For Immediate Release: June 8, 2006

On June 7, the Florida Fish & Wildlife Conservation Commission (FWC) at its regular quarterly meeting in West Palm Beach, Florida, ignored public outcry and unanimously voted to downlist manatees from “Endangered” status to “Threatened” over the objections of numerous scientists and manatee advocates. Seventeen conservation, animal welfare, and public interest groups from Florida and around the nation have filed a legal petition with the FWC, urging the state to revise its imperiled species classification system and also asking the agency to delay any species’ reclassifications, like the manatee’s, that recommended a lesser status of imperilment.

The action of the FWC may prevent the actual recovery of the manatee population and the conservation community fears that the same fate may await other at-risk species in Florida like the northern right whale, Florida panther, and Florida black bear.

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Read a press release on the legal petition

The petition is available at www.savethemanatee.org/fwcc_petition.pdf

You can help! Send an online letter protesting the manatee's reclassification.

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