Roanoke Times
Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: SATURDAY, March 18, 1995 TAG: 9503210042
SECTION: NATIONAL/INTERNATIONAL PAGE: A-3 EDITION: METRO
SOURCE: JOHN DIAMOND ASSOCIATED PRESS
DATELINE: WASHINGTON LENGTH: Medium
That has upset some Republican senators, and they only got huffier at a hearing on the endangered bird Friday.
Fort Bragg, home of the 82nd Airborne Division and other elite Army units, also is home of one of the largest concentrations in the world of the rare red-cockaded woodpecker. The bird has been on the endangered species list since 1973 with a population below 10,000.
When environmental groups threatened to sue in 1990 under the Endangered Species Act, the Army restricted its training. Instead of sending tank brigades blasting through the woods, units must steer clear of 430 red cockaded woodpecker sites speckled across the 150,000-acre fort.
The issue at Friday's hearing was whether a bird in the tree is worth a tank in the bush.
``This is silly,'' said Sen. Jesse Helms, R-N.C., who wants Fort Bragg exempted from the Endangered Species Act. His solution: ``Let's get you an extra appropriation for some sunflower seed.''
Retired Gen. Carl Stiner, who headed U.S. Special Operations Forces in the Persian Gulf War and commanded the 18th Airborne Corps at Fort Bragg from 1988 to 1990, told the Senate Environment and Public Works Committee that the woodpecker restrictions curtail tank gunnery and helicopter gunship practice, night maneuvers and antiaircraft drills. He said readiness of the Army units at Fort Bragg ``has been on a steady decline,'' since 1990.
Sen. John Warner, R-Va., noting that the woodpecker had managed to survive 70 years of intensive military training, said, ``Maybe some of the birds like the shooting.''
by CNB