A federal judge ruled this week that management is not violating the Endangered Species Act at historic Sharp Park Golf Course in Pacifica, Calif., and should not have to limit or eliminate operations.
In the lastest chapter in this long-running saga, U.S. District Judge Susan Illston denied a preliminary injunction by environmentalists, who want to, at the very least, limit water pumping, mowing and golf cart use at Sharp Park, a public course that is part of San Francisco's recreation and parks division, and designed by legendary architect Alister Mackenzie.
The injunction that the environmentalists wanted would have stopped pumping from a pond where frogs deposit their eggs. The San Francisco Public Golf Alliance opposed the injunction, saying an injunction might have closed the golf course. The plaintiffs are determined to save California red-legged frogs and the San Francisco garter snake, which have found an ideal habitat in the water features at Sharp Park, including the Laguna Salada marsh separating the course from the Pacific Ocean.
The environmentalists believe the management of the golf course, the presence of golfers and occasional flooding that the property experiences adversely affect those protected species, and the best resolution is converting the area into a natural preserve.
Illston noted that there is undisputed evidence that the red-legged frog population actually has increased over the past two decades, a key point in the case. In the ruling, the court indicated that experts from both sides of the case agreed that frog population at Sharp Park has increased and that plaintiffs "have failed to show a likelihood of irreparable harm."
Illston says the activists "failed to show the need for court intervention before their lawsuit goes to trial in July," according to The San Francisco Chronicle. The case is scheduled for trial July 16, 2012, in Federal District Court in San Francisco.
Attorney Chris Carr, who is representing the San Francisco Public Golf Alliance, said: "Plaintiff's position that the Endangered Species Act is violated by the death of a single or even a few frog eggs out of the hundreds of thousands or more laid each year at Sharp is simply untenable in the face of this biological reality."
Richard Harris, co-founder of the San Francisco Public Golf Alliance, said: "The evidence clearly showed that the species are doing quite well at Sharp Park and that the city's efforts to improve their habitat, while at the same time providing affordable recreation to a diverse and vibrant group of local golfers, is working."
For more on the Sharp Park saga, you can check out a pair of previously published GCM stories — "New chapter in Sharp Park saga" from the February 2010 issue, and "Sharp Park's future still up in the air" from the May 2011 issue.
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