The court holds that the Farmers Home Administration (FmHA) need not prepare an environmental impact statement (EIS) for the construction of a drinking water reservoir whose only significant effect on the human environment will be beneficial. The FmHA conducted an environmental assessment (EA) of th...

A magistrate judge holds that the U.S. Department of the Air Force abused its discretion when it failed to include the impact of a new state-managed air-to-ground training range in an environmental impact statement (EIS) prepared under the National Environmental Policy Act (NEPA) to evaluate the env...

The court holds that the Eleventh Amendment to the U.S. Constitution does not bar a citizen group that was denied attorney fees by the Wyoming Department of Environmental Quality from asserting a Surface Mining Control and Reclamation Act (SMCRA) claim against the state agency in federal court. The ...

The court affirms a district court order directing the U.S. government to release, under §2001(k)(1) of the Fiscal Year 1995 Emergency Supplemental Appropriations for Disaster Relief and Rescissions Act, all timber sale contracts offered or awarded between October 1, 1990, and July 27, 1995, in any...

The court holds that a federal statutory requirement that holders of unpatented mining claims pay $100 per claim in 1993 and 1994 or else forfeit their claims did not effect an uncompensated taking of claimholders' property in violation of the Fifth Amendment to the U.S. Constitution. The fee replac...

The court holds that salvage timber sales that had not yet been advertised were "in preparation" under the Supplemental Appropriations for Disaster Assistance and Rescissions Act's (Rescissions Act's) waiver of National Environmental Policy Act (NEPA) requirements. Environmental groups challenged th...

The court holds that the National Environmental Policy Act (NEPA) does not require the Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) to consider the master plan for an airport's expansion in an environmental assessment (EA) of the upgrade of one runway. The court first holds that the issue is not moot, even...

The court affirms a district court determination that §2001(k)(1) of the 1995 Rescissions Act is constitutional and does not violate separation of powers by permitting Congress to resurrect timber sales that federal courts have enjoined. The district court also correctly held that "offered" sales, ...

The court reverses a district court opinion that the stare decisis effect of a decision by a federal district court in Washington State bars appellants' current challenge to the president's 1994 forest plan. The court holds that stare decisis does not require a district court in one circuit to follo...

The court holds that federal and state transportation agencies did not violate the National Environmental Policy Act (NEPA) when they failed to perform a supplemental environmental assessment (EA) after modifying the original design of a proposed freeway interchange. The court first holds that condu...