[et_pb_section fb_built=”1″ fullwidth=”on” admin_label=”Section” _builder_version=”4.16″ global_colors_info=”{}”][et_pb_fullwidth_image src=”https:\/\/westernlaw.org\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/07\/oregon-clearcut.jpg” alt=”crazy mountains montana” admin_label=”Fullwidth header image” _builder_version=”4.16″ animation=”off” use_border_color=”off” border_color=”#ffffff” border_style=”solid” global_colors_info=”{}”][\/et_pb_fullwidth_image][\/et_pb_section][et_pb_section fb_built=”1″ custom_padding_last_edited=”on|phone” admin_label=”Section” _builder_version=”4.16″ custom_padding_tablet=”” custom_padding_phone=”30px||30px|” transparent_background=”off” make_fullwidth=”off” use_custom_width=”off” width_unit=”on” global_colors_info=”{}”][et_pb_row column_structure=”2_3,1_3″ custom_padding_last_edited=”on|desktop” admin_label=”Row” _builder_version=”4.16″ background_size=”initial” background_position=”top_left” background_repeat=”repeat” custom_padding=”0px||0px|” custom_padding_tablet=”” custom_padding_phone=”” make_fullwidth=”off” use_custom_width=”off” width_unit=”on” global_colors_info=”{}”][et_pb_column type=”2_3″ _builder_version=”4.16″ custom_padding=”|||” global_colors_info=”{}” custom_padding__hover=”|||”][et_pb_text admin_label=”NEPA Rollback Info Page” _builder_version=”4.27.4″ background_size=”initial” background_position=”top_left” background_repeat=”repeat” hover_enabled=”0″ use_border_color=”off” border_color=”#ffffff” border_style=”solid” global_colors_info=”{}” sticky_enabled=”0″]<\/p>\n
Congress is pursuing a bill called the Standardizing Permitting and Expediting Economic Development (SPEED) Act<\/a> (H.R. 4776). This deceptively titled bill was crafted solely to hamstring the nation\u2019s bedrock environmental law, the National Environmental Policy Act.<\/p>\n The bill, accounting for last-minute proposed changes that make it far worse, adds sweeping new exemptions, restricts input from experts in other agencies, and puts private interests in the driver\u2019s seat of environmental reviews, disregarding the federal government\u2019s role to protect the public interest. More than 100 groups signed a letter<\/a> opposing the SPEED Act, alongside another letter<\/a> from western organizations condemning the bill\u2019s total capitulation to extractive industries.<\/p>\n The bill\u2019s attack on NEPA is built on the myth that this bedrock environmental law slows project approval. In fact, new evidence-based research concludes:<\/p>\n Congress, with the SPEED Act, isn\u2019t interested in true reform that revitalizes bedrock environmental laws in service of climate action and protection of the West\u2019s public lands, wildlife and waters, and communities. They are, instead, recklessly careening off the road, drunk on bad facts and worse ideas and bullied by the fossil fuel and Big Tech industries\u2019 money and influence.<\/p>\n Democrats must not\u2014especially with the Trump administration in power for three more years\u2014surrender America\u2019s bedrock community and environmental protections to the fossil fuel and extractive industries, intent on looting public resources for profit without regard for the consequences to people, their communities, and our world. The SPEED Act would create new uncertainty and complication without improving decision making. In fact, we believe it would exacerbate the climate crisis and the fires, floods, droughts, hurricanes, and oppressive heat that have already killed so many Americans and so severely damaged our homes, public lands, and economy.<\/p>\n Deregulation interests have peddled myths<\/a> that NEPA is impeding construction of roads, housing, and other infrastructure, yet data shows the law leads to better decisions and ultimately better projects. Instead of taking a reasoned approach to identifying and addressing specific permitting needs, this SPEED Act would open the door to plundering our nation\u2019s resources on public lands and dramatically cut back the public\u2019s ability to be heard during project development or to seek redress for violations of law in court.<\/p>\n The SPEED Act sponsors bemoan NEPA\u2019s \u201ccumbersome and lengthy process,\u201d which experts agree<\/a> is rooted in chronic underfunding and under-staffing federal agencies\u2014a problem created by Congress and the Trump White House. The sponsors complain that NEPA \u201cis currently the most litigated environmental statute,\u201d but the fact is less than a quarter of a percent<\/a> of NEPA decisions end up in court annually.