Articles

Tomorrow, I’ll be speaking at the National Cattlemen’s Beef Association annual summer conference in Denver.  I’ll be presenting on Sackett v. EPA, and discussing other prominent and current environmental issues, including the pending draft agency guidance on interpreting Rapanos, the chicken coop controversy in West Virginia, and ...

Last week, the Federal Circuit Court of Appeals issued its decision in United States v. Hage, reversing Senior Judge Loren Smith’s 2008 decision concluding that the government had taken Hage’s property.  As most of you probably know, this 21-year old case arose from the federal government’s heavy-handed efforts to strip away the ...

PLF recently filed an amicus brief in the Texas Court of Appeals in Edwards Aquifer Authority v. Bragg.  Glenn and Jolynn Bragg own and operate two pecan orchards in Medina County, Texas.  They purchased both parcels of land—one in 1979 and the other in 1983—on account of their location above the expansive Edwards Aquifer.  Because … ...

Farmers in the Scott and Shasta Valleys of California’s Siskiyou County got an early gift on Christmas Eve, when the Siskiyou County Superior Court handed down a favorable ruling in their legal battle with the California Department of Fish and Game over whether the Department can issue permits to regulate water rights in California.  The &# ...

In December, the California Court of Appeal ruled, in Central Coast Forest Assoc. v. California Fish & Game Comm., that one may not petition the California Fish and Game Commission to de-list a species, under the California Endangered Species Act, on the basis that the species was not eligible for listing in the first instance.  … ...

Last December we reported on a court victory for the Siskiyou County Farm Bureau, in which the court ordered the Department of Fish and GameWildlife not to use its streambed alteration permits to regulate water diversions under valid water rights.  While this is a great success, the Department has other tools it can use to try … ...

Environment and Property Rights — Wetlands In response to our lawsuit, the Army Corps of Engineers withdrew its wetlands jurisdictional determination in Smith v. United States Army Corps of Engineers.  The Smiths were thanked by the Corps for all the work they did clearing trash and dead trees out of a dry arroyo in New … ...

A friend once explained the importance of agriculture to me in a way I have never forgotten:  “Every last physical thing that you use in life, was originally either grown from the ground or dug out of it.”  Ponder that for a moment (and yes, the seas and rivers are included). Today, March 19, is National … ...

A previous post summarizes the California Department of Fish and Wildlife’s ongoing improper effort to regulate water rights through minimum streamflow recommendations.  First the Department published the proposed restrictions for comment, then withdrew them from comment, saying that they were going to revise the recommendations. This week a ...