landusepbb
11-16-2003, 08:13 AM
http://www.denverpost.com/cda/article/print/0,1674,36%257E53%257E1765134,00.html
Denver Post
By Jim Hughes
Denver Post Staff Writer
Friday, November 14, 2003 -
The Bush administration on Thursday weighed in to support a Wyoming judge's ruling that a Clinton administration roadless initiative was illegal. In 2001, President Clinton signed a rule preserving 58 million acres of U.S. Forest Service land as roadless. Industry groups launched an attack on the rule.
Environmentalists have appealed the decision of U.S. District Judge Clarence Brimmer. In an amicus ("friend of the court") brief submitted to the 10th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals in Denver, Justice Department lawyers argued that environmentalists have no right to appeal.
Those same environmental groups volunteered as co-defendants when the state of Wyoming sued the U.S. Department of Agriculture over the Clinton administration's 2001 roadless plan in federal court in Cheyenne.
Brimmer allowed them to enter the case as defendants over the government's objection.
In July, Brimmer ruled in Wyoming's favor, a decision the administration did not appeal.
"When the executive (branch) ... determines to end litigation over a discretionary regulatory policy, a private party does not have standing to use the judiciary to override that," government lawyers wrote in Thursday's brief.
The government's argument "is a really radical new interpretation" of the law, said Jim Angell, an attorney with Earthjustice, one of the environmentalist groups involved in the case.
In August, critics in Washington, D.C., filed an ethics complaint against Brimmer. They said he had a conflict of interest, because he owned oil and gas stocks or royalty contracts when he took the roadless case.
Deanell Rece Tacha, chief judge of the 10th Circuit, dismissed that complaint Sept. 10.
Denver Post
By Jim Hughes
Denver Post Staff Writer
Friday, November 14, 2003 -
The Bush administration on Thursday weighed in to support a Wyoming judge's ruling that a Clinton administration roadless initiative was illegal. In 2001, President Clinton signed a rule preserving 58 million acres of U.S. Forest Service land as roadless. Industry groups launched an attack on the rule.
Environmentalists have appealed the decision of U.S. District Judge Clarence Brimmer. In an amicus ("friend of the court") brief submitted to the 10th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals in Denver, Justice Department lawyers argued that environmentalists have no right to appeal.
Those same environmental groups volunteered as co-defendants when the state of Wyoming sued the U.S. Department of Agriculture over the Clinton administration's 2001 roadless plan in federal court in Cheyenne.
Brimmer allowed them to enter the case as defendants over the government's objection.
In July, Brimmer ruled in Wyoming's favor, a decision the administration did not appeal.
"When the executive (branch) ... determines to end litigation over a discretionary regulatory policy, a private party does not have standing to use the judiciary to override that," government lawyers wrote in Thursday's brief.
The government's argument "is a really radical new interpretation" of the law, said Jim Angell, an attorney with Earthjustice, one of the environmentalist groups involved in the case.
In August, critics in Washington, D.C., filed an ethics complaint against Brimmer. They said he had a conflict of interest, because he owned oil and gas stocks or royalty contracts when he took the roadless case.
Deanell Rece Tacha, chief judge of the 10th Circuit, dismissed that complaint Sept. 10.