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Tom Smylie / U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service
Ocelots, nocturnal cats that can weigh up to 30 pounds, have been nearly wiped out in the U.S., with just 100 or so still living in the wild.
How did a pro baseball pitcher (Josh Beckett of the L.A. Dodgers), ocelots and a natural gas pipeline builder make it into the same news headline? They’re all part of a lawsuit filed by Beckett after the company used eminent domain to clear land on his 7,000-acre hunting ranch in south Texas.
Beckett alleges the company, Eagle Ford Midstream, violated the Endangered Species Act by clearing land that was habitat for the ocelot, of which only 100 are thought to be left in the wild in the U.S.
On Wednesday, two Beckett companies filed a restraining order against Eagle Ford from continuing work inside the ranch.
That followed a lawsuit filed Tuesday that states "multiple big cat tracks" were photographed there as recently as June and that Beckett saw ocelots as recently as last November, MySanAntonio.com reported.
Eagle Ford engaged in "willful destruction" by clearing land after a notice of intent to sue was filed in August, according to the lawsuit by Beckett Ventures Inc and Hall of Fame Land Ventures LP.
Beckett also claimed Eagle Ford was urged to choose a shorter, direct path rather than the diagonal swath that was cleared.
Ocelots are protected in Texas and at the federal level. A company found to have destroyed habitat could face fines and be forced to do mitigation work.
Eagle Ford did not immediately respond to NBC News' request for comment, but it filed a response with the court Wednesday, arguing that hunting on the ranch posed a greater threat than their pipeline.
Beckett owns the Herradura Ranch in LaSalle County and runs a hunting lodge out of the premises. "The Herradura has offered superb dove, quail and trophy whitetail (deer) for over a decade," its website states.
Eagle Ford, in its court response, alleged that "the protection of the ocelot was merely a sham to leverage additional money from (Eagle Ford) in exchange for an easement."
A state court earlier this month denied Beckett's similar request to halt the project, the company added.
It also noted that e-mails it received from Beckett's lawyers in April made no mention of ocelots and instead requested an alternative route because of the impact on an irrigation system and the ranch's hunting business.
Eagle Ford's environmental consultant earlier determined the land "does not exhibit the necessary density, coverage or structure generally described for potential ocelot habitat," adding that the nearest known population of ocelots was 120 miles away in Kenedy County.
Based on that information, the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service determined no further action was required.
Nocturnal wild cats that can weigh up to 30 pounds, ocelots prefer dense shrub habitat. While abundant in Central and South America, ocelots in the U.S. have been reduced to an estimated 100 in Texas and Arizona.
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A key ocelot habitat in Texas has been the Lower Rio Grande Valley, but "more than 95 percent of the dense thorn scrub habitat (there) ... has been converted to agriculture, rangelands, or urban land uses," the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service noted in its plan to help the species recover.
Other problems facing the Texas and Arizona population, the service added, include inbreeding, border fences separating the natural range that goes into Mexico, and ocelots becoming roadkill.
The Associated Press contributed to this report.
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If you thought you owned your property, think again.
Corporations with politically connected friends can get what they want.
Let's hope this gets stopped.
yep then maybe i can hook up a few big cats to pull my car around ...who needs HORSE power....i got CATS.....:)
Agreed Ed. He owns the land. He should be able to do as he pleases and clearly that is not the case.
The U.S. Supreme Court MAJORLY screwed up in 2005 when they ruled that emenent domain can be used by business to take land.
Maybe the worst decision in U.S. Supreme Court history. It goes against everything we stand for.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kelo_v._City_of_New_London
The U.S. Supreme Court MAJORLY screwed up in 2005 when they ruled that emenent domain can be used by business to take land.
Not the first time for the dopes. Look at the Obama care TAX. They are securely in the pocket of the money men. Citizens have no real power. Only an Illusion.
Yep. I got an upright piano up a flight of stairs once, using only three house cats and a whip.
