Description: Challenge to project intended to improve conditions in the Little Slate Creek watershed in Idaho.
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Alliance for the Wild Rockies v. Brazell
Case Documents:
Filing Date Type File Action Taken Summary 11/27/2013 Decision Plaintiffs' motion for summary judgment denied; defendants' cross-motion for summary judgment granted. The federal district court for the District of Idaho granted federal defendants’ motion to dismiss a challenge to the Little Slate Project, a set of actions including aquatic habitat restoration, timber harvest, fuel treatments, and changes to the roads and trails intended to improve conditions in the Little Slate Creek watershed in Idaho. Plaintiffs challenged federal decisions under the National Environmental Policy Act, the Endangered Species Act, and the National Forest Management Act. The court found that the defendants had not acted arbitrarily or capriciously. Although climate change impacts were not central to the federal defendants’ or the court’s analysis, the court noted that a biological opinion for bull trout prepared by the Fish and Wildlife Service identified global climate change as a cumulative effect and “determined the ‘quite certain’ warming of the global climate would have negative effects on bull trout habitat.”