Action timeline

March 2010 – The Center commented on the inappropriateness of the proposed location for the Foreign Affairs Security Training Facility, a sprawling State Department training center in rural Maryland in habitat for the Delmarva Peninsula fox squirrel. We also called for a legally required analysis of the facility's impacts on the fox squirrel.

June 28, 2010 – Just hours after the Center announced we'd sue over the project, the federal government scrapped plans to build the Foreign Affairs Security Training Facility in the endangered fox squirrel's habitat.

August 2010 – The Center submitted comments on the draft environmental assessment for the proposed expansion of the Easton County Airport runway in Talbot County, Maryland — a proposal that would involve clearcutting 34 acres of occupied squirrel habitat. We called for a full analysis of the impacts on the squirrel; complete information on proposed measures to compensate for those impacts, including sites planned to be set aside; and a new survey of areas occupied by the squirrel.

January 13, 2011 – The Center formally petitioned the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service to designate and protect critical habitat for the endangered squirrel.

September 19, 2014 – Interior Secretary Sally Jewell announced the recovery of Delmarva Peninsula fox squirrels and delisted them.

Photo of Delmarva Peninsula fox squirrel courtesy Wikimedia/Brian Gratwicke