Eminent domain is being increasingly misused. When the Supreme Court ruled that private companies can use eminent domain to take private land they screwed up and went well beyond the intent of eminent domain. Eminent domain was established to allow the government to take property for the public good, it was never intended to be a way for private companies to usurp the property rights of a private land owner. Something needs to be done to stop these abuses of eminent domain before there is no such thing as private property rights left.
I agree, but it'll never be done by a Republican Congress.
I'm for the Ocelots all the way. To hell with eminent domain.
Ok, so I was reading it right. It's Beckett's land, his to do what he pleases with it! He paid for it. This is just awful & so not fair.
so if it goes where you say it should go through your "hunting grounds" its ok? lets see;
guns....pipeline....hunters, ( most of whom are from the city with little or no real experience).....leaving a lodge where they can purchase alcohol no doubt.....
.......nope don't see any potential problems here...................................
The pipeline goes in the ground. The odds of a stray bullet getting through the earth and hitting it would be astronomical.
steve
if that were the case who would care what route it took? ground water concerns? certainly, but ocelot habitat?.. plants grow back ya know....its kinda what they do.
So...basically you like fossil fuels and not animals. Got it.
One problem with eminent domain is that the easement belongs to the company using it - and not the rightful property owner. I don't agree with either of these: Pay-to-kill or (legally) steal your property. I do agree with Warren's comment that the SC decision to allow private companies to invoke eminent domain is effectively the death of private property ownership in the US.
just what I was thinking. there are 100 ocelots left, and they are all on this guy's hunting lands. hmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmm
No, they are not ALL on this hunting site and the game being hunted there are doves, quail and deer.
Scooter tramp,
No, the pipeline owner will insist on the right to maintain its right of way and access as a short grass cover for ease of maintenance and repair. In other words, until the pipeline is formally abandoned at some point in the distant future, this easement (which is a right to exclusive use) could exist, just like a railroad RoW, for a century or more. A perpetual probable 100' wide scar across the center of the ranch.
I had a friend who was a career railroader of the old-school. The Iowa Northern bought a piece of the old Rock Island Railroad, with the intention of operating a shortline grain hauler. Inspection of the tracks showed that the city of Waterloo had paved over a grade crossing near downtown. Les called the city street department to let them know that the city had violated the terms of its crossing easement. The city laughed him off. Two days later, Less was on a 180ton locomotive reopening the crossing. This buckled the pavement for twenty yards in both directions. Then the street department and the city relearned that the railroad owned its ground, the city had an easement, which it had violated. The city had to not only repair its street, but return the crossing to its previous usable state. That said, there are also laws regarding how long a railroad can block a street easement not under repair.
I think the Ocelot might be the only animal protected by the state of Texas. All reptiles and amphibians are fair game.
hence no Democrats...............................:)
Steve@ yes if you purchase the proper amount of Licenses from the state.
You must pay the State for anything you do. IT'S THE LAW
If those cats did not pay for the land, then they need to move, plain and simple.
Texas is the product of common thieves breaching the terms of a legal contract with Mexico, that's been about the level they've operated on ever since. The Alamo was a shootout between the legal landowners and a bunch of drunken squatters trying to steal land as America of course is prone to do when it suits the need.
Now they do it to their own, hilarious. Can't wait to see what happens when the hurricanes hit again and they beg for other peoples money.
Nope. And we've got the bill of sale to prove it.
When was that bill of sale signed?
February 2, 1848. The signatures can be viewed at the National Archives and Records Administration website. Record Group 11, #299809.
And today's ignorant statement award goes too...
Yes, you have guessed it folks.
Poster number 4. Congratulations Sir or Madam
love that headline...talk about a kinky bunch... and in a courtroom to boot.... add in a guy in a turban and a goat and shoot a video............................:)
Don't forget the vacuum cleaner and the Miracle Whip.
