)-(D) (setting

procedures and time period for responding to petitions); id.

§ (b)(5) (setting procedures and time period for notice-andcomment on listing); id. § (b)(6) (setting time period for

publishing final listing or delisting rule); id. § (c)(1) (setting

requirements for what endangered and threatened lists must

contain); id. § (f)(4) & (5) (setting procedures for revising

recovery plans and considering public comments). Whether or

not the court views Congress’s chosen process as unnecessary,

see Op. at 10, “[the court’s] job is to interpret the methods that

Congress chose to further its goals, not to devise methods of our

own.” Consolidated Rail Corp. v. United States, 896 F.2d 574,

579 (D.C. Cir. 1990). If, as the court asserts, this dissent “labors

at length” about Congress’s use of the word “shall,” see Op. at

16, the “labor[ing]” has been for naught as the court chooses to

acknowledge its force selectively, in fact only with respect to

section 4(a)(1), see id. Furthermore, the court’s revision to

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14

section 4(f) does not make much sense for it has the decision to

delist driving what the recovery criteria are rather than the

recovery criteria driving the decision to delist. Consistent with

Congress’s choice of words and purpose to strengthen the ESA

in the 1988 amendments, the notice-and-comment process for the

recovery plan should sensibly precede consideration of delisting. 

See 16 U.S.C. § 1533(f)(4) (“The Secretary shall consider all

information presented during the public comment period prior to

approval of the plan.”) (emphasis added). 

Contrary to the Secretary’s suggestion in this court, the

requirements added by Congress in 1988 to strengthen the ESA’s

protections, see S. REP. NO. 100-240, at 8-9, are not a “makework exercise” or mere “hoop-jumping,” Appellant’s Br. at 43. 

Instead, consistent with its ESA findings and policy of

conservation, Congress determined to “require deliberation”

when the existence of precious species have been found

endangered or threatened. Congress instructed in plain terms

that only upon subjecting proposed revisions to recovery plan

criteria to the rigor of public comment would the Secretary (or

the FWS) be in a position properly to assess proposed revisions

and undertake to consider, upon applying the revised criteria,

whether they are met and the protected species should be delisted

pursuant to sections 4(a) and (b). After all, the purpose of

notice-and-comment procedures is “to ensure that affected

parties have an opportunity to participate in and influence agency

decision making at an early stage, when the agency is more

likely to give real consideration to alternative ideas.” See State

of N.J., Dept. of Envtl. Protection v. EPA, 626 F.2d 1038, 1049

(D.C. Cir. 1980) (internal quotation marks and citation omitted)

(emphasis added). That the Secretary (or the FWS) may find

these requirements inconvenient or view section 4(f)(4) as a

“make-work” exercise is irrelevant, for “[w]hen a statute

commands an agency without qualification to carry out a

particular program in a particular way, the agency’s duty is clear;

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15

if it believes the statute untoward in some respect, then ‘it should

take its concerns to Congress,’ for ‘[i]n the meantime it must

obey [the statute] as written.’” Oceana, Inc. v. Locke, 670 F.3d

1238, 1243 (D.C. Cir. 2011) (quoting Natural Res. Def. Council

v. EPA, 643 F.3d 311, 323 (D.C. Cir. 2011)) (second and third

alterations in original).

The court’s reliance on Norton v. Southern Utah Wilderness

Alliance, 542 U.S. 55, 72 (2004), is misplaced, see Op. at 10. In

determining that Bureau of Land Management (“BLM”) land use

plans were not binding documents, the Supreme Court relied on

a statutory provision granting the Secretary leeway in

implementing plans: “Title 43 U.S.C. § 1712(e) provides that

‘[t]he Secretary may issue management decisions to implement

land use plans’ — the decisions, that is, are distinct from the plan

itself.” Norton, 542 U.S. at 69-70 (alteration in original). BLM

regulations likewise provided that land use plans were “not a

final implementation decision on actions which require further

specific plans, process steps, or decisions.” Id. at 70 (quoting 43

C.F.R. § 1601.0-5(k) (2003)). By contrast, the ESA includes no

provision granting the Secretary leeway in issuing “management

decisions” about implementing recovery plans, and unlike land

use plans, which may lack specificity and process steps,

Congress mandated that recovery plans contain “objective,

measurable criteria” to be “met.” 16 U.S.C. § 1533(f)(1)(B)(ii). 

