The court holds that farmer and cattlemen associations lack standing under the Administrative Procedure Act (APA), 5 U.S.C. §551(13), to challenge the U.S. Forest Service's involvement with the Colorado lynx recovery plan, which concerns the introduction of Canadian lynx into the state. The court f...
The court holds that the Bald and Golden Eagle Protection Act (BGEPA), which only allows members of federally recognized Native American tribes to use protected eagle parts for religious purposes, does not violate the Religious Freedom and Restoration Act (RFRA). The court first recognizes that the ...
The 1990s mark the end of an era when pitched legislative battles can lead to either sound or timely public policy. Rather, the formulation of consensus by a critical mass of private-sector stakeholders is the only way to achieve the timely reauthorization of Superfund and may be the best (if not the only) way to break the gridlock that paralyzes other legislative debates.
Editors' Summary: Property owners often respond to solid and hazardous waste contamination of their properties by cleaning up the contamination and then seeking reimbursement of cleanup costs from responsible parties under federal and state hazardous waste laws. RCRA is one such law; however, RCRA §7002 does not explicitly provide for recovery of damages. A court faced with a RCRA §7002 citizen suit to recover cleanup costs must imply a private cause of action for damages. This Article addresses the availability of a private cause of action for damages under RCRA §7002.
Congress enacted the Resource Conservation and Recovery Act (RCRA) in 1976, to regulate management of solid and hazardous waste. RCRA Subtitle C regulates hazardous waste management and Subtitle D governs nonhazardous, solid waste. In 1984, Congress passed the Hazardous and Solid Waste Amendments (HSWA), significantly amending and expanding RCRA Subtitle C. HSWA added to RCRA the Land Disposal Restriction (LDR) Program, or land ban, which bars land disposal of hazardous wastes that fail to meet U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA or the Agency)-promulgated treatment standards.
Editors' Summary: Property rights advocates implicitly complained in Babbitt v. Sweet Home Chapter of Communities for a Great Oregon that a Fish and Wildlife Service regulation that aimed to protect endangered and threatened species by defining "harm" to include habitat modification impinged on their rights as private landowners by asking them to share with the government responsibility for protecting such species. The U.S. Supreme Court upheld the regulation as reasonable given the relevant language of the Endangered Species Act.
Editors' Summary: Although most talk in terms of wildlife protection seems to focus on the operation of the ESA, there are a host of other federal and state laws designed to protect wildlife from the impacts of resource-development projects—before the species become threatened or endangered.
Editors' Summary: In 1989, a National Research Council study concluded that contaminated sediments are "widespread in U.S. coastal waters" and have "potentially far-reaching consequences to both public health and the environment." A 1996 interim EPA report reached a similar conclusion. This concern over contaminated sediments is not new. It has manifested itself in a dizzying array of statutory and regulatory restrictions on the disposal of these sediments.
Keynote Presentation: Making the Partnership Work
Panel Discussion: Regulation of Nuclear Materials
Regulation of Air Quality
Regulation of Water Quality: Is EPA Meeting Its Oblilgations or Can the States Better Meet Water Quality Challenges?
Regulating Solid and Hazardous Wastes
In a suit raising constitutional challenges to the siting of a regional low-level radioactive waste disposal facility, the court holds that freedom from environmental releases of nonnatural radiation is not a fundamental, unenumerated right protected by the Ninth Amendment, and differences in the fe...