PORTLAND, Maine (AP) – A judge’s ruling that the federal government didn’t take adequate steps to protect endangered whales will probably result in another monthslong court battle, parties to the lawsuit said.
Environmental groups sued the U.S. government with a claim that regulators’ failure to protect the North Atlantic right whale from harm was a violation of the Endangered Species Act, and U.S. District Judge James Boasberg ruled April 9 that they were right. The right whales number only about 400 and are in the midst of a worrisome decline in population.
The government, environmentalists and industry members who are involved in the lawsuit must still return to court to determine a remedy. Boasberg ruled that the risk posed to the whales by the lobster fishery was too great to be sustainable, and that a remedy could ultimately result in new restrictions on lobster fishing.
The whales are vulnerable to lethal entanglement in lobster fishing gear.
Members of the industry, including the Maine Lobstermen’s Association, have vowed to fight to protect the fishery. The two sides will have to exchange court filings about what the remedy could look like, and the process is likely to take months, said Jake O’Neill, a spokesman for Conservation Law Foundation, one of the environmental groups involved in the lawsuit.