Opinion ID: 186592
Heading Depth: 3
Heading Rank: 1

Heading: NPS' Alleged Failure to Forward Reports to the President

Text: 24 TWS seeks an order requiring NPS to forward to the President the agency's completed wilderness recommendations for Glen Canyon National Recreation Area and Lake Mead National Recreation Area. There is no good reason to believe that such an order will redress TWS' injuries. No legal consequences flow from the recommendations. Even if this court were to order NPS to forward its recommendations to the President, it would still be up to Congress to decide whether to designate the cited lands as wilderness. See 16 U.S.C. § 1132(c) (Wilderness Act); 16 U.S.C. § 460dd-8 (Glen Canyon National Recreation Area Reporting Provision). 25 Congress has no obligation to consider the President's recommendations, should he offer any, let alone act upon them. And no order from this court requiring NPS to submit recommendations to the President in the hope that he will in turn forward them to Congress will change this situation. See Guerrero v. Clinton, 157 F.3d 1190, 1191 (9th Cir.1998) (holding where reports [to Congress] themselves trigger no legal consequences, any injury allegedly incurred by the absence of reporting is. . . not redressable). In short, the judicial order that TWS requests will not afford it the redress it seeks. 26 2. NPS' Alleged Failure to Complete a Legal Description and Boundary Map for Death Valley National Park 27 TWS similarly cannot establish redressability with respect to its request for an order compelling NPS to complete a legal description and boundary map of designated wilderness in Death Valley National Park. In other words, the member injuries cited by TWS will not be redressed by the relief requested. 28 TWS submitted the declaration of Ms. Wold, which asserts that she is a member of TWS and that she spends significant time in Death Valley National Park. Ex. F, Wold Decl. ¶¶ 1, 4. The declaration states further that, in December 2002, Ms. Wold and her family had planned five park adventures for the coming year. Id. ¶ 4. The declaration identifies the particular parts of the park that Ms. Wold has frequented in the past, as well as the areas that she plans to frequent over the next year. Id. Ms. Wold then asserts the following purported injuries: 29 I want the Park [Service] to fulfill its obligations to complete final boundary maps and wilderness legal descriptions for Death Valley National Park in order to prevent uses of the land that are incompatible with my enjoyment of the Park. Off-road vehicle (ORV) ingress is a constant threat to the Park. A Toyota 4WD vehicle was abandoned in Butte Valley, located in the Park, the last time we were hiking in the area. Abandoned vehicles and vehicle parts have violated the beauty of park areas like Surprise Canyon [an area of Death Valley she has frequented], and its delicate riparian area. 30 . . . . 31 NPS's failure to comply with its wilderness responsibilities harms my ability to use and enjoy Death Valley National Park as wilderness because most citizens do not realize that 95% of the park was designated as wilderness on October 31, 1994. Without maps, to most people with 4WD vehicles, a dirt tract is a road to be traveled — and travel it they will. 32 Id. ¶¶ 7, 9. 33 It simply defies reason to think that a court order compelling NPS to issue final boundary maps and legal descriptions of Death Valley National Park will reduce off-road vehicle abuses of the wilderness. Indeed, 95% of the park already has been designated wilderness, so the identification of protected areas is hardly an issue of any moment. There is no reason to believe (and TWS cites none) that maps and descriptions of the park will curb off-road vehicle abuses. TWS has thus failed to show that it is likely, as opposed to merely speculative, that the injuries cited by Ms. Wold will be redressed by a favorable decision on this issue. Lujan, 504 U.S. at 561, 112 S.Ct. 2130 (internal citations and quotation marks omitted). 34 3. NPS' Alleged Failure to Review Lands for Wilderness Suitability 35 TWS also seeks a court order compelling NPS to review lands for wilderness suitability pursuant to 16 U.S.C. § 1132(c) in the Wilderness Act. Section 1132(c) states: 36 Within ten years after September 3, 1964 the Secretary of the Interior shall review every roadless area of five thousand contiguous acres or more in the national parks, monuments and other units of the national park system and every such area of, and every roadless island within the national wildlife refuges and game ranges, under his jurisdiction on September 3, 1964 and shall report to the President his recommendation as to the suitability or nonsuitability of each such area or island for preservation as wilderness. The President shall advise the President of the Senate and the Speaker of the House of Representatives of his recommendation with respect to the designation as wilderness of each such area or island on which review has been completed, together with a map thereof and a definition of its boundaries. Such advice shall be given with respect to not less than one-third of the areas and islands to be reviewed under this subsection within three years after September 3, 1964, not less than two-thirds within seven years of September 3, 1964 and the remainder within ten years of September 3, 1964. A recommendation of the President for designation as wilderness shall become effective only if so provided by an Act of Congress. Nothing contained herein shall, by implication or otherwise, be construed to lessen the present statutory authority of the Secretary of the Interior with respect to the maintenance of roadless areas within units of the national park system. 