Supreme Court will review controversial water rule

 

The property purchased by Mike and Chantell Sackett in northern Idaho is pictured here and was dubbed within the regulatory purview of the Clean Water Act, even though a nearby lake is 300 feet away and there are rows of houses between the property and the water.

A neighborhood lot in Idaho. Farmland in California. Properties in the West are running up against a controversial water rule that the Supreme Court is due to revisit.

Will it change anything?

Mike and Chantell Sackett bought a vacant lot to build their dream home on in a mostly built-out subdivision in northern Idaho only to be told by the federal government their property was a wetland and subject to the authority of the Clean Water Act.

“The Sacketts’ vacant lot neighbors Priest Lake, which is 300 feet away and behind two rows of houses,” said Tony Francois, an attorney with the Pacific Legal Foundation, which sued on behalf of the couple in 2008.

Francois said the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency and Army Corps of Engineers have construed a rule, called Waters of the United States, or WOTUS, to expansively extend their authority beyond what is reasonable due to an earlier 2006 Supreme Court decision that gave little to no clarity on the issue.

...In California, farmer Jack LaPant purchased 900 acres that had been for years traditionally farmed for winter wheat. He planted winter wheat on the newly acquired land and then subsequently sold it to another buyer. The eventual new owner planted an orchard.

Then the Army Corps of Engineers issued a cease-and-desist order to the newest buyer and, five years after LaPant had owned the property, he was cited for destroying “vernal” pools...MORE