ELR Citation: 54 ELR 20051
No(s). 20-3706 (RC) (D.D.C. Mar 29, 2024) (Contreras, J.)

A district court granted in part and denied in part summary judgment for a conservation group in a challenge to the National Park Service's (NPS') delayed implementation of a marine reserve zone and commercial fishing phaseout in Biscayne National Park in Florida. The group argued NPS violated the APA by abandoning or at least substantially delaying implementation of the zone and phaseout. The court found NPS' 2015 general management plan record of decision for the park, which stated that NPS would pursue the marine reserve zone "as soon as practicable" and was the culmination of a years-long process, bound the agency to create the zone; but NPS was not "required to take" specific action with regard to the commercial fishing phaseout because it had not made a firm commitment to do so. It ordered NPS to publish a proposed special regulation to designate the marine reserve zone as soon as practicable.