Opinion ID: 78002
Heading Depth: 1
Heading Rank: 4

Heading: Whether section 7(a)(2) of the ESA requires FEMA to independently analyze the FWS's proposed reasonable and prudent alternatives

Text: In addition to finding that the FWS's 2003 RPAs were arbitrary and capricious, the district court held that FEMA's admitted failure to engage in any independent consideration of the sufficiency of the 2003 RPAs renders its actions arbitrary and capricious. Fla. Key Deer II, 364 F.Supp.2d at 1359. That is, the district court found that agencies cannot rely exclusively on the FWS's post-consultation recommendations without conducting any independent analysis of their sufficiency. For this proposition, the court relied upon Pyramid Lake Paiute Tribe of Indians v. U.S. Department of the Navy, wherein the Ninth Circuit stated that [a] federal agency cannot abrogate its responsibility to ensure that its actions will not jeopardize a listed species; its decision to rely on a[n] FWS biological opinion must not have been arbitrary or capricious. 898 F.2d 1410, 1415 (9th Cir.1990). The Ninth Circuit qualified its statement, however, stating that another agency's reliance on that opinion will satisfy its obligations under the [ESA] if a challenging party can point to no `new' information  i.e., information the [FWS] did not take into account  which challenges the opinion's conclusions. Id. We agree with the Ninth Circuit and do not share the concern of the Wildlife Organizations that an agency will be able to avoid substantive review of its adopted reasonable and prudent alternatives merely by pointing to its reliance on the FWS's opinion. If the FWS's proposed reasonable and prudent alternatives are arbitrary and capricious, an agency's decision to adopt them is likewise arbitrary and capricious and may be challenged. [5] FEMA need not, therefore, conduct any independent analysis of the proposed alternatives; however, as the Ninth Circuit notes, where new information arises between the proposal and the adoption, and an acting agency would otherwise be required to consider that information prior to acting, the decision to adopt is particularly susceptible to challenge absent consideration of the new evidence. Id. Perhaps in acknowledgment of this possibility, FEMA adopted the 2006 RPAs the same day that the FWS proposed them. [6]