49 results for 'cat:"Environment" AND cat:"Agency"'.
J. Hicks grants the Department of the Interior's motion to dismiss. The nonprofit wild horse public education group challenges the government's proposed "gather" of excess horses for population control purposes. Certain federal code precludes liability in federal government actors, and cited case law remedies are not available against a federal agency. Relief specific to a concluded gather is moot, though not as to future gathers. The bureau's motion to dismiss the First Amendment cause of action is granted, as it fails to establish a qualified right to view “humane” gathers.
Court: USDC Nevada, Judge: Hicks , Filed On: May 8, 2024, Case #: 3:23cv372, NOS: Environmental Matters - Other Suits, Categories: environment, agency, First Amendment
J. Lamberth grants a motion by the Department of the Interior and other federal defendants to sever the offshore wind farm opponents' action seeking to challenge approvals of two such projects into separate actions for each project, and partially grants the projects' developers' motion to intervene. Judicial economy and efficiency factors favor severance, and the claims to be severed do not present common questions of law or fact. The developer of one project is permitted to intervene in this case, but the motion to intervene is denied as to the other project's developer, given the severance of claims related to its project.
Court: USDC District of Columbia, Judge: Lamberth, Filed On: April 10, 2024, Case #: 1:24cv141, NOS: Environmental Matters - Other Suits, Categories: Energy, environment, agency
J. Contreras offers a mixed bag to both the National Parks Conservation Association and the Department of the Interior, which the association is suing for allegedly failing to protect Florida’s Biscayne National Park. ON the one hand, the federal government has delayed the implementation of a marine reserve zone for too long, but on the other, it has not issued a final agency action that the court can review for being arbitrary and capricious. The association is owed FOIA attorney fees. The government is ordered to propose a zone designation as soon as it can.
Court: USDC District of Columbia, Judge: Contreras, Filed On: March 29, 2024, Case #: 1:20cv3706, NOS: Environmental Matters - Other Suits, Categories: Administrative Law, environment, agency
J. Du grants the animal rights activists' motion for summary judgment. The activists allege the U.S. Bureau of Land Management, Department of the Interior, and the Nevada Bureau of Land Management violated the Wild Free-Roaming Horses and Burros Act and the National Environmental Policy Act by a recent roundup of wild horses. Reducing livestock grazing to increase wild horse management levels was not reasonable because it would have undermined the roundup's stated purpose to “prevent undue... degradation...and to restore ecological balance.” The bureau must prepare a herd management area plan and reanalyze foreseeable effects and significance of its roundup alternatives on wildfire risks.
Court: USDC Nevada, Judge: Du, Filed On: March 28, 2024, Case #: 3:22cv34, NOS: Environmental Matters - Other Suits, Categories: Administrative Law, environment, agency
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J. Wilson vacates the Environmental Protection Agency's order prohibiting the plastic container manufacturer from producing toxic long-chain perfluoroalkyls through its fluorination process. The EPA exceeded its statutory authority, and it may not skirt Administrative Procedure Act framework by arbitrarily deeming the company's decades-old fluorination process a “significant new use.” Reversed.
Court: 5th Circuit, Judge: Wilson , Filed On: March 21, 2024, Case #: 23-60620, Categories: Administrative Law, environment, agency
J. Matheson finds that the lower court properly tossed claims from environmentalists that sought to challenge a land management plan for the Rio Grande National Forest. Environmentalists claim that the plan did not properly take into consideration how it would effect the local lynx population, but the record shows that the government relied on all the proper logging and environmental impact data to make its findings that the plan would not have a significant negative impact on the local lynx. Affirmed.
Court: 10th Circuit, Judge: Matheson, Filed On: March 11, 2024, Case #: 23-1093, Categories: environment, agency
J. Grogan finds the circuit court properly granted summary judgment to the commerce lobby and dry cleaning business in their lawsuit challenging certain regulations put in place by the natural resources agency regarding PFAS and other contaminants. The agency's policies for PFAS and other "emerging contaminants" fall under the statutory definition of "rules" according to the five-factor test established by Wisconsin Supreme Court precedent, and the rules are invalid and unenforceable because the agency did not put them through statutorily required rule-making procedures under state law which, among other things, give parties affected by the rules proper notice of how the law is to be implemented. Affirmed.