<\/p>\n Congress has passed numerous updates to NEPA that are meaningfully reducing permitting times<\/a>, such as FAST-41, the Inflation Reduction Act, the Fiscal Responsibility Act, and others. Before eviscerating our nation\u2019s bedrock environmental law, we should allow these changes to play out. The prior administration also made substantial improvements to permitting<\/a> that accelerated permitting timelines and respected, rather than undermined, the public interest abandoned by the current administration that should serve as a starting point for any congressional action.<\/p>\n Significantly, by defining the law as purely procedural, the bill guts NEPA\u2019s central purpose to ensure that all federal agencies consider the environmental impacts of their actions. For 50 years the law has directed agencies to consider environmental consequences of proposed actions, engaging the public and communities in that process to ensure that \u201cto the fullest extent possible,\u201d they \u201clook before they leap\u201d and make well-informed decisions that encourage balance between human beings and the environment for present and future generations.<\/p>\n The bill also limits the types of projects subject to environmental review and eliminates an agency\u2019s ability to consider the combined impacts of other projects, meaning environmental reviews will no longer adequately inform the public. In addition, it takes away standard judicial remedies by eliminating courts\u2019 ability to set aside agency actions that violate NEPA, eliminating the incentive for agencies to comply with the law. Moreover, projects would be able to proceed while any violations are corrected\u2014tantamount to \u201cbulldoze first, consider impacts later.\u201d<\/p>\n We can<\/i> improve the speed of permitting, and we already are<\/i>. We must, because the climate and biodiversity crises demand swift and powerful responses. But we must not erode community and environmental protections to achieve this goal.<\/p>\n The NEPA rollback proposed by the U.S. Forest Service to overhaul its environmental analysis procedures under the National Environmental Policy Act (NEPA), which will dramatically curtail the role the public and science play in land management decisions on 193 million acres of national forest lands across the country. This page is dedicated to making information available to the public about this extremely concerning action.<\/p>\n These changes would create loopholes to increase the pace and scale of resource extraction, including logging and mining, all while limiting the scope of public awareness and input on proposed projects. The Forest Service has proposed several new categorical exclusions that would allow the agency to move project planning behind closed doors by cutting the public out of the decision-making process.<\/p>\n The goal of NEPA is to foster better decisions to protect, restore, and enhance our environment and is based on three key principles: 1) transparency; 2) informed decision making; and 3) giving the public a voice. This is achieved through two key tools: public comment and requiring the Forest Service to \u201clook before it leaps\u201d by preparing a detailed environmental analysis. This analysis provides agency decision makers, the public, and outside experts with relevant information and requires agencies to take a \u201chard look\u201d at the potential environmental consequences of a proposed project before making a decision and taking action.\u00a0 Other laws provide for administrative review of these decisions, which gives the public another chance to weigh in on decisions affecting national forestlands.<\/p>\n The Forest Service\u2019s proposed rule undermines these basic tenets by increasing the number and scope of \u201ccategorical exclusions\u201d \u2013 or very cursory review of project effects \u2013 for nearly every type of land management action. The proposed rule exempts those decisions from public comment, and only requires public notice; and such categorical exclusions are already exempt from administrative review.<\/p>\n Cutting the public out of public lands management is a recipe for increased controversy and disagreement, and will not lead to efficient implementation of science-based projects on the ground. Unsurprisingly, the rollback faces overwhelming public opposition, with 94 percent of public comments against<\/a>.<\/p>\n In July 2020, the Trump administration finalized its proposal to gut core components of the National Environmental Policy Act (NEPA), a crucial safeguard for communities\u2019 clean air, clean water, and health, as well as imperiled species and wild lands. Environmental justice and conservation advocates including WELC have responded to the rollback with legal action.