The Washington Post‘s Robert Barnes has a story here on the Sackett case, which will be argued on Monday:
[T]he Supreme Court will review the Sacketts’ four-year-long effort to build on land that the EPA says contains environmentally sensitive wetlands. A decision in the couple’s favor could curtail the EPA’s authority and mean a fundamental change in the way the agency enforces the Clean Water Act.
Even before the court takes up the case, the couple have become a favored cause for developers, corporations, utilities, libertarians and conservative members of Congress, who condemn what one ally told the court is the EPA’s “abominable bureaucratic abuse.”
It is a familiar spot for the agency, which has come under withering criticism in the political arena. Republican presidential contenders routinely denounce the EPA’s actions and regulations as “job-killers,” while GOP House members have voted to ban the agency from regulating greenhouse gases and tried to cut its enforcement budget….
“This is what happens when an overzealous federal agency would rather force compliance than give any consideration to private property rights, individual rights, basic decency or common sense,” said the Sacketts’ home-state senator, Mike Crapo (R.)
Meanwhile, SCOTUS Blog‘s Lyle Denniston previews Monday’s argument here. And the L.A. Times’ David Savage has more here:
It remains unclear why EPA officials were convinced the Sacketts’ lot was a wetland. One part of the lot is bordered by cattails, and it is wet sometimes during the year, Mike Sackett reported. But he also said no water flows from his land to the lake, which is about 500 feet away and across a road. Contradicting the Sacketts, an environmental group says the couple were warned in advance their lot had a wetland.
The legal authority for regulating wetlands comes from the Clean Water Act, which forbids the “discharge of any pollutant” into the “navigable waters of the United States.” Since the late 1970s, the EPA and the Army Corps of Engineers have claimed broad authority to protect wetlands, even when they are not connected to rivers or lakes. As the Sacketts learned, putting gravel on a dry lot amounts to “discharging pollutants” into the “waters of the United States” if the lot is deemed to be wetlands.
These guys need to win. I’m a disabled landowner that has been trying to clean up a bunch of dead Hawthornes for several years with many flat tires. I just had two surgeries so a friend came down with his track hoe and pushed them into piles for burning. The NEXT day I was visited by the US Army Corp, DEP, Blair County Conservation District. So far I have received two citations for “earth disturbance” because the scrub was pushed over. No earth was moved other than the little bit on roots. I received a cease and desist letter from Baltimore but it doesn’t say what I did. I’ve lived here 20 years and try to maintain a decent crop farm. There is no construction. Just clearing brush. The funny part is the land is contained by a very high rail bed, water flows south, and they claim I am polluting a stream 1 mile North of me. Although this defies the laws of physics, the way it was put to me (almost verbatim) is I can either shut up and agree with them or they can make my life a living hell. They are to come and meet with me soon. In the mean time I’ve witnessed DEP vehicles driving very slow past my house almost daily. Isn’t this harassment? I made a contribution and hope the Sackett’s win big! I told these guys I’m all for being a good steward of the land and to be considered an “environmental criminal” over something so stupid just proves how out of control they are. Now the EPA, Fish and Wildlife, and who knows who else is involved. It’s ruined my reputation, my health, and why am I paying taxes on land that belongs, according to the letter, the United States?
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