NPR was talking about televised Sheep Beauty contests, in I believe Senegal; I was laughing to hard to listen as closely as I usually do. The last part, was what got me. The breeder and showman of a 122.5kilo ram works full-time just to afford to feed and care for the sheep, who could not live on local pastuerage as they are too delicate. So add a pretty 175lb ram to the courtroom.
Land Grab, and some posters think the EPA is bad, just think there goes you back 40 and you have no legal recourse. Corp. X wants to build a golf course and your home stands in the way, oops, so sorry your evicted. seems in some states a land-owner has no rights to their property. Bad SCOTUS decision, along with Citizen's United. Money talks.
Doesn't work that way skyparrot. Eminent domain is used for the greater good and the land owner is paid, well I might add.
Tell that to your kids when you're living in a cardboard box on the street. Yeah, some "greater good" -- strip malls and all sorts of other unnecessary crapola. But because a corporation wants it, it must be good for us, right?
more like "the good of the greater" than "the greater good" these days
and as far as being "well paid" those that want to steal your land simply get their own "appraisers" to lowball the value
Wait until a gas producer decides to drill and frack a gas well, using a million gallons of water which will be made irreparably toxic. West Texas ranchers have already been losing those battles.
Corporations are able to steal your land because people became willing to take a check instead of defending their land. Now corporations get to decide what your land is worth as well. This will not change in the courts, at best you might be able to get value recognized in the violative nature of the act itself and fair value for the property.
It will change if patriots are willing to defend their land with force and their life if neccessary.
Defend your land? Read a story several years ago about an old duffer in the Everglades, one of the Gvmt.'s needed the land, State or Federal can't remember. All the people around this old duffer sold as the amount of $'s was more than fair. But not him, he showed how brave he was. Or smart, ended up getting a quarter million dollar house in South Florida and a million or so folding. Not bad for a shack with no indoor plumbing or electricity. In Atlantic city one homeowner hold out found his self nestled between two giant casino's, crazy location, now property virtually worthless, probably lost a million or more. When the number gets right, sell. You can always get same for less or better somewhere else.
That's assuming you ever get a "right" offer. The amount you get is up to a court, there is no negotiation.
Just another big business acting like a bully! Sounds like someone running for president. It only my way that counts attitude. We need to come together and stop abusing individuals rights.
Agreed OV. A shame he has to rely on ESA when his right to leave his own land as-is should be enough.
I did some survey work for big cats when I was a wildlife biologist, long ago in my misspent youth. I never worked on ocelots, but did a bit of work on lynx. It's fun work if you can get it. Cats are secretive and very hard to document when rare like this. If the habitat is at all appropriate, the burden of proof should be on the industry rather than the landowner.
The only problem I'd have with letting the burden of proof rest on the shoulders of the industry involved is that I cannot imagine actually being able to trust any expert or consultant hired by that industry to be an impartial party. Better there should be a totally unrelated authority with absolutely no interest in the outcome engaged to do the study. It would be better still if the unrelated authority had no knowledge of the identities of the parties involved in the dispute (should that be possible).
Bullet171. Getting a good price for your property is not always correct.
Where I live many people have lost property from eminent domain because of a major construction project. They are not even getting the tax value of their property.
That's the government for you. When they tax your property they say it is worth one thing. When they buy your property they say it is worth something else and it is always alot less.
Those Bastards! Eminent domain should be outlawed.
There was a huge issue in my neighborhood a few years ago. The city came and built this huge brick wall along where they were widening a road - as a sound dampener. A guy had an RV gate, with his RV parked in the back bricked in by this new wall they built on his property. As they had eminet domain, they were allowed to build the wall on his property. So his RV is STILL sitting in his backyard because he can't get it out and he's made a major stink, the law just isn't on his side. Basically he was told to pound sand. Just a sad state we live in now-a-days
I respect private land rights but it wasn't like the wall was sprung on this guy. He must have seen it coming knowing how cities operate. It's his fault the RV is trapped.
