The proposal to add the northern long-eared bat to the federal endangered species list is slated for a full hearing in front of the U.S. House National Resources Committee (NRC) on Monday, Sept. 8.
The field hearing in Harrisburg, Pennsylvania, will examine questions regarding bat data and non-human-caused disease, as well as the likely negative impacts that a federal endangered listing for this particular species would have on such important activities as farming and forestry.
Witnesses will be called to discuss the economic impacts of placing the bat on the endangered species list and how the proposed designation could fail to help the species.
“This is a potentially sweeping decision that affects portions of 38 states,” Rep. Doc Hastings (R-Wash.), chairman of the NRC, said. “It is vital that a decision of this magnitude be based on actual data, not settlement deadlines, and that it includes input from affected landowners and stakeholders not only from Pennsylvania, but from the rest of the two-thirds of the United States that would be impacted.”
The northern long-eared bat was one of several hundred species placed on a preliminary list of protected species in 2011, but a final determination must be made by 2016.