Small rodent, big pain for builders

Developer Steve Schuck said he never found a Preble’s meadow jumping mouse on land north of Colorado Springs, but he said the animal wound up costing him $1 million and years of delay.

As he crawled his way through a maze of federal regulations under the Endangered Species Act, Schuck said he encountered requirements that did nothing for the “quality and the livability of the development.”

“That’s all because we couldn’t prove a mouse didn’t live on our property,” he said.

The U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service announced Thursday that the Preble’s mouse will retain its federal protection under the Endangered Species Act in Colorado but not Wyoming.

While agency officials say development in Colorado has destroyed much of the mouse’s habitat, developers and some local government officials say they are being unfairly burdened by regulations to protect the mouse.

“This is all about a mouse that nobody ever sees,” Schuck said.

“Millions and millions of dollars are going out for this rodent — and that’s what it is,” said Monument Mayor Byron Glenn. “In the meantime, schools are not being built. Roads are not being built.

“It’s been a great, great expense to the people in the northern part of the county.”

The mouse lives only along creeks of the Front Range in Colorado and Wyoming. The Fish and Wildlife Service has found some of the greatest numbers in northern El Paso County, particularly Monument Creek and its tributaries.

According to the agency’s proposal, residential development of private land poses the greatest threat to the mouse. Such land is usually in valley bottoms, the favored habitat of the mouse, officials wrote.

The Endangered Species Act requires developers and property owners to consult with the Fish and Wildlife Service, conduct surveys for the presence of the mouse and avoid destroying its habitat or mitigate any habitat loss.

Nobody has calculated exactly how much it is costing Colorado developers and property owners, but Denver attorney Kent Holsinger, who has represented them in issues involving Preble’s, says it is a lot.

“That consultation can drag on for months and even years in complex cases,” Hol-singer said. “There are many examples in Colorado where consultations have cost hundreds of thousands of dollars and even millions.”

In El Paso County, in recent years, the regulations forced a developer in Monument to abandon plans for 175 acres of trails and ballfields in a housing project. A developer in Briargate had to give up plans for 155 acres of homes, trails and ballfields in a 7,600-acre development.

This year, the Air Force Academy was chastised and changed its procedures after building a parking lot on mouse habitat without getting Fish and Wildlife approval. And when the widening of Interstate 25 from Colorado Springs to Monument is done, planners must mitigate impacts to 10 of the 14 streams thought to support the mouse.

Schuck, the developer, said he was told he could not disturb a stream between two lakes in the Forest Lakes project, forcing him to build two separate subdivisions.

“It’s pretty clear the activists and interests who are advancing this are more interested in thwarting development,” Schuck said.

Fish and Wildlife Service spokeswoman Diane Katzenberger said that is not the intent.

“This is a biological finding on the status of the mouse and the status of suitable habitat,” Katzenberger said.

For frustrated developers and property owners, there could be some changes.

El Paso County has nearly completed its habitat conservation plan for the mouse. If approved by the Fish and Wildlife Service, local officials would take over regulation. Projects would go through a local office, removing the long delays associated with federal approval.

“You know where you’re at just by looking at the map,” said Mark Johnston, the county’s deputy director of environmental services. But if a project is in Preble’s habitat, the current restrictions will apply.

Meanwhile, for Schuck, after years of delays, dirt is being moved on the Forest Lakes project.

After that, he said, he’ll never build another house in an area the Preble’s mouse may call home — no matter who is in charge of the regulations.

“It’s just too unpredictable,” Schuck said. “We have a hard enough time trying to predict the marketplace.”

CONTACT THE WRITER: 476-1605 or scott.rappold@gazette.com