Nothing is going right for you this year eh Josh?
Welcome to the Corporate States of America!
never trust a Red Sox pitcher.
I know tha t Denver Bill is wrong Because in 1848 Nobody could write here in Texas at the time and the reason I know it is because they just started to count when they hit oil and gas and could only get a check so they had to learn to scrible and count !
Beckett has noble intent but the eminent domain law has been abused enough.
It was meant for the narrowest scope of land use concerns.
I think some people are confused about what is occurring here. This pipeline will be put underground. Usually about six feet deep. There will be "risers" every few miles for pipeline maintenance. There will be a "right of way" cleared for about thirty feet on each side of the line. The positive side of this is that sixty foot wide strip will serve as a fire break should a brush fire occur. The land will still belong to the landowners. They will be paid anywhere between $20-40 dollars PER FOOT! You figure out how much that is worth. The pipeline is much safer than trucking the product over the road in a tanker truck.
dronezrock,
I agree with your analysis. Widths may vary but this is like what I described about easements with which I am familiar. Now the question really gets down to how will this affect the operation of his ranch. Obviously, no hunting near the risers. And the clear strip may represent a killing ground for quail and young pheasant due to raptors (hawks and eagles). I doubt that an ocelot would take down anything much larger than a fawn. My understanding is that they are more likely to prey on rodents and lizards.
But as to land usage and ownership, those terms are quite often one-sidedly written by the utility or pipeline owner and basically deny what most people would call property rights of ownership. Including adjacent land usages and an encumbered title which may make the property unsaleable.
Emminent domain is a bad joke on the public. Many, many years ago it may have had its place, but I think it is just used as a tool now for big businesses and governments to take away what belongs to private citizens, purely for profit, not the public good. Everyone should start harassing their representatives to change these laws.
pw,
Many years ago, emminent domain was used to establish post roads, streets and alleyways, and provision for the installation of public or quasi-public (private monopoly operating under government license) utilities. Often there was little or no recompense since the property owner would be advantaged by improved access, better fire and police protection due to better access, and the advances of modern water, sewage, electrical, telephone and gas service. This somehow changed in the 1920-1930 period when massive public works projects flooded valleys to provide flood control and fresh water for major cities like New York, Los Angeles, Atlanta and others. The 1950's brought Interstate Highway construction and public housing construction.
However, the case of New London, Connecticut raised the spectre of a government seizing private property solely to provide to a private developer, with the expectation of increasing future government revenues. Ironically, that particular plan failed when the end customer reneged and closed its existing facilities in New London, leaving the city with an $80nillion loss on the seized property and a much reduced value on the existing facility, which was built under a tax abatement that had not expired, yeilding NO revenue.
I fear, however, the Kelo vs, New London decision of the Supreme Court has emboldened energy producers and pipeline developers to run rough-shod over landowners' rights in pursuit of their profits. We must frack this well to maximize gas production, thus we must seize your water to do it. We must route our pipeline here, because --- well, we just must do that and we don't need to explain. Unfortunately the Court does not revisit its orders very often, much less change them.
Well, Bill, you put a lot more detail into your reply than I did, but the gist is the same. Thank you for the historical data, though, I hope some of these people read it.
Using someone else's computer and username. She lets me. She is an angel.
Jack Welch is an idiot whose voice sounds like he has been castrated. His balls has already shrunk that much. How the heck do these guys get the wife they do? Because of money. Why else would young women (frigid sluts who marry for money) marry old wrinkled insensitive dumb farts like this one? For money. Give this guy a few million dollars to shut up...he will. Money will make these guys do anything...including switch sides. Here Welch, here Welch...take a few dollars boy, take it...now go home to your pretty wife and shut up.
Sorry Dr. MS for being so crude with your username . But this guy gets my bile going. I got bigger balls and can do his wife better. I just need his money...which he got by playing unfairly.