Injunction hearing TODAY

[bcr229]

Beat me to it! Also, there is a restriction to USARK members only on this too, unfortunately, suggested by USFWS.

This is very important. If you are not a USARK member then you are not covered by the temporary injunction. So, not only will you need to join USARK if you want to ship/receive a retic or anaconda across state lines, you will need to verify that the person on the other end of the transaction is also a USARK member.

I think USFWS really screwed up - this restriction will encourage people to join USARK if they aren't already members! Because the judge didn't state in the opinion that a person had to be a USARK member as of a certain date to be covered, but only that one had to be a member to ship.

[Chkadii]

I'm trying not to see the FWS as an enemy. I DO think they're misguided, and acknowledge that there may be some overlap of individuals between FWS and some more radical animal welfare groups, but FWS is ultimately in place to "...conserve, protect, and enhance fish, wildlife, and plants and their habitats for the continuing benefit of the American people."

The rule was heavy-handed. It's easy to look at a practice and say, "well let's just be done with the whole thing" rather than find the resources to correct and manage each aspect of it that would ensure the concerns do not actually become issues.

With the way things stand, that seemingly arbitrary and counterproductive qualifier makes the distribution of reticulated pythons regulated and enforceable. There's less of a draw to do things illegally - why pay $500 of fines (or however much the penalty is) when you can pay $250 to join USARK? And those that ship legally will be policed by USARK itself, just like we try to do with CITES permits. No one wants to be associated with someone who is irresponsible or a crook, or risk losing what they've worked so hard for.

Essentially, by "allowing" USARK to ship large constructors, FWS is putting the accountability on USARK and if a bunch of people skirt that rule, it'll look bad on the industry as a whole (and risk losing support for future battles) since there's a solution that accommodates any claims of desperation. Any non compliance looks that much worse since we have something to prove.

The FWS and USARK ultimately want the same thing: for giant constrictors to not destroy native wildlife or cause mass panic because one of them ate Mrs. Doe's teacup yorkie. This is just one way of forcing a compromise, rather than saying "okay, well then you all need to have permits and take these classes and comply with these inspections..." which eats up a bunch of resources FWS would probably rather use elsewhere.

[Penultimate]

This is very important. If you are not a USARK member then you are not covered by the temporary injunction. So, not only will you need to join USARK if you want to ship/receive a retic or anaconda across state lines, you will need to verify that the person on the other end of the transaction is also a USARK member.

I think USFWS really screwed up - this restriction will encourage people to join USARK if they aren't already members! Because the judge didn't state in the opinion that a person had to be a USARK member as of a certain date to be covered, but only that one had to be a member to ship.

Excuse me if I'm misunderstanding, but doesn't it say "limited to USARK members on or before April 8, 2015" here (http://usark.org/2015-blog/7182/)? So wouldn't that mean you would've had to be a member as of or before then?

[reptileexperts]

Excuse me if I'm misunderstanding, but doesn't it say "limited to USARK members on or before April 8, 2015" here (http://usark.org/2015-blog/7182/)? So wouldn't that mean you would've had to be a member as of or before then?

THIS is the big question that USARK has not been able to answer as of yet. The Court Document only states that you must be a member of USARK - It does not state like USFWS requested, that you must have been a member before the injunction was filed. We are all still waiting on hearing that answer. IF that is the case a lot of folks will be extremely upset as countless of us have donated to USARK without ever filing for membership. . . So if you get 50% of the folks who paid the bill NOT be members and then they are withheld from the injunction, its going to be an ugly day in the community.

Hopefully we have more information soon, but it seems like USARK is suggestive that you simply need to be a member WHEN you ship / receive. And we must remember that USFWS put this into the wording. It was not USARK demanding members out of this as some people have now started to suggest

[bcr229]

THIS is the big question that USARK has not been able to answer as of yet. The Court Document only states that you must be a member of USARK - It does not state like USFWS requested, that you must have been a member before the injunction was filed. We are all still waiting on hearing that answer. IF that is the case a lot of folks will be extremely upset as countless of us have donated to USARK without ever filing for membership. . . So if you get 50% of the folks who paid the bill NOT be members and then they are withheld from the injunction, its going to be an ugly day in the community.

Hopefully we have more information soon, but it seems like USARK is suggestive that you simply need to be a member WHEN you ship / receive. And we must remember that USFWS put this into the wording. It was not USARK demanding members out of this as some people have now started to suggest

This. Also remember that even IF the preliminary injunction is limited to USARK members as of the filing date, if you have a retic or anaconda to ship out and you aren't covered by the injunction, it shouldn't be difficult to find someone who is, and that person handles the shipping for you.

[reptileexperts]

This. Also remember that even IF the preliminary injunction is limited to USARK members as of the filing date, if you have a retic or anaconda to ship out and you aren't covered by the injunction, it shouldn't be difficult to find someone who is, and that person handles the shipping for you.

The greatest of all loopholes is also this -

Since fedex is shipping company, and we use SYR "all pro shipping". If all pro shipping is covered under the USARK membership, does that make it cover shipments? consequently if All Pro Shipping was not a member, does this mean their account is null and void for shipping retics and anacondas? *Sigh* - again, unless stickers are forcefully sent to be used there is no means to enforce this logic. But i'm still waiting on official wording saying that it only applies to members pre-injunction.

[reptileexperts]

Apparently the injunction officially only applies to those who were members prior to April 9th. Those who become members after are not qualified to ship.


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[Marrissa]

I'm trying to figure out how to prove my membership. You can't even log on to the usark site. I did do the bronze membership before the 4/9 date.

[Marrissa]

So I managed to log into USARK by hitting renew membership, which requires you to log in. But I can't find anywhere where it says my membership for how long it's active kind of thing. I do have it in my paypal history of the $40 though.

[Bluebonnet Herp]

This is very important. If you are not a USARK member then you are not covered by the temporary injunction. So, not only will you need to join USARK if you want to ship/receive a retic or anaconda across state lines, you will need to verify that the person on the other end of the transaction is also a USARK member.

I think USFWS really screwed up - this restriction will encourage people to join USARK if they aren't already members! Because the judge didn't state in the opinion that a person had to be a USARK member as of a certain date to be covered, but only that one had to be a member to ship.

"Members" are anyone who donated anything - even just volunteered - before April 8th. It does not necessarily encourage people to join now as they won't be covered. In addition, and if I'm not mistaken, only the person who is shipping them out has to be a member. Not the receiver/buyer.
That said, this does look like some form of screw up for USFWS. Since we're playing by their rules, they cannot challenge the injunction, in addition to other negative implications for USFWS that I do not yet understand.
USARK is also now being protected by the Court in that USFWS is not allowed to bankrupt them, which is very awesome.

To me, the best part about an injunction is the fact that it sort of acts like a preview for the entire lawsuit - one of the reasons why a PI is so hard to get is that the requesting party has to be proven to likely win by their merits. And they did! So whether the rules of the injunction suck or not, the final ruling of the lawsuit can be expected to reach a far better conclusion to allow interstate transport and hopefully even imports.