Receipt of Incidental Take Permit Application and Proposed Habitat Conservation Plan for the Florida Scrub-Jay; Brevard County, FL; Categorical Exclusion

Receipt of Incidental Take Permit Application and Proposed Habitat Conservation Plan for the Florida Scrub-Jay; Brevard County, FL; Categorical Exclusion

Dates

We must receive your written comments on or before September 7, 2023.

Supplementary Information

We, the Fish and Wildlife Service (Service), announce receipt of an application from CenterPoint Integrated Solutions, LLC (applicant) for an incidental take permit (ITP) under the Endangered Species Act of 1973, as amended (ESA; 16 U.S.C. 1531 et seq. ). The applicant requests the ITP to take the federally listed Florida scrub-jay ( Aphelocoma coerulescens; scrub-jay) incidental to the construction and operation of a commercial development in Brevard County, Florida. We request public comment on the application, which includes the applicant's habitat conservation plan (HCP), and on the Service's preliminary determination that this proposed ITP qualifies as low effect, and may qualify for a categorical exclusion pursuant to the Council on Environmental Quality's National Environmental Policy Act (NEPA) regulations (40 CFR 1501.4), the Department of the Interior's (DOI) NEPA regulations (43 CFR 46), and the DOI's Departmental Manual (516 DM 8.5(C)(2)). To make this preliminary determination, we prepared a draft environmental action statement and low effect screening form, both of which are also available for public review.

Proposed Project

The applicant requests a 5-year ITP to take scrub-jays via the conversion of approximately 3.4 acre (ac) of occupied nesting, foraging, and sheltering scrub-jay habitat incidental to the construction of a commercial development on a 11.87-ac parcel in Section 20, Township 28 South, Range 37 East, Brevard County, Florida. The applicant proposes to mitigate for take of the scrub-jays by purchasing credits equivalent to 6.8 ac of scrub-jay-occupied habitat from a Service-approved conservation bank. The Service would require the applicant to purchase the credits prior to engaging in any construction phase of the project.

Public Availability of Comments

Before including your address, phone number, email address, or other personal identifying information in your comment, be aware that your entire comment, including your personal identifying information, may be made available to the public. While you may request that we withhold your personal identifying information, we cannot guarantee that we will be able to do so.

Our Preliminary Determination

The Service has made a preliminary determination that the applicant's proposed project, including the construction of a commercial building, driveway, parking space, green areas, stormwater pond, and associated infrastructure ( e.g., electric, water, and sewer lines), would individually and cumulatively have a minor effect on the scrub-jay and the human environment. Therefore, we have preliminarily determined that the proposed ESA section 10(a)(1)(B) permit would be a low-effect ITP that individually or cumulatively would have a minor effect on the scrub-jay and may qualify for application of a categorical exclusion pursuant to the Council on Environmental Quality's NEPA regulations, DOI's NEPA regulations, and the DOI Departmental Manual. A low-effect ITP is one that would result in (1) minor or nonsignificant effects on species covered in the HCP; (2) nonsignificant effects on the human environment; and (3) impacts that, when added together with the impacts of other past, present, and reasonable foreseeable actions, would not result in significant cumulative effects to the human environment.

Next Steps

The Service will evaluate the application and the comments to determine whether to issue the requested ITP. We will also conduct an intra-Service consultation pursuant to section 7 of the ESA to evaluate the effects of the proposed take. After considering the preceding and other matters, we will determine whether the permit issuance criteria of section 10(a)(1)(B) of the ESA have been met. If met, the Service will issue ITP number PER2768044 to CenterPoint Integrated Solutions, LLC.

Authority

The Service provides this notice under section 10(c) of the Endangered Species Act (16 U.S.C. 1531 et seq. ) and its implementing regulations (50 CFR 17.32) and the National Environmental Policy Act (42 U.S.C. 4321 et seq. ) and its implementing regulations (40 CFR 1500-1508 and 43 CFR 46).