The court’s remaining citation is to out-of-circuit precedent

providing no statutory analysis and relying on a case decided

before the 1988 ESA amendments. See Op. at 11 (citing Fund

for Animals v. Rice, 85 F.3d 535, 547 (11th Cir. 1996) (citing

Strickland v. Morton, 519 F.2d 467, 469 (9th Cir. 1975))).

Viewing the ESA as a whole, see Dole v. United

Steelworkers of Am., 494 U.S. 26, 42-43 (1990), — and

consistent with “one of the most basic interpretative canons, that

‘[a] statute should be construed so that effect is given to all its

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16

provisions, so that no part will be inoperative or superfluous,

void or insignificant,’” Corley, 556 U.S. at 314 (internal citation

omitted) (alteration in original) — there is only one statutory

reading that gives full effect to all of section 4's provisions. For

this reason, section 4(c)(2), which provides that determinations

to remove a species from the list of endangered or threatened

species be “made in accordance with the provisions of

subsections (a) and (b),” 16 U.S.C. § 1533(c)(2), must be read in

light of Congress’s 1988 amendment to section 4(f) to strengthen

protections for species. “[W]hen” the existing or properly

revised recovery criteria have been “met,” delisting is to occur

pursuant to section 4(a) and (b). Where a species’ recovery plan

criteria have not been met, the species remains listed. Where

circumstances change, the recovery plan criteria may be revised

in the manner prescribed by section 4(f)(4). Because section

4(f)(4) mandates notice be given prior to approval of a plan

revision, and that public comments be considered before

approval of a plan revision, section 4 is likewise unambiguous

that the notice-and-comment period for plan revisions may not

run concurrently with the notice-and-comment period for the

proposed delisting rule. 

A statute that permits only one intelligible outcome is not

ambiguous, and the court thus errs in deferring to the Secretary’s

contrary interpretation, see Final Rule, 73 Fed. Reg. at 50,226,

that recovery plans are discretionary and mere guidance

documents whose recovery criteria do not inform delisting

decisions. Because “the statutory language is unambiguous and

the statutory scheme is coherent and consistent,”Barnhart, 534

U.S. at 950 (internal citations omitted), the court’s inquiry is at

an end. For these reasons, I would affirm the judgment of the

district court that the Secretary could not delist the Squirrel

without either satisfying, or soliciting and considering public

comments on the revisions to, the delisting criteria in the

Squirrel’s recovery plan.

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II.

Although the Secretary’s statutory challenge is properly

resolved under Chevron step one, as there is no ambiguity for the

Secretary to interpret, the court errs as well in rejecting

appellees’ alternative argument that the Secretary violated the

Administrative Procedure Act (“APA”). A delisting, no less than

a “listing determination[,] is subject to review under the APA

and must be set aside if ‘arbitrary, capricious, an abuse of

discretion, or otherwise not in accordance with law.’” Am.

Wildlands v. Kempthorne, 530 F.3d 991, 997 (D.C. Cir. 2008)

(quoting 5 U.S.C. § 706(2)(A)). 

A.

“Under APA notice and comment requirements, ‘[a]mong

the information that must be revealed for public evaluation are

the ‘technical studies and data’ upon which the agency relies [in

its rulemaking].’” Am. Radio Relay League, Inc. v. FCC, 524

F.3d 227, 236 (D.C. Cir. 2008) (quoting Chamber of Commerce

v. SEC, 443 F.3d 890, 899 (D.C. Cir. 2006)) (alterations in

original). “More particularly, ‘[d]isclosure of staff reports

allows the parties to focus on the information relied on by the

agency and to point out where that information is erroneous or

where the agency may be drawing improper conclusions from

it.’” Id. (quoting Nat’l Ass’n of Regulatory Util. Comm’rs v.