<\/p>\n The rollback is the culmination of a relentless, multiyear assault on NEPA\u2019s protections for workers, local communities, and the natural environment. It would open the door for the government to exempt pipelines, large-scale logging operations, waste incinerators, smog-spewing highways, and countless other federal actions from environmental review or sharply limit local communities\u2019 ability to participate in the environmental decision-making process.<\/p>\n The administration\u2019s disregard for NEPA flies in the face of decades of bipartisan consensus on the law. Passed almost unanimously by Congress and signed into law by President Nixon in 1970, it was the product of years of determined activism from people who wanted a greater say in decisions affecting their homes, health, and environment.<\/p>\n We have sued the administration over this illegal subversion of the will of Congress.<\/p>\n [\/et_pb_text][\/et_pb_column][et_pb_column type=”1_3″ _builder_version=”4.16″ custom_padding=”|||” global_colors_info=”{}” custom_padding__hover=”|||”][et_pb_text admin_label=”Related Documents – linked PDFs” _builder_version=”4.16″ background_size=”initial” background_position=”top_left” background_repeat=”repeat” use_border_color=”off” border_color=”#ffffff” border_style=”solid” global_colors_info=”{}”]<\/p>\n [\/et_pb_text][et_pb_text admin_label=”Staff – attorney name linked to tag query” _builder_version=”4.27.4″ background_size=”initial” background_position=”top_left” background_repeat=”repeat” use_border_color=”off” border_color=”#ffffff” border_style=”solid” global_colors_info=”{}”]<\/p>\n Erik Schlenker-Goodrich [\/et_pb_text][et_pb_cta title=”Make Your Voice Heard! Submit Your Public Comment Here:” button_url=”https:\/\/actnow.io\/SDHxzru” url_new_window=”on” button_text=”SUBMIT COMMENT” disabled_on=”on|on|on” admin_label=”Call To Action” _builder_version=”4.16″ background_color=”#dd6622″ background_size=”initial” background_position=”top_left” background_repeat=”repeat” custom_button=”on” button_text_size=”15″ button_font=”|||on|” text_orientation=”left” use_border_color=”off” border_color=”#ffffff” border_style=”solid” button_letter_spacing_hover=”0″ disabled=”on” global_colors_info=”{}” button_text_size__hover_enabled=”off” button_one_text_size__hover_enabled=”off” button_two_text_size__hover_enabled=”off” button_text_color__hover_enabled=”off” button_one_text_color__hover_enabled=”off” button_two_text_color__hover_enabled=”off” button_border_width__hover_enabled=”off” button_one_border_width__hover_enabled=”off” button_two_border_width__hover_enabled=”off” button_border_color__hover_enabled=”off” button_one_border_color__hover_enabled=”off” button_two_border_color__hover_enabled=”off” button_border_radius__hover_enabled=”off” button_one_border_radius__hover_enabled=”off” button_two_border_radius__hover_enabled=”off” button_letter_spacing__hover_enabled=”on” button_letter_spacing__hover=”0″ button_one_letter_spacing__hover_enabled=”off” button_two_letter_spacing__hover_enabled=”off” button_bg_color__hover_enabled=”off” button_one_bg_color__hover_enabled=”off” button_two_bg_color__hover_enabled=”off”][\/et_pb_cta][\/et_pb_column][\/et_pb_row][\/et_pb_section][et_pb_section fb_built=”1″ admin_label=”section” _builder_version=”4.16″ global_colors_info=”{}”][et_pb_row admin_label=”row” _builder_version=”4.16″ background_size=”initial” background_position=”top_left” background_repeat=”repeat” global_colors_info=”{}”][\/et_pb_row][\/et_pb_section]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" Protecting NEPA – The Environmental Magna Carta The SPEED Act: Congress is pursuing a bill called the Standardizing Permitting and Expediting Economic Development (SPEED) Act (H.R. 4776). This deceptively titled bill was crafted solely to hamstring the nation\u2019s bedrock environmental law, the National Environmental Policy Act. The bill, accounting for last-minute proposed changes that make […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":20,"featured_media":0,"parent":0,"menu_order":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","template":"","meta":{"_et_pb_use_builder":"on","_et_pb_old_content":"","_et_gb_content_width":"","_uag_custom_page_level_css":"","_monsterinsights_skip_tracking":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_active":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_note":"","_monsterinsights_sitenote_category":0,"footnotes":""},"categories":[253],"tags":[384,379,272,385],"class_list":["post-19707","page","type-page","status-publish","hentry","category-climate-energy","tag-crazy-mountains","tag-matt-bishop","tag-montana","tag-public-access"],"yoast_head":"\n\n
The Forest Service NEPA Rollback:<\/h3>\n
The White House NEPA Rollback:<\/h3>\n
Related Documents<\/h3>\n
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Staff<\/h3>\n
Marlyn Twitchell
Sangye Ince-Johannsen<\/p>\n