Recent federal court decisions have changed the way wetlands are regulated in the United States. Here's what you need to know. A Shift in Wetland Regulation: The Sackett Decision and Its Impact In 2023, the U.S. Supreme...more
Bats in the Belfry and Water under the Bridge...New Federal Regulations Developers Need to Know - In recent months, the federal government has issued various regulations that developers need to consider before they...more
The Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) released the final Clean Water Act (CWA) rule (New Rule) to comply with the US Supreme Court decision in Sackett v. EPA, 598 U.S. _, 143 S. Ct. 1322 (2023) (“Sackett”). This is a...more
The U.S. Supreme Court recently issued an opinion in Sackett v. EPA that established a stricter test for whether the federal Clean Water Act (CWA) applies to a wetland. The test limits federal jurisdiction to wetlands with a...more
Last month, the U.S. Supreme Court weighed in on a long-standing controversy over the extent to which the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) and the Army Corps of Engineers (ACOE; collectively, the Agencies) have...more
On May 25, 2023, the United States Supreme Court issued its long-awaited opinion in Sackett v. U.S. Environmental Protection Agency, diving back into a decades-long debate over the definition of “waters of the United States”...more
After many decades of uncertainty around the meaning of “the waters of the United States” (WOTUS), the United States Supreme Court narrowed the definition of WOTUS under the Clean Water Act (CWA) in its opinion on May 25,...more
In a 9-0 ruling published on May 25, 2023, the U.S. Supreme Court rejected the U.S. EPA’s and U.S. Army Corps of Engineers’ (USACE's) use of the expansive “significant nexus” test to assert authority over adjacent wetlands as...more
The Supreme Court ends protection for most wetlands in the United States... In a sweeping decision, the Supreme Court last week eliminated federal protection for more than half the wetlands in the United States. (Sackett...more