Court: Wisconsin Court of Appeals, Judge: Grogan, Filed On: March 6, 2024, Case #: 2022AP000718, Categories: Administrative Law, environment, agency
Per curiam, the appellate division finds that the trial court properly granted a petition seeking to annul approval of a plan to reconfigure the viaduct portion of an interstate highway over environmental concerns. The officials took the requisite "hard look" at air quality and stormwater management, and the groups failed to establish they had a "clear legal right" to relief. Affirmed.
Court: New York Appellate Divisions, Judge: Per curiam, Filed On: February 2, 2024, Case #: CA 23-00388, Categories: environment, agency
J. Welch finds that the lower court improperly reversed a decision by the Louisiana Department of Environmental Quality to issue fifteen permits to a company for its proposed construction of a chemical manufacturing complex at a site located along the Mississippi River near communities where a majority of the population is Black. The department's decision to issue the permits was not in violation of the Clean Air Act or its "public trust duty." Reversed.
Court: Louisiana Court Of Appeal, Judge: Welch, Filed On: January 19, 2024, Case #: 2023CA0578, Categories: environment, Property, agency
[Consolidated] J. Southwick denies Texas and an energy company's petition for review of the EPA's designation of certain Texas counties as having below-national air quality standards. Although the EPA reclassified the counties as "unclassified" due to inconclusive data following its original classification, and then, later, reclassified them again as below standards, it did not originally have the authority to wait for future data before making the designation. The EPA may change designations based only on available data. Affirmed.
Court: 5th Circuit, Judge: Southwick , Filed On: January 11, 2024, Case #: 17-60088, Categories: environment, Due Process, agency
J. Smith grants the Environmental Protection Agency's motion to transfer venue to the District of Columbia in this matter procedurally coordinated with a related case. The refinery challenges the agency's action that created an alternative compliance approach for small refineries with outstanding Renewable Fuel Standard program obligations that does not require the refinery to retire renewable identification numbers to meet their compliance obligations. The District of Columbia is the appropriate venue to resolve the claim the EPA should have provided additional relief in the form of replacement numbers.
Court: 5th Circuit, Judge: Smith , Filed On: November 22, 2023, Case #: 22-60357, Categories: environment, agency, Venue
[Consolidated] J. Smith finds the Environmental Protection Agency improperly denied the small refineries' requested exemptions from obligations under the Clean Air Act. The agency used a novel interpretation and economic theory published in 2021 that was impermissibly retroactive and contrary to law. Vacated.
Court: 5th Circuit, Judge: Smith , Filed On: November 22, 2023, Case #: 22-60266, Categories: environment, Due Process, agency
[Consolidated]. J. Stras finds a lower court improperly granted the Environmental Protection Agency's motion to place a ban on the use of chlorpyrifos on food crops. The protection agency argued that the use of chlorpyrifos as insecticides are harmful to humans. However, the EPA may have made a hasty decision under the pressure of the environmental groups and a narrow deadline, forcing it to act quickly to decide the "winners and losers." Reversed.
Court: 8th Circuit, Judge: Stras, Filed On: November 2, 2023, Case #: 22-1422, Categories: Agriculture, environment, agency
J. Witt finds that the lower court properly found for the waste management district in a declaratory judgment action over a change in law that no longer requires waste management districts to enter into Financial Assistance Agreements with the state as a prerequisite to receiving grant funds from the Solid Waste Management Fund. The law now provides that 61% of funds must be directly distributed to management districts without preconditions on how that funding will be used. The waste management district is entitled to attorneys' fees on appeal. Affirmed.
Court: Missouri Court Of Appeals, Judge: Witt, Filed On: October 24, 2023, Case #: WD85984, Categories: environment, agency, Attorney Fees
J. Corley denies a request for a preliminary injunction against the federal government regarding claims from a biologist that flood releases from the Coyote Valley Dam into the Russian River are harming local populations of salmon. The biologist has not only shown failed to show how serious harm will befall the local salmon if the flood releases continue, but has also put forward an injunction request that is unreasonable for the government to work around and is unlikely to fix any of the alleged issues stemming from the dam's operations.
Court: USDC Northern District of California, Judge: Corley, Filed On: October 23, 2023, Case #: 3:22cv6143, NOS: Environmental Matters - Other Suits, Categories: environment, agency, Injunction
J. Morris dismisses claims that sought to challenge the feds management of the Beaverhead Deerlodge National Forest. Environmentalists challenged the analyses of seven domestic grazing sites in the forest, such as their move to not prepare a supplemental NEPA analysis. But the feds have shown they completed all the required steps in their forest management, and the environmentalists cannot show why an additional hard look under NEPA is needed.