FCC, 737 F.2d 1095, 1121 (D.C. Cir. 1984) (alteration and

emphasis in original). “It is not consonant with the purpose of

a rule-making proceeding to promulgate rules on the basis of . .

. data that, [in] critical degree, is known only to the agency.” 

Portland Cement Ass’n v. Ruckelshaus, 486 F.2d 375, 393 (D.C.

Cir. 1973), superseded by statute on other grounds, Am.

Trucking Ass’ns, Inc. v. EPA, 175 F.3d 1027 (D.C. Cir. 1999);

see also Idaho Farm Bureau Fed’n v. Babbitt, 58 F.3d 1392,

1403 (9th Cir. 1995). 

USCA Case #11-5128 Document #1389720 Filed: 08/17/2012 Page 39 of 47
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1. In the Final Rule, the FWS relied heavily on the 2007

Analysis of the Squirrel’s recovery plan as the basis for

eliminating the protections of the ESA for the species. See Final

Rule, 73 Fed. Reg. at 50,227. It also relied on the 2006 5-Year

Review.7

 See id. Neither the 2007 Analysis nor the 2006 5-Year

Review were published in the Federal Register, see id.; indeed,

the 2007 Analysis was created after the close of the public

comment period on the proposed rule, see id., and counsel for the

Secretary was unable during oral argument to indicate where a

member of the public could gain access to the 2007 Analysis

prior to, or even after, promulgation of the Final Rule. See Oral

Arg., at 20:44-22:08. 

Nor did the notice of proposed rulemaking to delist the

Squirrel provide adequate substitute notice of the recovery plan

revisions set forth in the 2007 Analysis. Instead, although it

generally outlined the FWS’s reasons for concluding recovery of

the Squirrel had occurred, see Proposed Rule to Remove Squirrel

From List of Endangered Species, 71 Fed. Reg. 75,924 (Dec. 19,

2006) (“NPRM”), the public had no opportunity to comment on

the revisions of criteria one and three in the Squirrel’s recovery

plan, including the definition of “persistence” in the 2007

Analysis and in the Final Rule. Neither, therefore, was there an

opportunity for the FWS to consider, as Congress required, “all

information presented during the public comment period [on the

recovery criteria revisions],” 16 U.S.C. § 1533(f)(4), because no

such comment period occurred. Even if the FWS was generally

aware, through comments submitted in response to the NPRM,

of criticisms of rejection of initial recovery plan criteria,

“‘knowing’ is not, in any event, the same as actually considering

7

 See U.S. FISH & WILDLIFE SERVICE, WEST VIRGINIA

NORTHERN FLYING SQUIRREL, 5-YEAR REVIEW: SUMMARY &

EVALUATION, App. B (Apr. 2006); 16 U.S.C. § 1533(c)(2)(A). 

USCA Case #11-5128 Document #1389720 Filed: 08/17/2012 Page 40 of 47
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the problems raised by” commenters. Gerber v. Norton, 294

F.3d 173, 183 (D.C. Cir. 2002). The jettisoned procedures of

section 4(f)(4) were designed to facilitate such consideration. 

2. Furthermore, the NPRM gave no indication that the

FWS intended to abandon “population” as the relevant standard

in assessing the Squirrel’s recovery. “Given the strictures of

notice-and-comment rulemaking, an agency’s proposed rule and

its final rule may differ only insofar as the latter is a ‘logical

outgrowth’ of the former.” Envtl. Integrity Project v. EPA, 425

F.3d 992, 996 (D.C. Cir. 2005). “A rule is deemed a logical

outgrowth if interested parties ‘should have anticipated’ that the

change was possible, and thus reasonably should have filed their

comments on the subject during the notice-and-comment

period.” Northeast Md. Waste Disposal Auth. v. EPA, 358 F.3d

936, 952 (quoting City of Waukesha v. EPA, 320 F.3d 228, 245

(D.C. Cir. 2003)). 

