The Endangered Species Act is a program that aims to protect, but some say it can cause more harm than good. A small herd of Wood Bison are waiting to be reintroduced into the wild at the Alaska Wildlife Conservation.
Wood Bison have been extinct in the United States for over 100 years, and the Alaska Department of Fish and Game is hoping to change that. But stakeholders worry that their reintroduction would give them full protection under the Endangered Species Act, and cause problems in Interior Alaska.
"In essence you may have to designate critical habitat for those animals," said Doug Vincent-Lang, Endangered Species Coordinator for the Alaska Department of Fish and Game.
The state fears they wouldn't be able to properly manage the herd once released, including restrictions on hunting because of federal regulations.
"We've been working with the state on this issue for some years now and our aim is to work with the state and find a way to allow this reintroduction to go forward as quickly, and as smoothly as possible," said Bruce Woods, spokesperson for the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service.
Critics of the Endangered Species Act say it doesn't have a very good track record of helping a species recover. Many point to the recent controversy in the Northern Rockies over grey wolves.
In the mid 1990s the federal government reintroduced wolves into Yellowstone National Park. By 2010, state departments estimated there were over 1,000 roaming the Northern Rockies. Montana, Idaho and Wyoming wanted to take management into their own hands, but U.S. District Court Judge Donald Molloy ruled that Wyoming didn't have proper management tools in place, and the wolves remained on the list.
In April 2011, Congress stepped in and in an unprecedented move delisted wolves using a rider on the budget bill.
"In the U.S. this is the first time that we've ever seen Congress without worrying about the science just delist a species and take away the public's right to have any input on the listing of the species," said Rebecca Noblin, with the Center for Biological Diversity.
Some environmental groups worry this could set a bad precedent.
"The Endangered Species Act is supposed to be on science and in this case it was a political reason wolves were taken off and that defies everything that I think the law should stand for," said Carole Holley, Co-Program Director for Alaska with Pacific Environment.
Rep. Don Young has introduced legislation to delist Polar Bears.
"I got the support to pass it out of the House but I doubt if we can get it out of the Senate because they are so locked into, ‘Oh, we are saving the world, they are not saving the world,’" Young said in a phone interview.
Once a species is on the list it's tough to get it off, according to the Alaska Department of Fish and Game.
"We are setting these recovery objects to get back to recovery levels that aren't necessarily to prevent their extinction when they are no longer threatened with extinction," said Vincent-Lang. He said a perfect example is the Steller sea lion population in the Aleutians.
"The recovery objective for Steller sea lions in the western Aleutians right now is sitting someplace in the order of 110,000 animals. Right now we have over 75,000 animals," Vincent-Lang said. But even with those numbers, the National Marine Fisheries Service shut down fisheries near Adak.
"The process that has brought them to the point where they need protection has been long, it's been a long process and it's taken a long time," said Woods. He says there are plenty of success stories in Alaska, including the Cackling Goose, Peregrine Falcon and Arctic Peregrine Falcon, which were all previously listed and have now been removed.