The Seventh Circuit upheld a dredge and fill permit issued by the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers for a highway project that crosses wetlands in Indiana. The Corps adequately considered practicable alternatives when it issued the permit. Although the Corps has an independent responsibility to enforce t...
The Ninth Circuit reversed a lower court decision dismissing a conservation group's CWA citizen suit alleging that a scrap metal company violated California's general NPDES permit for industrial stormwater at three of its scrap recycling facilities. The lower court dismissed the case, holding that C...
The District of Columbia's highest court upheld the dismissal of a property owner's lawsuit against the D.C. sewer and water authority for pinhole leaks in his apartment buildings' pipes. The trial record provides ample support for the court's determination that the authority's actions or inactions ...
The Seventh Circuit upheld a lower court decision that a campground operated as a "public water system" under the SDWA. The court found that the campground had failed to conduct the requisite water sampling, monitoring and reporting to consumers and awarded a $29,754 civil penalty to the government....
The Sixth Circuit vacated a U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) rule exempting from the Clean Water Act's (CWA's) national pollutant discharge elimination system (NPDES) permitting requirements pesticides applied in accordance with the Federal Insecticide, Fungicide, and Rodenticide Act. The ...
The U.S. Supreme Court held that a government's demand for property from a land use permit application must satisfy the "nexus" and "rough proportionality" requirements of Nollan v. California Coastal Comm'n, 483 U.S. 825, 17 ELR 20918 (1987), and Dolan v. City of Tigard, 512 U.S. 374, 24 ELR 21083 ...
The U.S. Supreme Court held that Oklahoma statutes that favor in-state water appropriation permit applicants over out-of-state permit applicants do not violate the Commerce Clause and are not preempted by the Red River Water Compact—an interstate water compact that allocates water among Texas, Okl...
A California court validated a settlement agreement and 11 related agreements concerning the conservation, transfer, and exchange of Colorado River water diverted for beneficial consumptive use among Southern California water agencies. The agreements were negotiated and executed to resolve longstand...
The Eleventh Circuit upheld the dismissal of a Native American tribe's lawsuit challenging the government's management of the Central and Southern Florida Project for Flood Control in the Everglades. The tribe complained that the project diverts excessive flood waters over tribal lands, in part to p...
A district court dismissed an environmental group's APA lawsuit against EPA challenging 40 C.F.R. §124.55(b), which pertains to state certification of discharge permits issued by the Agency under the CWA. Specifically, the group challenged the portion of §124.55(b) that prohibits EPA from modifyin...