The NPRM solicited comments on four topics, three of

which explicitly sought input on Squirrel population:

We particularly seek comments concerning: (1)

Biological, commercial, trade, or other relevant data

concerning any threat (or lack thereof) to the [Squirrel];

(2) additional information on the range, distribution,

and population size of the [Squirrel] and its habitat; (3)

the location of any additional populations of the

[Squirrel]; and (4) data on population trends.

71 Fed. Reg. at 75,924 (emphases added). The NPRM sought no

comments on the use of “persistence,” rather than population, as

the relevant standard, see Ass’n of Private Sector Colls. & Univs.

v. Duncan, 681 F.3d 427, 461 (D.C. Cir. 2012), and only vaguely

referenced “presence” and “persistence,” see NPRM, 71 Fed.

Reg. at 75,926 (citing “strong evidence of the [Squirrel’s]

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20

continued presence throughout its range”); id. (citing ability of

Squirrel to “adjust its foraging and denning behavior . . . to

persist in and around . . . forest patches”); id. at 75,928 (citing

Virginia laws as “ensur[ing] the [Squirrel’s] persistence in

Virginia into the foreseeable future”); id. at 75,929 (noting that

southern flying squirrel “does not appear to be affecting

population persistence of the [Squirrel]”); id. at 75,929-930

(citing surveys showing Squirrel “persistent at multiple locations

for multiple generations,” stating that “protected habitat should

allow for persistence of viable populations” and concluding that

“available information shows that the [Squirrel] is persisting

throughout its historic range.”). The FWS nowhere indicated,

contrary to the request for comments on population size, that

“population” would be replaced as the recovery standard with

“persistence” (or how “persistence” was to be defined). And

two of the vague references to “persistence” fall in the same

sentences in which NPRM mentions “population.” See id. at

75,929-930. 

Given the vague references to “persistence” and the explicit

requests to comment on population size, interested parties were

not reasonably apprised that they should submit comments on the

use of “persistence,” rather than population, as the standard. The

text of the NPRM provided no basis for anticipating that the

FWS “considers persistence to be the best indicator of

successfully reproducing populations for [the Squirrel],” Final

Rule, 73 Fed. Reg. at 50,227. Yet the FWS’s reliance on

“persistence,” and how it was to be defined, were critical shifts

in the standard for the Squirrel’s recovery that presented the

occasion for notice to the public so comments could address

whether the FWS’s definition complied with the ESA’s stated

purpose of “conservation” and the FWS could consider those

comments before amending the recovery plan, much less

completely delisting the Squirrel. The fact that some

commenters criticized the lack of population data in the NPRM

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21

and the lack of a definition of “persistence,” see Final Rule, 73

Fed. Reg. at 50,227, cannot eliminate the FWS’s obligation to

provide notice of its intent to substitute “persistence” for a

“population” standard and of the definition of “persistence” and

how it related to ESA’s policy of conservation. See Fertilizer

Inst. v. EPA, 935 F.2d 1303, 1312 (D.C. Cir. 1991). Having

directed parties to focus on population size in their comments,

the FWS may not “use the rulemaking process to pull a surprise

switcheroo.” Envtl. Integrity Project, 425 F.3d at 996. 

The court nowhere addresses these notice problems, despite

the fact that this argument appears explicitly (and repeatedly) in

appellees’ brief, see, e.g., Appellees’ Br. 36-40, with pin cite

citations to and quotations from this circuit’s logical outgrowth

doctrine cases. The argument is not, as the court concludes, see

Op. at 20, forfeited.

B.

The court’s approval of the Secretary’s reliance on the

Squirrel’s “persistence” as the standard for delisting, see Op. at

11-14, is also contrary to the repeated, unambiguous distinction

in the ESA between conservation of a species and its mere

survival, id. § 1532(3). 

