Am. Wild Horse Pres. Campaign v. Vilsack
| Decision Date | 30 September 2015 |
| Docket Number | Civil Action No. 14–0485 (ABJ) |
| Citation | 133 F.Supp.3d 200 |
| Parties | American Wild Horse Preservation Campaign, et al., Plaintiffs, v. Tom Vilsack, Secretary, U.S. Department of Agriculture, et al., Defendants. |
| Court | U.S. District Court — District of Columbia |
William Stewart Eubanks, II, Meyer Glitzenstein & Eubanks LLP, Fort Collins, CO, David Lawerence Zaft, Matthew W. O'Brien, Caldwell Leslie & Proctor, PC, Los Angeles, CA, Jeffrey D. Pierce, Animal Legal Defense Fund, Cotati, CA, for Plaintiff.
Meredith L. Flax, Stuart Campbell Gillespie, U.S. Department of Justice, Washington, DC, for Defendant.
AMY BERMAN JACKSON
Plaintiffs the American Wild Horse Preservation Campaign, Carla Bowers, and Return to Freedom have brought this action against the Secretary of the United States Department of Agriculture, Thomas J. Vilsack; the Chief of the United States Forest Service, Thomas Tidwell; and the Acting Director of the Modoc National Forest, Ann Carlson. Compl. [Dkt. # 1]. The case arises out of the Forest Service's 2013 management plan for the Devil's Garden Wild Horse Territory ("WHT"). Id.
The Devil's Garden WHT is a wild horse territory located in the Modoc National Forest in California. Id. ¶ 1. Plaintiffs acknowledge that the territory consisted of two separate, non-contiguous parcels when it was established in 1975. Id. ¶ 39. However, they allege that at some point in the 1980s, the Forest Service adjusted the borders of the WHT to create a larger, unified territory, and that these more expansive borders were also recognized in a 1991 forest plan. Id. ¶¶ 39–40. In this lawsuit, they claim that the Forest Service acted improperly in 2013, when it adopted a new management plan which delineated the territory's borders in accordance with the original 1975 layout and explained that any previous references to one contiguous territory were the result of "administrative error." Id. ¶¶ 3–4, 48–49. The Forest Service also adjusted the territory's minimum wild horse population threshold, called the appropriate management level ("AML"). Id. ¶¶ 5–6, 51–52. Plaintiffs allege that these decisions are contrary to multiple statutes and reflect arbitrary and capricious agency action in violation of the Administrative Procedure Act ("APA"), 5 U.S.C. § 706(2)
. Id. ¶¶ 58–91.
Plaintiffs' first set of challenges to the Forest Service's actions are premised upon their assertion that the disputed 25,000–acre parcel—which lies between the two original non-contiguous portions of the Devil's Garden WHT—was made an official part of the WHT at some point prior to 2013. In its 2013 environmental assessment, the Forest Service explained that any previous drawings or plans that appeared to incorporate the parcel—and unite the territory's two non-contiguous halves—had done so in error. The Court does not find this action to have been unreasonable or unlawful. Plaintiffs have failed to demonstrate that the disputed parcel was ever formally incorporated into the Devil's Garden WHT through the required public process or that it could have been. So they are unable to meet their burden to show that the record does not support the agency's 2013 decision to correct and clarify the boundaries.
With respect to the second issue raised in the complaint, the Forest Service has articulated a rational connection between the facts it found and its choice to broaden the AML range for the Devil's Garden WHT. Thus, the Court finds that the challenged actions were not arbitrary and capricious or contrary to law, and it will grant defendants' cross-motion for summary judgment.
The complaint recognizes that the Devil's Garden WHT consisted of two separate, non-contiguous parcels, totaling an estimated 236,000 acres, when it was established in 1975. Compl. ¶ 39. Plaintiffs allege that at some point in the 1980s, the Forest Service adjusted the borders of the WHT to create one contiguous territory of roughly 258,000 acres. Id. Plaintiffs further claim that the Forest Service improperly revised those borders in 2013. Id. ¶¶ 3–4. They seek to vacate the Forest Service's clarification of the territorial borders and its simultaneous adjustment of the AML as arbitrary and capricious under the APA, and on the grounds that the agency's actions violated all of the applicable statutes. Id. ¶ 8.
Three statutory schemes control the Forest Service's management of the Devil's Garden WHT and form the basis for plaintiffs' challenges to the decisions embodied in the 2013 environmental assessment and management plan: the Wild Free–Roaming Horses and Burros Act ("Wild Horses Act"), 16 U.S.C. §§ 1331
–1340, the National Forest Management Act ("NFMA"), 16 U.S.C. §§ 1600 –1687, and the National Environmental Policy Act ("NEPA"), 42 U.S.C. §§ 4321 –4370.
