00:00 - The following program is sponsored in part by

00:03 - customer's bank.

00:13 - Cindy Dunn secretary of the pa department of conservation and natural resources

00:19 - how big a problem is drivers

00:21 - having collisions with wildlife in Pennsylvania.

00:26 - Yeah Pennsylvania

00:27 - leads the nation and and

00:29 - deer vehicle collisions is actually quite a

00:31 - quite a problem so you think about that

00:33 - but many other.

00:35 - Tax groups really go on notice like amphibians and reptiles

00:40 - and amphibians in the spring when you're moving

00:43 - around the so called vernal ponds there's a lot of

00:46 - carnage that time and

00:49 - all all the taxes of tax or just things like mammals birds.

00:53 - Amphibians reptiles is quite an issue

00:56 - in Pennsylvania i think about are many many miles of rural roads

01:00 - we are a commonwealth and

01:02 - i could fill this in for you but

01:04 - we.

01:05 - Are

01:06 - record breaking on the miles of roadways

01:08 - of we

01:09 - we paved and made roads out of a lot of farmlands and forests roads so

01:13 - we've got lots of roads with a lot of

01:15 - vehicle collisions

01:17 - and we have.

01:18 - A diversity of wildlife in Pennsylvania we are blessed with

01:23 - eighty three thousand miles of streams and rivers

01:26 - terrain rich in

01:27 - animal life we've got a healthy

01:29 - bird population we've got a very large deer population so

01:33 - we're just set up right for a commonwealth with a lot of issues and so it's really.

01:38 - An asset and an opportunity to get ahead of this a little bit

01:42 - what's happening to the wildlife habitat that puts wildlife in the path of vehicles.

01:49 - When you think about anything that

01:50 - disrupts or fragments habitat

01:53 - anything on the landscape as resulting in loss of natural habitat

01:57 - really creates a

01:59 - need for animals to move around and

02:02 - so you might have a situation where it's a highway crossing

02:05 - pipeline crossing could be

02:07 - at a dam or a waterways or development of any kind

02:11 - creates an obstacle so wildlife need to move for their lifecycles

02:16 - to feed to rear and raise their young

02:19 - different

02:20 - different seasons they do different things they seek different foods in the winter

02:25 - than they may in the summer they seek sure shelter.

02:28 - So you have animals moving around and so understanding and knowing

02:32 - where the true needs for connectivity and corridors are is very important

02:37 - so that's where we distinguish between say a quarter and a crossing

02:40 - quarters can be something like the mount rich

02:42 - here about Harrisburg like the kind of tiny Ridge

02:45 - or the allegheny front

02:47 - like major

02:48 - mountain ranges which are often migration corridors

02:51 - a crossing is where.

02:54 - Penndot would create an opportunity for.

02:57 - Printers to cross

02:58 - over or under a highway for instance so

03:01 - crossings and corridors and dcnr swirled is more

03:05 - the corridors the wildlife

03:07 - habitat connectivity and the critter

03:09 - animals and it'll be weather's habitat

03:12 - and and pen dots world it's really the crossing so it's.

03:17 - Those dcnr and pandora have agreed to co-lead

03:20 - this eleven agency working group.

03:23 - That came out of

03:24 - house resolution eighty seven and everyone at the table

03:28 - brings something unique and welcoming needed to this

03:31 - complex discussion.

03:33 - Now let's talk more about the

03:35 - special crossings that allow wildlife to safely cross the highway

03:39 - we already have a number of them in Pennsylvania don't worry about how many

03:42 - exist right now.

03:45 - Know i don't actually have the number of how many but you do see

03:48 - you just see them everywhere and they really run the gamut from.

03:51 - Underpasses all like a nine ninety nine where bears and deer can cross underneath

03:57 - ninety nine it was

03:58 - fairly relatively new highway so that incorporated that

04:02 - then you see kind of unique features like along

04:05 - five twenty two

04:06 - near mount union where an

04:09 - accommodation was made for the map turtle hey

04:11 - it's a very special

04:13 - turtle and not everywhere in Pennsylvania is unique and it needed habitat

04:17 - for it's a habit somebody comes out of the water and berries eggs and it has to have

04:22 - haven't touched right along the river bank and

04:25 - so that was added after the highway was added.

04:29 - Then you have things like dcnr recently did

04:32 - at cic allenby state park where we added a naturalistic fish way

04:37 - because this is not a highway situation but the river is a highway

04:40 - for migratory fish like shad and iOS but also local fish that need to move up down

04:46 - so a nationalistic fish way

04:48 - is providing il habitat crossing

04:52 - there's so many different examples that my micro and macro scale and so people think

04:57 - about the big overpass that you may have seen you know and out west or

05:02 - over mass crossings

05:03 - but they do take many many forms

05:06 - and

05:06 - we at dcnr focus on the habitat connectivity the forest land habitat connectivity

05:13 - what uncut activity stream connectivity.

05:17 - And like

05:17 - where it comes to a highway situation that pen dot c expert on the

05:22 - design and building across an overpass or underpass

05:26 - are some places like

05:27 - kind of automatically serve that function i i walk around wildwood lake here at

05:31 - Harrisburg you'll see there's an underpass

05:34 - by the Paxton creek there.

05:36 - That is utilized heavily by wildlife because it's along the creek and

05:40 - underpass under twenty two three twenty two

05:43 - so you have situations where.

