Under provisions of the Lacey Act, the USFWS not only regulated the importation of injurious wildlife into the United States and its territories, but it was also further interpreted since the 1960s as banning interstate movement within the continental United States. Following a challenge by the U.S. Association of Reptile Keepers, the U.S. Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia on April 7, 2017 affirmed a lower court ruling that the government lacks authority to regulate shipment of injurious species across state lines. Thus, depending on the outcome of state agency decisions following this court ruling, and potential changes to state regulation, there may be increased uncertainty and complexity for aquaculture producers if regulations are added on a state-by-state basis. Our goal was to identify anticipated changes at the state level, the strengths and weaknesses of these and other identified policy/regulatory approaches, to provide clarity to producers. We used a formal phone survey with a standardized questionnaire to identify current and anticipated regulatory practices. The phone survey was directed to state Aquatic Nuisance Species coordinators.
Following the Lacey Act ruling, 43 states made no changes, 3 added species to their prohibited list, and 1 state harmonized regulations with USFWS injurious wildlife lists. Of the 43 states yet to make changes, 33 had no plan for changes, 9 were in the process of assessing their options, and 1 had plans for harmonization with USFWS lists. With respect to procedures for evaluating invasiveness risk of aquaculture species, 32 states had no standardized procedure, 13 had a standardized process, and 2 used common processes but were not standardized. Further, 31 states had no intention of changing process and 16 were interested in changing or adopting a process. Ultimately, this survey indicated there were few regulatory changes following the court ruling in 2017.