The Ninth Circuit upheld a district court decision staying a Nevada State Engineer's ruling granting the U.S. and the Pyramid Lake Paiute Tribe of Indians' applications to make temporary changes to two water rights set forth in the Orr Ditch Decree, a 1944 federal court decree quieting title to cert...

A California appellate court held that the statute of limitations governing the filing of a petition for administrative mandamus challenging a decision of the state's Board of Forestry and Fire Protection is found in California Public Resources Code §4601.3. Consequently, a petition for a writ ...

A California appellate court reversed a lower court's denial of a developer's petition to overturn an adverse decision by a local planning commission due to an unacceptable probability of actual bias on the part of one of the decisionmakers. While this matter was pending before the planning commissi...

A California appellate court held that a local airport commission's adopting of an airport land use compatibility plan was a "project" under the California Environmental Quality Act (CEQA). Adoption of the plan was a project because it has the potential to result in physical change to the environmen...

A California appellate court held that maintenance work done on a levee to protect an island in the Delta in San Joaquin County from flooding was not a public works project subject to the prevailing wage laws. The work did not involve the operational work of a reclamation district, nor is there any ...

The Fifth Circuit held that a local ordinance that prevents a corporation that owns state-granted mineral interests under and around a lake from drilling within 1,000 feet of that lake is preempted by Louisiana's comprehensive regulation of oil and gas drilling. The ordinance, therefore, is invalid ...

A California appellate court affirmed a trial court decision ordering a county to set aside its approval of a single-family residence within a riparian area designated as an environmental resource of critical concern. The county found generally that any adverse environmental impacts were eliminated ...

A California appellate court reversed a lower court decision ordering a county to set aside its decision extending the expiration date of the tentative subdivision map for a residential housing project. Contrary to the lower court's interpretation, §66452.6 of the California Government Code aut...

A California appellate court held that for determining just compensation in a "quick" take eminent domain action, the date of valuation should be the date a deposit of probable compensation was made rather than the date of trial on the issue of just compensation. Under California law, the date of va...

The Ninth Circuit held that California's air pollution control districts are not arms of the state and therefore are not entitled to sovereign immunity under the Eleventh Amendment. To determine whether an entity is an arm of the state, the Ninth Circuit uses a five-point test that looks at whether ...