Sprawl Imperils N.C. Species, New Report Says

Say goodbye to the rare and beautiful Schweinitz’s sunflower as well as the humble Carolina heelsplitter and Carolina creekshell mussels, if sprawl is allowed to continue at present rates in North Carolina.

That’s the finding of a new report by the National Wildlife Federation, Smart Growth America and NatureServe titled Endangered by Sprawl: How Runaway Development Threatens Wildlife. It found that the paving of natural areas and farmland for subdivisions, shopping centers, roads and parking lots has become a leading threat to America’s native plants and animals.

“Runaway sprawl will deplete wildlife habitat in many metropolitan areas in the next two decades,” says John Kostyack, NWF senior counsel and a co-author of the report. “As Endangered by Sprawl shows, consumption of these critical areas could bring an astonishing number of species up to, or even over, the brink of extinction. If we allow that to happen, both people and wildlife will suffer.”

The Charlotte, N.C. metro area – home to 13 imperiled species – is projected to lose 35 percent of its remaining open space to development over the next 25 years. The report focused only on the 35 fastest-growing large metro areas and thus does not consider the smaller Raleigh region, where sprawl is also a significant concern.

The report recommends ways to halt habitat loss by changing local land use patterns and improving state and federal natural resource and transportation policies.

“As Congress prepares to debate the future of the Endangered Species Act, this study drives home the critical role that better planning must play in both protecting threatened wildlife and improving our cities and towns,” says Smart Growth America Executive Director Don Chen. “To check runaway land consumption, we need to provide incentives for development in existing urban and suburban areas, build new development at higher densities and set aside natural areas as off limits to new development.”

Unfortunately, such efforts face an uphill battle in North Carolina, where the pro-development lobby is one of the state's most powerful political forces. A 2003 study (PDF) by Democracy North Carolina, a nonprofit advocating for campaign finance reform, found that the N.C. Realtors Association and the N.C. Home Builders Association were the top two donors to legislative campaigns in the 2002 election cycle, together giving almost $500,000.

Pro-development interests also hold considerable power at the local level. A November 2003 investigation by Raleigh Eco News found that the state home builders gave more direct contributions to Raleigh City Council candidates than any other political action committee, according to disclosures filed before the September 2003 municipal elections.

And that's bad news for the sunflowers, mussels and other imperiled species that get in the way of the bulldozers.