MARK WAITE / PVT From left, U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service biologist Jeri Krueger, Nye County planner Kyle Walton and county planner David Stallworth address county commissioners Tuesday. MARK WAITE / PVT A map shows the Pahrump Regional Planning District and a striped area designated as a desert tortoise fee zone. Advertisement

The latest Nye County desert tortoise habitat conservation plan would be a high-impact plan allowing the disturbance of up to 1,000 acres over 10 years, planner Kyle Walton told county commissioners Tuesday afternoon.

Previous plans were termed low effect, covering up to 100 acres. A low-effect plan would mean it would be an insignificant impact to the environment and would fly under the radar when it came to having to comply with requirements of the National Environmental Policy Act.

"Up to 100 acres, we could probably justify. It is going to be the responsibility of the Fish and Wildlife Service to justify to the public that this is, in effect, a low-effect habitat conservation plan. The higher impact, the greater the number of acres that can be disturbed, the harder it is for us to make the case to the public that this is indeed a low-effect plan," said U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service Biologist Jeri Krueger.

Nye County planner Kyle Walton, who gave a brief outline of the latest plan by overhead projector, said this high-effect plan would involve an official environmental assessment.

Krueger said she has been working with Nye County officials on desert tortoise plans since 1998.

Nye County has been struggling to pass a conservation plan for the desert tortoise, an endangered species, for several years. There were previous plans floated by former Nye County Natural Resources Director Jim Marble, Entrix Consultants, consultant Mary Ellen Giampaoli and Julene Haworth.

Haworth, whose plan was accepted by Nye County commissioners last July, later balked at paying her fee to submit the application to the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service, blasted county officials.

"Had my reasonable contract proposal to complete the HCP not been pulled from the Aug. 8 county agenda, the Pahrump Planning District would have been protected," Haworth said. "Currently anyone, and I mean anyone, who would disturb any amount of dirt for any purposes is literally in violation of the Endangered Species Act and would be subject to a violation."

Haworth said if she would have been able to follow through with her plan, which called for disturbing up to 500 acres, it would have better represented the county's view, instead of a plan drafted by Fish and Wildlife.

Haworth said the county last March turned over her work to Walton, a former Las Vegas planner, who lacked her experience in drafting habitat conservation plans. Nye County planning has picked up some of the environmental work formerly under the county natural resources department, which was abolished. Walton was hired to work in the planning department this year because of his environmental experience.

"You already have an adopted and viable plan. The adopted HCP plan just needs to be adjusted and completed. It has stakeholder input and has been publicly vetted. It could be ready in a few short weeks," Haworth said.

County officials didn't reply to Haworth's comments.

Commissioner Joni Eastley questioned the wisdom of the latest plan to cover 1,000 acres in 10 years, which would be a high-effect plan and would allow only an average of 100 acres per year to be disturbed.

Walton suggested a $550 per acre mitigation fee. Eastley questioned whether the county had negotiated a smaller fee back when Marble drafted a plan.

The latest plan includes mostly areas east of Highway 160 in the desert tortoise impact zone and some parts of the southern Pahrump Valley. Areas outside of the zone historically developed for agriculture would be free from the restraints.

County officials would be trained on how to train construction workers on removing tortoises. There would even be an educational program in the middle schools to educate children about the desert tortoise.

Temporary fencing would be required around construction sites.

Walton gave some indication what the mitigation fees would go for: habitat conservation, the desert tortoise conservation center in Clark County, highway signage warning of desert tortoises, along with measures to control predators like ravens including reducing litter and enforcing covered loads on trucks.

"I would rather have a $350 fee and buy our own trash containers and support our own enforcement of the covered loads," Eastley said.

Krueger told Commissioner Butch Borasky California had a raven control program, Clark County also had an animal control worker to do raven control in specific areas.

When Walton talked about preventing motorists from driving into the desert, such as from unfinished subdivisions, to avoid desert tortoise habitat, commissioner Lorinda Wichman became concerned.

"Please just be very, very careful with this. People have been using those roads for hundreds of years, longer than you and I have been here," Wichman said.

Commissioner Gary Hollis said Nye County has a map to show every RS 2477 road -- roads designated as public roads prior to the passage of the Federal Public Land Management Act of 1976 -- and the county will enforce that right.

Under questioning from Hollis, Krueger said Clark County doesn't require fencing, but that could change with some planned revisions. They are also not required to move tortoises out of the way of construction, she said.

"We will come up with a method, an acceptable way to move the tortoises. It comes down to how many tortoises you run into. If you don't find many tortoises, it may be acceptable just to move them onto adjacent BLM land," Krueger said.