37 16 U.S.C. § 1132(c). TWS points out that special protections are afforded wilderness areas, see 16 U.S.C. § 1133, and that these protections would redress the Society's injuries. The problem, however, is that it is clear from 16 U.S.C. § 1132(c) that only Congress can designate lands as wilderness. 38 Unsurprisingly, TWS argues that the likelihood of an area attaining wilderness designation is increased if NPS or the Secretary of Interior submit a suitability recommendation to the President, who in turn may then submit a recommendation to Congress. The analysis is too attenuated, however. As noted above, an order from this court requiring NPS to submit recommendations to the President in the hope that he will in turn forward them to Congress does not make it likely, as opposed to merely speculative, that the injuries cited by TWS will be redressed by a favorable decision. Lujan, 504 U.S. at 561, 112 S.Ct. 2130 (internal citations and quotation marks omitted). 39 TWS fares no better with reference to the individual park enabling acts or the MANAGEMENT POLICIES itself. NPS has no final authority under these acts to designate an area as wilderness. See, e.g., Big Cypress National Preserve Addition Act, 16 U.S.C. § 698 l. An order from this court cannot make Congress designate an area as wilderness, so the redress that TWS seeks cannot be found with the judiciary. A suitability assessment undertaken pursuant to the MANAGEMENT POLICIES similarly does not create a designation as wilderness. 40 TWS responds that, under the agency's POLICIES, NPS has committed itself to managing areas as if they are wilderness once it commences to review lands for wilderness suitability. TWS points us to § 6.3.1 of the MANAGEMENT POLICIES, which states, in part, that [NPS] will take no action that would diminish the wilderness suitability of an area possessing wilderness characteristics until the legislative process of wilderness designation has been completed. MANAGEMENT POLICIES, § 6.3.1, supra, at 65 (emphasis added). We do not view this policy statement as a commitment by NPS to manage areas as if they are wilderness once the agency commences review of lands for wilderness suitability. And there is certainly no statutory or case law support for this contention. 41 More importantly, even under the policy statement cited by TWS, it is clear that NPS has wide discretion to decide how to proceed to take no action that would diminish the wilderness suitability of an area possessing wilderness characteristics. Id. TWS has not demonstrated that an order from this court compelling NPS to review lands for wilderness suitability would change NPS' management of the land in ways that would redress the injuries its members allege. For example, TWS has not shown that various types of motorized vehicles which allegedly degrade the wilderness that its members use would be prohibited by NPS so as not to diminish wilderness suitability. The point is that the existence of various nonconforming uses, such as logging, farming, mining, and even utility lines, in some situations, on lands possessing wilderness characteristics does not per se preclude a recommendation from the Park Service that the area is wilderness suitable and should be designated as wilderness. See MANAGEMENT POLICIES, § 6.2.1.2, supra, at 64. 42 In short, TWS has not shown that NPS has committed itself to managing areas as if they are wilderness once it commences a review of lands for wilderness suitability. Had the Wilderness Act provided that NPS must manage wilderness-suitable areas as if they were designated wilderness, i.e., conforming to the prohibitions and protections of the Wilderness Act, then TWS' alleged injuries might have been redressable. Nothing in the statute, however — indeed, nothing in the MANAGEMENT POLICIES — requires this. 43 Put differently, TWS lacks standing because it has not presented a situation comparable to those covered by Telecommunications Research & Action Center v. FCC, 750 F.2d 70 (D.C.Cir.1984) ( TRAC ). In a paradigmatic TRAC case, a petitioner seeks to compel agency action that the petitioner claims is legally required and that directly affects the party before the court. When the agency then acts pursuant to a TRAC order, the petitioner will either secure the redress sought or have a final order on the merits from the agency that will be subject to judicial review. This case would be covered by TRAC if, hypothetically, TWS' claim arose because the agency had failed to comply with a statutory provision under the Wilderness Act requiring NPS to make a determination on the merits of a concrete wilderness proposal within a precise time frame and a positive determination would redress the particularized injuries of TWS' members. We have no such situation here. 44