The Federal Circuit affirms a lower court decision finding property owners' takings claim against the National Marine Fisheries Service unripe. The owners sought to harvest redwood trees on their property. After learning that the cost of an incidental take permit (ITP) under the Endangered Species A...

The Federal Claims Court holds that landowners are not entitled to just compensation under the Fifth Amendment in their action against the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers (the Corps) for requiring them to set aside a portion of their property as mitigation wetlands in exchange for a §404 permit to...

The Seventh Circuit held that the state of Illinois would be violating the U.S. Constitution if it confiscated any part of a clean energy foundation's assets. After the state legislature passed an authorizing statute, the foundation was created out of the profits from a private company's sale of sev...

The Fourth Circuit held that U.S. Environmental Protection Agency inspectors who took wastewater samples at a mill are entitled to qualified immunity. The owner of the mill had no reasonable expectation of privacy in the wastewater under the circumstances shown in the record and therefore had no Fou...

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 ...

The Federal Circuit reversed a lower court decision that the Surface Mining Control and Reclamation Act (SMCRA) produced a physical taking of a company's mineral rights. In 1937, the company sold the surface rights of land in the Daniel Boone National Forest to the United States but it retained the ...

A Nevada court upheld a county decision denying a company's request for a special use permit to mine clay from two open pits on federal land north of Reno, Nevada, and to build a plant to produce cat litter on private land nearby. The Mining Law of 1872 and federal regulations don't exempt the proje...

The Fifth Circuit affirmed the dismissal of residents' lawsuit against the Dallas Housing Authority seeking to enjoin it from constructing public housing in their community. The decision to build does not violate the residents' right to equal protection under the Fourteenth Amendment. The authority ...

A district court dismissed property owners' takings, substantive due process, and equal protection claims against a city after the city denied the owners' request for building permits. The owners' takings claim was dismissed for lack of subject matter jurisdiction. The owners did not adequately seek...

The court holds that the U.S. Forest Service (Forest Service) was required by the National Environmental Policy Act (NEPA) to consider the connected and cumulative impacts of a timber company's proposed timber-management project and six applications for access-road permits to the company. The Forest...