The FWS defined “persistence” as “continuing captures of

[the Squirrel] over multiple generations at previously

documented sites throughout its historical range,” Final Rule, 73

Fed. Reg. at 50,227; see also 2007 Analysis at 2. Stating that

“analysis . . . shows no evidence of localized extirpation since

the [Squirrel] was listed” and that “[t]he [Squirrel] persists in or

near all of the historical areas where it was originally known at

the time of listing,” Final Rule, 73 Fed. Reg. at 50,229, the FWS

determined that the Squirrel is not extinct and some (although

unclear how many) continue to survive after multiple

generations.

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1. ESA section 4(b) requires that “[t]he Secretary shall

make determinations . . . solely on the basis of the best scientific

and commercial data available.” 16 U.S.C. § 1533(b)(1)(A); see

id. § 1533(c)(2). The court concludes the Secretary properly

relied on available data on “persistence,” see Op. at 12-14, citing

Southwest Center for Biological Diversity v. Babbitt, 215 F.3d

58, 60-61 (D.C. Cir. 2000), which held that “the Secretary has no

obligation to conduct independent studies.” But Southwest

Center concerned a dispute over whether population estimates

supported a decision to list a species, not over a shift in the

relevant standard for determining whether to delist a species. In

that case, the court approved the Secretary’s reliance on

estimates of species’ population where an actual count was

unavailable, noting that the Secretary was not alleged to have

“acted on the basis of no data.” Id. at 61. By contrast, here the

Secretary delisted the Squirrel on the basis of “no data,” id.

(emphasis added), regarding population. Instead, the Secretary

shifted the standard from population numbers, see NPRM, 71

Fed. Reg. at 75,924; Recovery Plan at 18, to the Squirrel’s mere

presence/persistence, Final Rule, 73 Fed. Reg. at 50,227, an

entirely different concept. As appellees point out, see Appellees’

Br. at 49, “population” is a measure of quantity; “persistence” is

a measure mere survival, or existence, of the species. 

Indeed, one of the main reasons stated in the NPRM for

delisting was the FWS’s conclusion that there had been “an

increase in the number of individual squirrels.” NPRM, 71 Fed.

Reg. at 75,924. In response to comments, however, the FWS 

acknowledged that “use of the phrase ‘increase in number if [sic]

individual [Squirrels]’ was not accurate, as [the FWS] ha[s] not

estimated the size of the [Squirrel] population.” See Final Rule,

73 Fed. Reg. at 50,230. If there is no data available to answer

the relevant question, section 4(b)(1)(A) does not permit the

Secretary to answer another question that does have supporting

data. The court’s reasoning presumes that the Secretary may

USCA Case #11-5128 Document #1389720 Filed: 08/17/2012 Page 44 of 47
23

begin with a conclusion (to delist) and then rely on some data

remotely related to the species even if in answer to a question

untethered to the ESA’s primary goal of recovery and

conservation, to satisfy the “best . . . data available” standard. 

The “best . . . data available” standard cannot be used as an

excuse to avoid implementing the recovery plan criteria. If the

Secretary (or the FWS) concludes the available data suggests

recovery but is insufficient to satisfy the recovery plan criteria,

then the recovery plan must be revised in the manner prescribed

by section 4(f)(4). This is the process Congress mandated, and

it ensures that the criteria for recovery, and the data by which

they are measured, are the best available.

2. Even assuming section 4(b)(1)(A) permitted the

Secretary to change the standard used to measure a listed

species’ recovery, the plain text of the ESA precludes the

Secretary’s choice of “persistence.” The ESA defines

“conservation” as “the use of all methods and procedures which

are necessary to bring any endangered species or threatened

species to the point at which the measures provided pursuant to

[the ESA] are no longer necessary.” 16 U.S.C. § 1532(3). It

requires post-delisting monitoring for “all species which have

recovered to the point at which the measures provided pursuant

to [the ESA] are no longer necessary.” Id. § 1533(g)(1). As

other circuits have recognized, Congress unambiguously

required more than simply a species’ continued survival in

determining whether it is to be protected under the ESA. In

considering the Secretary’s regulations implementing the critical

habitat provision, 16 U.S.C. § 1536(a)(2), the Ninth Circuit

concluded that “the ESA was enacted not merely to forestall the

extinction of species (i.e., promote a species survival), but to

allow a species to recover to the point where it may be delisted.” 

