Your ability to provide public input to oppose projects that will harm birds and the places they need—such as building roads and transmission lines, leasing and drilling on public lands, and clearcutting forests—is in jeopardy.

When President Nixon signed the National Environmental Policy Act (NEPA) into law in 1970, it established a broad national framework for protecting our environment, requiring federal agencies to consider the environmental effects of their proposed actions. Now, the White House Council on Environmental Quality is proposing a new rule that will significantly weaken NEPA by curtailing public and scientific review for government projects.

You still have the right to speak out. Tell the Council on Environmental Quality that you oppose this dangerous attempt to undermine one of our bedrock environmental laws.

The new rule limits when and how the public like you and me can provide input on proposed projects, and weakens scientific review. It creates arbitrarily short deadlines for review and public input no matter the scope of complexity of a project. It redefines the types of impacts federal agencies must look at, which could eliminate consideration of many of the impacts from climate change that would arise from approving projects, such as leasing coal or opening more lands to oil and gas leasing. It would even let companies themselves help write the reports about the environmental impacts of their projects.

Industry groups have been trying to chip away at NEPA for years, and this latest attempt is one of the most wide-ranging and comprehensive. It’s no wonder—Audubon and other conservation groups are able to defend against environmentally destructive projects because of the principles enshrined into law by NEPA. For instance, we are currently suing to protect old-growth forests for Marbled Murrelets in Alaska’s Tongass National Forest and to prevent oil and gas drilling in vital sage-grouse habitat. If agencies don’t have to consider climate change or other effects of their decisions, then they won’t address the two-thirds of bird species that Audubon’s recent report showed are at risk from climate change while authorizing the destruction of more habitat.

Your right to comment today, and in response to many of the alerts we share with you, is only possible because of the National Environmental Policy Act. It allows all of us to understand what’s happening to birds and our environment and allows you, organizations like Audubon, and other experts to have a voice in the process. Ultimately, it leads to more informed—and therefore better—decisions.

We’ve made it quick and easy for you to send comments directly to the Council on Environmental Quality. Please speak out today on behalf of birds and the places they need by sending comments to oppose weakening the National Environmental Policy Act.