Capital Press
A g
The West’s

FRIDAY, MARCH 16, 2018
Weekly
VOLUME 91, NUMBER 11
WWW.CAPITALPRESS.COM
$2.00
After 12 years in Washington, D.C., Alexis Taylor visits all 36 counties
during first year as Oregon Department of Agriculture director
Alexis Taylor
U NDERSTANDING
OREGON
Birthplace: Dubuque, Iowa
Education: Bachelor’s
degree, Iowa State University
Family: Single
Resides: Milwaukie, Ore.
Career: Director, Oregon
Department of Agriculture
(2016-present); Deputy
undersecretary, USDA Farm
and Foreign Agricultural
Services (2013-17); Legisla-
tive assistant, U.S. Sen. Max
Baucus, D-Mont. (2011-13),
Legislative director, U.S. Rep.
Leonard Boswell, D-Iowa
(2006-11)
Hobbies: Hiking and
exploring the outdoors, and
stand-up paddle boarding with
her dog, a sheepdog-poodle
mix named Frankie.
Did you know: Taylor spent
eight years serving in the U.S.
Army Reserves, including one
tour in Iraq with the 389th
Combat Engineer Battalion.
Sources: www.oregon.gov;
Capital Press research
Capital Press graphic
LEFT: ODA Director
Alexis Taylor rides with
the U.S. Army Corps
of Engineers on the
Columbia River to see
the problems associat-
ed with flowering rush,
an irrigation-clogging
noxious weed.
TOP: Taylor visits a
seed-cleaning plant
owned and operated
by grass seed grower
Bob VanderZanden in
Washington County.
By GEORGE PLAVEN
Capital Press
T
he walls and shelves in Alexis Taylor’s office at the Oregon Department of Agricul-
ture are lined with framed photographs from her earlier career in Washington, D.C.
There’s Taylor with retired congressman Leonard Boswell from her home state of
Iowa, whom she served as legislative director for five years. There’s Taylor next to
Tom Vilsack, secretary of agriculture under former President Barack Obama. And
there’s Taylor smiling alongside the president and first lady Michelle Obama at the White House.
All together, Taylor spent 12 years in the na-
tion’s capital, including the last four years with the
USDA, where she oversaw Farm and Foreign Ag-
ricultural Services — including the Farm Service
Agency, Risk Management Agency and Foreign
Agricultural Service.
As her political appointment came to an end
in 2016, Taylor began her job search in the Mid-
west to be closer to her family’s farm outside Holy
Cross, Iowa. A friend and co-worker at the USDA
then told her about a position in Oregon, leading
the state Department of Agriculture in Salem.
Photos courtesy of ODA
Turn to TAYLOR, Page 12
“I need that real-life context with farmers and ranchers, so when I’m sitting here in my office
with my staff talking about an issue, I’ve gotten to see the people it’s impacting.”
Alexis Taylor, ODA director
Streaked horned lark lawsuit targets Oregon farm exemptions
Environmental group
claims federal policy
violates Endangered
Species Act
By MATEUSZ PERKOWSKI
Capital Press
An environmental group is chal-
lenging the federal government’s de-
cision to exempt common farm ac-
tivities from the prohibition against
“taking” streaked horned larks.
In 2013, the U.S. Fish and Wild-
life Service listed the lark as “threat-
ened,” which would usually disal-
low “take” of the species by killing,
harming or harassing the birds.
However, the agency enacted
a special “4(d) rule” under the En-
dangered Species Act that exempted
“normal farming and ranching activ-
ities” from the “take” prohibition in
Oregon’s Willamette Valley. Those
activities include planting, mowing,
spraying, tilling and harvesting.
Streaked horned larks were once
National Park Service
The streaked horned lark.
common in the Pacific Northwest
but have disappeared from 90 per-
cent of their range and now inhabit
the Willamette Valley, islands on the
Columbia River and portions of the
coast and Puget Sound in Washing-
ton.
Because the species prefers flat
ground with little vegetation, activ-
ities such as plowing, mowing and
burning fields can actually create
habitat for the birds.
However, these practices can also
kill or injure streaked horned larks
during their nesting and breeding
season, which lasts from April until
August.
Farm operations in the Willa-
mette Valley, where the majority of
the birds live, were broadly exempt-
ed from the “take” prohibition be-
cause the federal government want-
ed to “allow landowners to continue
those activities without additional
regulation.”
For that reason, the Fish and
Wildlife Service decided against
modifying the 4(d) rule to re-
quire farmers to avoid disturbing
streaked horned lark habitat during
the sensitive nesting and breeding
season.
Turn to LARK, Page 12
Washington to study moving wolves from east to west
UW to search
South Cascades
By DON JENKINS
Capital Press
OLYMPIA — Washington law-
makers took two tentative steps last
week to hasten the day wolves are off
the state’s protected-species list.
The spending plan passed on
the session’s last day appropriates
$183,000 to study moving wolves
from northeast Washington to unoc-
cupied territories to the west.
It also allocates $172,000 to the
University of Washington to search
for wolves in the South Cascades.
If wolves are moved or confirmed
in the South Cascades, they would be
big steps toward delisting.
Lawmakers are realizing the burden
that wolf recolonization has put on four
northeast counties, House Agriculture
and Natural Resources Committee
Chairman Brian Blake said Friday.
“I think some of the barriers are
starting to break down,” said Blake,
D-Aberdeen.
Wolves have surpassed recovery
goals in the northeast corner, but are
too few or non-existent elsewhere to
meet the state’s objectives. A decade
after the Department of Fish and Wild-
life identified Washington’s first pack,
the South Cascades doesn’t have a con-
firmed wolf,
Blake said hunters tell him that
wolves are in the region.
“We know there are wolves down
there, but Fish and Wildlife has been
so busy putting fires out in (northeast)
Washington that they haven’t had the
time or resources to put into the South
Cascades,” he said.
Turn to WOLVES, Page 12