The Wild Horses Act, passed in 1971, states that wild horses and burros "shall be protected from capture, branding, harassment, or death; and to accomplish this they are to be considered in the area where presently found, as an integral part of the natural system of the public lands." 16 U.S.C. § 1331
. The Act requires the Forest Service to "protect and manage" wild horse populations on lands under its administration in order to "achieve and maintain a thriving natural ecological balance." Id. § 1333(a). To manage the wild horses, the Forest Service has established wild horse and burro territories on "lands which were territorial habitat of wild free-roaming horses and/or burros at the time of the passage of the Act," and it develops and maintains a "management plan" for each territory. 36 C.F.R. §§ 222.60(b)(15), 222.61(3)–(4). Each unit or subunit of a wild horse territory is assigned an appropriate management level, or AML, which represents the number of animals the territory can sustainably support. 16 U.S.C. § 1333(b)(1).
The National Forest Management Act requires the Forest Service to "develop, maintain, and, as appropriate, revise" a Land and Resource Management Plan (herein, a "forest plan") for all sections of the National Forest System. Id. § 1604(a). While a management plan under the Wild Horses Act applies to a specific wild horse and burro territory, a forest plan under the NFMA governs a particular unit of the National Forest System. The Forest Service may make nonsignificant amendments to a forest plan "in any manner whatsoever" after giving public notice. Id. § 1604(f)(4). However, significant amendments to a forest plan must undergo more extensive approval procedures and require greater public involvement. Id.
The National Environmental Policy Act requires all federal agencies to analyze the impact of any agency action "significantly affecting the quality of the human environment." 42 U.S.C. § 4332(C)
; see also 40 C.F.R. § 1508.27 (). Under NEPA, an agency must first prepare an environmental assessment ("EA"), which briefly discusses the environmental impacts of the proposed agency action and sets out "sufficient evidence and analysis for determining whether to prepare" one of two additional documents: an environmental impact statement ("EIS") or a finding of no significant impact ("FONSI"). 40 C.F.R. §§ 1501.4(b), 1508.9. If the agency finds, on the basis of the EA, that the proposed action will have a significant impact on the quality of the human environment, it must prepare an EIS, which examines five factors relevant to the cumulative environmental impact of the action. 42 U.S.C. § 4332(C). If, however, the agency finds that the action does not significantly affect the environment, it need only prepare a FONSI setting forth the reasons "why an action ... will not have a significant effect on the human environment and for which an [EIS] therefore will not be prepared." 40 C.F.R. § 1508.13 ; see alsoid. § 1501.4(b), (e).
After the passage of the Wild Horses Act in 1971, the Forest Service established a wild horse territory at Devil's Garden, a large, flat plateau located within the Modoc National Forest in northeastern California. See AR02969–70.1 The first formal Devil's Garden WHT management plan was issued in 1975. AR02965–97 (the "1975 Management Plan"). It provided for a wild horse territory "broken into two large units which encompasses a gross acreage estimated at 236,000 acres." AR02970–71.
The two ranges were separated by a strip of land that was not incorporated into the Devil's Garden WHT when it was established. See, e.g., AR00157 (depicting the "1975 Wild Horse Territory"). This strip, which the Court will refer to as the "disputed territory," consisted of the Triangle Ranch and Avanzino Ranch grazing lands, some of which were privately-owned. See, e.g., AR00156 ("The Avanzino and Triangle private ranch lands which lay in between the West and East home ranges were not included in the WHT."). It also included portions of the Carr, Big Sage, and Timbered Mountain livestock grazing allotments. See, e.g., AR03927 (showing boundaries of grazing allotments in red and boundaries of Devil's Garden WHT in yellow). In 1976, the Forest Service acquired the Triangle Ranch lands through a land exchange and incorporated them into the Modoc National Forest. AR03965; AR03968. However, the Forest Service did not make the Triangle Ranch lands part of the Devil's Garden WHT at that time. See AR03998 (1979 Decision Notice stating that "Triangle is not part of a designated horse management unit").
The Forest Service revised the Devil's Garden WHT management plan in 1980, AR02949–64 (the "1980 Management Plan"), and again described the Devil's Garden WHT as a territory "broken into two large units which encompasses a gross acreage estimated at 236,000 acres." AR02953. In 1982, the Forest Service issued another management plan, AR02839–51 (the "1982 Management Plan"), which again characterized the Devil's Garden WHT as a territory ...
To continue reading
Request your trial