OCR Text |
Show OroeodilG Toors for UfnEi Bom? snail darter, may prove to be groundless. A colony of snail darters that may have lived for years in a creek totally unaffected by the Tel. lico dam, was found by a University . of Tennessee Zoologist. of If, to achieve other ends st: the environmentalists again a" make cynical use of a fish an and legislation to protect be it, could under m ine congres - sional support for conserva. ! bl tlon and make-an endangered j si species of the Endangered I e; Species Act. c Remember the snail darter, dart-er, the infamous minnow whose threatened extinction delayed construction of the TelUco Dam in Tennessee for three years? After much litigation, a special 1979 congressional exemption allowed al-lowed completion of the dam. This year a similar case is stirring in Utah that may endanger the Endangered Endanger-ed Species Act itself Act itself if local environmentalists environmen-talists resort to extremism. The disputed structure is the proposed $25 million White River Dam, which Utah wants In order to meet the anticipated water needs of companies seeking oil in its Uinta Basin tar sands and shale. Because the dam site lies on federalproperty.theBLM is withholding a construction permit until it determines whether the squawfish is dependent de-pendent on the White River for its spawning grounds. Governor Scott Matheson fears that a snail darter replay would not only stifle efforts to extract oil in Utah but would also set a precedent prece-dent that could doom many of the West's proposed synthetic syn-thetic fuel projects. It now turns out that the crocodile tears shed by the environmentalists over the |