To the Editor:

The article in today’s edition about the National Fish & Wildlife Service requesting public comment on their plan for bat conservation in three states (including New York) intrigued me [“Comments sought on bat conservation plan,” The Altamont Enterprise, Oct. 30, 2024].

So I spent a half an hour trying to locate the actual plan in case I might want to comment. There was no direct link to the document in the article so it took quite a while to track it down. (The link in the article took me to a general index, not the actual document.)

Once I found it, I was flabbergasted to discover it is a 110-page document full of legalese and gibberish. It is absolutely scandalous that this is what our taxpayer dollars are used for.

What I gathered from this document is that anyone who wants to build anything or even modify an existing building or construct a road or bridge in the entire state will now have to do additional paperwork in order to ensure their plans don’t negatively impact any of the three bat species of concern.

There. I was able to state that in one sentence. Why couldn’t they? Why take up 110 pages?

Oh, that would be because they really don’t want the general public to be able to understand their proposal and possibly object.

Why might the public object to protecting valuable bat species? I don’t know.

That’s because the document is so opaque and difficult to decipher. All it really needs to tell us, in plain English, is how people will know a special permit will be required, where people will need to go to apply for the permit, how much it will cost, and exactly what the application will require of them.

Will it be necessary to hire a bat specialist to certify the project won’t harm any bats or bat habitat? Will a lawyer be needed? Exactly how does one identify bat habitat? How would one know if bats are already inhabiting a potential building site?

These are the questions I need answered in such a document. What I don’t need is useless gibberish like, “This EA compares the potential direct, indirect, and cumulative effects on the human and natural environment resulting from the proposed Federal action of approving the proposed GCP and subsequent issuance of IPs with a baseline No Action Alternative.”

Please follow this link — https://www.fws.gov/sites/default/files/federal_register_document/2024-25089.pdf — to access the document for yourself and see what our tax dollars are paying for.

Cindy Adams-Kornmeyer

Westerlo