CARL HIAASEN,  The Miami Herald

Let the celebration begin.

Manatees, those lovable, bewhiskered icons of Florida waterways, are officially no longer endangered!

The news is all the more amazing because the state's own biologists fear ''a significant decline'' in the manatee population due to increased threats from boats, red tide and habitat loss.

That doesn't sound like much of a reason to break out the champagne, but it's only because we don't understand the advanced scientific logic used by state regulators:

Reducing the number of manatees in the wild simply means there will be fewer of them to die later.

That's obviously what members of the Florida Fish and Wildlife Conservation Commission had in mind last week when they voted unanimously to downgrade the pokey sea cow to the status of ``threatened.''

Cheering estimates that the burly aquatic mammals now number about 3,000, commission chairman Rodney Barreto said, ``I believe the manatee has recovered. We should be rejoicing.''

So far, the only ones rejoicing over the panel's decision are waterfront developers, marina builders and representatives of the marine industry, who or five years have been waging an expensive political campaign to get the manatee ``downlisted.''

They were miffed by strict rules imposed in some places while manatees were on the state's endangered list. Speed zones were established that inconvenienced fishermen and weekend boaters, while restrictions were imposed on permits for new docks and marinas in certain areas.

As adorable as they might be, the sea cows had become a nuisance. They were getting in the way of big plans by people with big bucks.

The more slips that you can cram into a marina, the fatter your profit margins. And the larger the marina is, the more boats will be sold to fill it.

Everybody makes out dandy except for the near-sighted manatees, which tend to gather and breed in the same quiet waters along which developers like to build their projects.

So, heavyweight lobbyists such as Wade Hopping were hired to promote the notion that manatees are doing just great. Last week the seven FWCC commissioners, all appointed by Gov. Jeb Bush, agreed.

A non-scientist looking at the mortality data might wonder why they're so upbeat. Last year, 396 manatees -- more than 10 percent of the estimated population -- died. Of those, only 81 fatalities were classified as natural.

This year, manatees are perishing at a record pace. As of May 31, there were 195 known deaths in Florida.

Those sort of statistics don't exactly make you want to dance a jig with Rodney Barreto. Nor does the final report of the state Biological Review Panel, which says there's a better-than-even chance that the manatee population will shrink by 20 percent over the next 30 years.

But sunny optimism rules at the wildlife commission, which prefers to trumpet a 100 percent increase in the annual aerial manatee census over the last 20 years.

Yet if the protection program is working so well, why scrap it? Isn't it insane to eliminate the very rules that resulted in such impressive results?

It is if you want the manatee population to continue growing -- but that's plainly not the goal of coastal developers, the recreational marine industry or state wildlife managers.

By their count, we've got enough sea cows. What we need more of is boats, docks, ramps, marinas and condos. To the softhearted, the lobbyists might say: What better way to reduce the number of manatee deaths than to start reducing the number of manatees?

Scratching the species off the endangered list was the first step, but no restrictions on building or boating can be lifted until the state comes up with a management plan.

Meanwhile, the manatee remains on the federal endangered species list, although the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service is under pressure from members of Congress who are shilling for the same special interests that prevailed in Florida.

At last week's meeting in which the manatee's rebound was heralded, state wildlife officials elevated the gopher tortoise to the list of threatened species.

They did not, however, suspend the policy of permitting developers to bury the animals alive in exchange for paying into a conservation fund.

More than 74,000 gopher tortoises have been ''entombed'' with state approval, which might explain why the species is in trouble. Commissioners promised to find a less cruel way to deal with the critters, one of these days.

Presumably we can look forward to another round of rejoicing.