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The Obama Administration has decided not to defend Bush Administration policies for the threatened Northern Spotted Owl. Instead, federal attorneys want to negotiate with the two sides that sued over the plans - environmentalists and timber advocates.

As Rob Manning reports, the idea is to chart a new course for protecting the owl.

Rather than battling environmental groups and the timber industry in court, federal attorneys are asking the judge to set aside litigation over the owl, and allow 30 days to negotiate a new course. At the heart of the conflict - and any negotiated settlement - is science.

Tom Partin is with the timber industry group, American Forest Resource Council.

Tom Partin: “Well, we think this is an unprecedented step that goes backwards on about five years of study on the owl recovery plan, and critical habitat.”

Todd True: “A decision that puts science in its rightful place and is going to follow the law is exactly what we need after the political meddling that brought about the current problems.”

That’s Todd True with the environmental law firm, Earthjustice.

Justice officials point to political meddling as the main reason it’s backing away from the Bush spotted owl plans.

In 2007, Interior Department Deputy Assistant Secretary, Julie MacDonald resigned amid allegations that she interfered politically with scientific research.

Interior’s Inspector General released a report late last year concluding there was meddling. At the time, Senator Ron Wyden predicted the Obama Administration would have to deal with some of the legal aftermath.

Ron Wyden: “The Obama Administration will have considerable follow-up work to do, given what Julie MacDonald did to hot-wire too many of these Endangered Species decisions to satisfy her political agenda.”

Those decisions involved Critical Habitat maps, that inhibit logging and other activities near the spotted owl - and the Recovery Plan, an advisory document, meant to restore the owl population. Ground zero for all of that work is the owl’s backyard - in the Oregon Coast Range.

This winter, I joined environmentalists outside Philomath, as they walked through an old-growth forest. Noah Greenwald with Center for Biological Diversity says rather than help the owl, the new plans gutted protections in places like this.

Noah Greenwald: “For the owl, they actually reduced critical habitat by five million acres. It went from something like six and a half million to one and a half million acres. And in the recovery plan, they recommended protecting a much-reduced area of Critical Habitat, so yes, issues like habitat fragmentation come into play, when you reduce habitat protection to that extent.”

Fish and wildlife officials have argued that some habitat areas were removed because they weren’t really “critical” to recovering the owl. Recent studies point to more problems for the owl, like the barred owl, which competes with the spotted owl.

Some say the barred owl is more important than habitat acreage. But Doug Heicken with Oregon Wild says those two issues are related.

Doug Heicken: “The barred owl is a new threat to the spotted owl. They use similar habitat, they have similar prey requirements, and the scientists tell us when you have two competing species using similar habitat, you need more habitat. You need bigger habitat blocks, and more habitat blocks.”

The barred owl comes up frequently in discussions of the northern spotted owl, and everybody agrees they’re causing problems. Fish and Wildlife spokeswoman, Joan Jewett says that’s one area to move forward on.

Joan Jewett: “We do want to maintain the momentum that we have already going on the recovery plan, particularly in the area where no one has any dispute with, and that is with addressing the threat posed by barred owls.”

It’s not clear what’ll happen next. The judge in D.C. could point the feds, and the litigants in a different direction. But if the negotiations do take place, the feds say that won’t be where maps get re-drawn, or plans get re-written.

Instead, they’ll try to use that 30-day timeline to determine how much of the plans need work, and how much time the government should take to carry that out.