Gifford Pinchot Task Force v. U.S. Fish & Wildlife Serv., 378

F.3d 1059, 1070 (9th Cir. 2004). “The purpose[] of [the ESA] .

. . [is] to provide a program for the conservation of [] endangered

USCA Case #11-5128 Document #1389720 Filed: 08/17/2012 Page 45 of 47
24

species and threatened species . . . .,” 16 U.S.C. § 1531(b);

consequently “survival” and “recovery” were distinct goals of

the ESA, see Gifford, 378 F.3d at 1070. The Fifth Circuit

reached the same conclusion in Sierra Club v. Fish & Wildlife

Service, 245 F.3d 434, 441-42 (5th Cir. 2001), observing that

“‘[c]onservation’ is a much broader concept than mere survival,”

id. at 441; cf. New Mexico Cattle Growers Ass’n v. Fish &

Wildlife Serv., 248 F.3d 1277, 1283 n.2 (10th Cir. 2001). 

Congress repeatedly referred in the ESA to “survival” as a

separate status than “conservation” or “recovery.” See 16 U.S.C.

§§ 1533(f)(1) & (f)(1)(B)(i) (mandating recovery plans for the

“conservation and survival” of species); id. §§ 1535(c)(1) &

(c)(2) (authorizing cooperative agreements with State agencies

that have “an adequate and active program for conservation of

endangered and threatened species,” id. §§ 1535(c)(1) & (c)(2),

and are also authorized to “conduct investigations to determine

the status and requirements for survival,” id. §§ 1535(c)(1)(C) &

(c)(2)(C)); id. §§ 1535(d)(1)(B) & (E) (authorizing financial

assistance to states based on the state’s capacity to “proceed with

a conservation program” and the “urgency to initiate a program

to restore and protect [a species] . . . in terms of survival of the

species”); § 1539(a)(2)(B)(iv) (permitting “taking” of species

where, among other things, it “will not appreciably reduce the

likelihood of the survival and recovery of the species”). From

the statutory text, “it is clear that Congress intended that

conservation and survival be two different (though

complementary) goals of the ESA.” Gifford, 378 F.3d at 1070. 

The Secretary’s regulation on delisting, which provides that “[a]

species may be delisted on the basis of recovery only if the best

scientific and commercial data available indicate that it is no

longer endangered or threatened,” 50 C.F.R. § 424.11(d)(2)

(1984) (promulgated prior to the 1988 ESA Amendments), must

be viewed in light of Congress’s distinction between “survival”

and “recovery.” Consequently, the Secretary’s decision to delist

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the Squirrel on the basis of its “persistence” – that is, its bare

survival – is a statutorily insufficient basis for delisting.8

In sum, contrary to Congress’s plain text, the court jettisons

the protections in the ESA for endangered and threatened species

and leaves the Secretary (and the FWS) more insulated and less

informed than Congress contemplated in strengthening the ESA

in 1988. The court’s approval of the FWS’s covert revisions to

the Squirrel’s recovery plan, surprise introduction of a new

recovery standard in the Final Rule, and adoption of a delisting

standard unambiguously foreclosed by the ESA leaves little of

the species’ protections Congress provided in the ESA,much less

of APA requirements. 

Accordingly, I respectfully dissent.

8

 In view of the APA violations, it is unnecessary to address

whether the FWS additionally failed adequately to explain the

delisting conclusion by demonstrating a “rational connection between

the facts found and the choice made,” Motor Vehicles Mfrs. Ass’n v.

State Farm Mut. Auto. Ins. Co., 463 U.S. 29, 43 (1983) (internal

quotation marks and citation omitted). The capture data referenced in

the Final Rule appear to show that only 36 of the 105 sites provide

data (i.e., multiple captures over more than five years) of

“persistence.” See 2006 5-Year Review, App. B.

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