05:45 - Accommodating humans needs wildlife have been accommodated as well

05:50 - so we actually have many of them

05:52 - already but this support group or identify the need and come up with a strategic plan

05:58 - on where all we need to to provide them over

06:01 - over the next

06:02 - decades and where we can

06:05 - perhaps do a better job.

06:07 - As a commonwealth and our planning and and preserve

06:10 - what's already in place and what's there and

06:13 - keep that connectivity going.

06:15 - Secretary done expand on the news from the

06:17 - governor's office you've already touched on it twice

06:20 - where state agencies will be able to collaborate on a plan to reduce

06:25 - wildlife vehicle collision so

06:28 - tell us who's involved.

06:30 - So

06:31 - governor the governor asked penndot and dcnr to lead this and we have a dp

06:36 - and so many game commission Pennsylvania fish and boat commission.

06:40 - Pennsylvania department of insurance

06:43 - we have d p because they regulate the wetlands and they have

06:47 - waterways

06:48 - waterways there are tremendous

06:50 - opportunity.

06:52 - Department of health we have.

06:55 - Gosh i dunno who I've missed so far but we have pretty free myself that soup of

06:59 - agencies offering something unique to the table

07:03 - for this for group and the governor's policy office

07:06 - the governor's office has asked us to collaborate and work together so.

07:11 - As a

07:11 - leaders are

07:12 - policy director.

07:14 - Is leading with the policy directors of the other

07:17 - agencies and working with penndot to lay out

07:20 - an agenda and a plan for

07:22 - really gleaning the best that each agency has offer

07:26 - and

07:26 - coming up with a plan for Pennsylvania has for house resolution eighty seven

07:31 - how are you going to go about this collab operation secretary done

07:34 - is there a meeting is there something

07:36 - formal in the works

07:38 - is going to get things going yes.

07:40 - Are there meetings happening now are the policy offices are working with

07:45 - some of the contractors to lay out a plan for the summer

07:49 - to convene and pull out the expertise

07:52 - each one of our.

07:54 - Agencies has a set of stakeholders we call them

07:56 - you're interested parties who have a lot to offer

07:59 - like for instance DC at arts world

08:02 - the land trust community.

08:04 - Like western Pennsylvania conservancy for instance is a partner with us on our

08:08 - heritage area program or Harry's partnership for

08:11 - wildlife

08:13 - but other land trust like nature conservancy and others have a lot of mapping and

08:18 - biodiversity information to bring to the table yeah

08:21 - but each agency has partnerships like that so.

08:24 - Alright now what you're planning our

08:26 - engagements for different sectors

08:28 - so that the transportation sector or the insurance sector the health

08:33 - and medical sectors can have

08:35 - their input

08:36 - for what

08:37 - if what they

08:38 - feel should be into the plan

08:40 - there's a lot of interest in this and

08:42 - a lot of people have something to bring to the table so

08:46 - each agency will try to.

08:48 - Provide that funnel for input and ideas to then

08:52 - weave into a cohesive plan for the commonwealth

08:55 - let's go back to a point you made earlier a secretary done

08:59 - and that has to do do with not just obviously preventing collisions between vehicles

09:05 - and wildlife but there's another goal

09:07 - that has to do with reconnecting what you've referred to as

09:11 - fragmented wild lands and the governor has mentioned this too

09:15 - so talk more about that point.

09:18 - When you think about the name Pennsylvania that all alright tells you what

09:22 - essentially a natural haven't had it was penn's woods

09:25 - so we were forced to state

09:27 - i i may have mis attribute this

09:30 - comment but i think it was William pendants hit a

09:32 - squirrel could go free talk across a couple well

09:35 - that's not the case anymore

09:37 - we've

09:38 - we have needed farmland to feed us all we've god highways we've got

09:43 - housing and development we've got industrial development

09:46 - we have a very fragmented habitat in Pennsylvania

09:49 - land use decisions are made it's a very local level at the township and city and in

09:54 - in

09:55 - the community level

09:56 - which has a lot of advantages but the disadvantage is.

10:00 - You don't always connect

10:01 - dots from line to line so where we can really

10:05 - i think this plan that will come up with will really speak to planning departments

10:10 - perhaps mainly at the county level because Kelly planning

10:14 - offices provide a framework that helps local townships

10:18 - and mrs polities

10:20 - plan at the local level so if we can just

10:23 - put the building blocks in place

10:25 - where a like a mountain quarter like the kid attended to be preserved throughout it's

10:31 - length or river corridor could be preserved and

10:33 - actually there's a

10:35 - there's an opportunity for restoration and a lot of places

10:38 - habitat

10:39 - loss

10:40 - whether it's mining whether it's

10:42 - a brownfields development that

10:44 - was abandoned abandoned mill all

10:46 - along the stream or river

10:47 - and that we can do we could

10:49 - perhaps restore that habitat and bring back some connectivity

10:52 - last question secretary done is there's some time table

10:56 - when the

10:58 - plan for wildlife road crossings

11:01 - has to be in erp place.

11:03 - Well we're aiming for

11:05 - this fall but the final timeline is being developed right now

11:09 - we want to develop

11:11 - we want to lay out a series of meetings and planning

11:13 - and make sure we get the data and input we need so all

11:16 - one now's the time lionesses were a little more

11:18 - certain about what all we need to feed into that.

11:22 - Cindy Dunn secretary of the pa department of

11:25 - conservation and natural resources thanks for your time

11:29 - and thank you thanks for your interest.

11:31 - Hmm.