Court: USDC Montana, Judge: Morris, Filed On: October 19, 2023, Case #: 2:23cv12, NOS: Environmental Matters - Other Suits, Categories: environment, agency
J. Silva denies the environmental advocacy group’s motion for a preliminary injunction to halt a watershed restoration project, arguing that the environmental assessment violates the Administrative Procedure Act and environmental and land management policies. The Bureau of Land Management has found that delaying the project will allow the establishment of invasive trees to continue, reducing indigenous sagebrush. This will reduce usable habitat for the greater sage-grouse and other species. Interference with the ability of visitors to enjoy the woodlands does not weigh as substantially as other matters.
Court: USDC Nevada, Judge: Silva, Filed On: October 18, 2023, Case #: 2:23cv435, NOS: Administrative Procedure Act/Review or Appeal of Agency Decision - Other Suits, Categories: environment, Evidence, agency
J. Molloy grants a group of federal agencies’ motion for summary judgment in this matter concerning wildlife standards. Several environmental groups argue the federal agencies did not properly consider and omitted standards when formulating the 2021 Land Management Plan for the Helena - Lewis and Clark National Forest, and claim the removal of big game standards could adversely affect the endangered grizzly bear. The instant court finds that the federal agencies did consider the standards and incorporated some aspects of them into the new plan, and the agencies did not violate the National Environmental Policy Act or the Endangered Species Act.
Court: USDC Montana, Judge: Molloy, Filed On: October 11, 2023, Case #: 9:22cv126, NOS: Environmental Matters - Other Suits, Categories: environment, agency
J. Lie grants the county’s petition for a writ of mandate directing the trial court to modify its discovery order in the underlying land use dispute involving allegations that the county tried to bury a report that a potential chemical release at a plant adjacent to a project site presented a risk to the public. A legal education nonprofit’s attempt to use the Civil Discovery Act as a shortcut to enforce the Public Records Act is not permissible, and the portion of the order compelling compliance with the Public Records Act by way of the Civil Discovery Act is reversed because of the potential for abuse in the breadth of pretrial discovery. “Writ review is appropriate in discovery matters where ... it is necessary to address ‘questions of first impression that are of general importance to ... courts ... and where ... guidelines can be laid down for future cases.’”
Court: California Courts Of Appeal, Judge: Lie, Filed On: October 10, 2023, Case #: H050285, Categories: environment, agency, Discovery
J. Cassel finds the Nebraska Department of Natural Resources properly dismissed the resources district and a citizens group’s objections to the Platte to Republican Basin High Flow Diversion Project’s application seeking to divert surface water from an over-appropriated river. The groups’ allegations do not demonstrate that they have or will suffer an injury in fact, and so they fail to establish standing. Affirmed.
Court: Nebraska Supreme Court, Judge: Cassel, Filed On: October 6, 2023, Case #: S-23-028, Categories: environment, Water, agency
J. Moritz grants in part the environmentalists petition to challenge a final rule related to Colorado’s State Implementation Plan for air pollution. The environmental group says the EPA approved the plan despite the fact that the state's permit program excludes all “temporary emissions” and “emissions from internal combustion engines on any vehicle” in determining if a source is subject to the permit process. Under the regulations used by the EPA itself to approve the plan, there is no clear language that would allow for such an exclusion as it relates to temporary emissions. That portion of the final rule is vacated and more proceedings are called for. Remanded.
Court: 10th Circuit, Judge: Moritz, Filed On: September 18, 2023, Case #: 22-9546, Categories: environment, agency
J. Tymkovich finds that the lower court properly dismissed a suit from victims of the Roosevelt Fire who sued the U.S. Forest Service with claims that the agency delayed its fire suppression response. Under the Federal Tort Claims Act, government entities are shielded from certain suits when they show they had to exercise a "discretionary function" that requires judgment and choice in tackling an event or problem. Responding to a wildfire falls under that umbrella, leaving the Forest Service immune from the suit due to the discretionary function exception. Affirmed.
Court: 10th Circuit, Judge: Tymkovich, Filed On: September 15, 2023, Case #: 22-8023, Categories: environment, Tort, agency