In recent years, the frantic pace of land speculation and development in rural areas of the Northeast has threatened to alter irreversibly the traditional character of New England. As urban environments deteriorate, residents of New York, Boston, and other cities have begun in increasing numbers to buy second homes in Vermont, New Hampshire, and Maine. Occasionally, a locality has tried on an ad hoc basis to stem the tide of developers and their customers: In Steel Hill Development, Inc. v.

Although it became effective in early 1969, the Interstate Land Sales Full Disclosure Act of 1968 (ILSFDA)¹ has seen little use as a tool to control unscrupulous sales and development techniques used by subdividers who market their projects to distant audiences.

(See Comment, Litigation Under the Clean Air Act, 3 ELR 10007, and Tables at 3 ELR 10022, 10090.)

Starting January 1, 1974, the Environmental Protection Agency will issue "environmental explanations" written in laymen's terms for proposed new standards, regulations, and guidelines of national application.¹ The new policy, a response to what EPA called the "growing demand by the judiciary and the public" for full disclosure of the reasons for governmental decisions, would apply to national standards of environmental quality and to emission, effluent, and performance standards.

On August 23, 1973, the Environmental Protection Agency announced that it would request auto manufacturers to label 1974 model year cars to show customers the model's weight, probable mile-per-gallon rating, and estimated operating cost.¹ The proposed program is to be voluntary, although EPA's Assistant Administrator, Robert Sansom, noted that the Federal Trade Commission may already possess the authority to make such disclosure mandatory.

The Maine Supreme Judicial Court recently upheld the validity of two Maine laws, both of which promise to have a far-reaching impact upon state environmental legislation in the 1970s. The Site Location Act of 1970¹ establishes a strict land use control system by requiring state approval of the landsites of all major industrial, commercial, and residential developments.

In March of this year, after the United States signed the Convention on International Trade in Endangered Species of Wild Fauna and Flora,¹ two bills designed to implement the Convention were introduced in the House of Representatives. The two measures, one proposed by the Administration, the other by Rep.

On September 23, 1973, Oregon Gov. Tom McCall ordered a complete ban on the use of electricity for commercial display or decorative purposes throughout the state.¹ The Governor declared that the "inherent authority" of his office provided the legal basis for the unprecedented order.

A question that has begun to appear with increasing frequency in recent NEPA litigation concerns the environmental damage that a private or state party may cause in the early, "pre-federal" stages of a project before it becomes a "major federal action" and an impact statement must be prepared. This is another of the second-generation NEPA issues that have come to the fore as the battle lines between environmental plaintiffs and nonfederal developers have been drawn.

A comment in last month's ELR¹ analyzed the question of NEPA's applicability to "major federal actions" taken by the Environmental Protection Agency, and called on EPA to prepare impact statements, rather than "environmental explanations," for its guidelines, regulations, and standards. On September 20, the House received the conference report on H.R.