Protecting Wetlands

After President Bush took office, and following the filing of a law suit by the National Association of Home Builders, the Army Corps of Engineers moved to weaken proposed wetlands protections.

In March 2000, the Army Corps of Engineers proposed new protections for wetlands.[1] After the National Association of Home Builders filed suit,[2] and after President Bush took office, the Corps reversed course and moved to weaken these protections.[3] In the process, Interior Secretary Gale Norton suppressed scientific information and analysis that was contrary to the Corps’ new plan.

Because of the large number of wetlands at stake, it was expected that the Interior Department would provide detailed comments to the Corps on the appropriateness of the proposed rules. Scientists at the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service, part of the Interior Department, had prepared such an analysis.[4] The scientists found that the new Corps proposal would “encourage the destruction of stream channels and lead to increased loss of aquatic functions.” It also found that the Corps’ own data was “overwhelmingly” against changing mining rules, another Corps proposal. The U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service criticized the Corps for its “lack of basic knowledge of the effects of these permitted losses on the environment.”[5]

Secretary Norton, however, failed to submit the scientists’ comments to the Corps. Her spokesman stated that the Department had run out of time. This led former Fish and Wildlife director Jamie Rappaport Clark to comment, “This is just nuts . . . For Interior to stop Fish and Wildlife from commenting on something of this magnitude and importance, that’s really unbelievable.”[6]

The Corps subsequently issued rules that weakened key wetland protections.[7]

[1] 65 Federal Register 12818 (Mar. 9, 2000).

[2] Interior’s Silence on Corps Plan Questioned, Washington Post (Jan. 14, 2002).

[3] 66 Federal Register 42070 (Aug. 9, 2001).

[4] Interior’s Silence on Corps Plan Questioned, supra note 162.

[5] Id.

[6] Id.

[7] White House Relaxes Rules on Protection of Wetlands, Washington Post (Jan. 15, 2002).