Opinion ID: 203581
Heading Depth: 2
Heading Rank: 2

Heading: The AWW's Inclusion Under the WSRA

Text: The AWW is approximately eighty-five miles long and connects a series of forty lakes and ponds, as well as numerous streams and brooks in northern Maine. It has provided a wilderness canoeing experience for centuries. Henry David Thoreau canoed the river during July 1857. He wrote of his experience: It is wonderful how well watered this country is. ... Generally, you may go in any direction in a canoe, by making frequent but not very long portages. You are only realizing once more what all nature distinctly remembers here, for no doubt the waters flowed thus in a former geological period, and instead of being a lake country, it was an archipelago. H.D. Thoreau, The Maine Woods 251-52 (1864). Before Congress passed the WSRA, Maine took independent steps to protect the AWW through the Allagash Wilderness Waterway Act of 1966, now codified at Me.Rev.Stat. Ann. tit. 12, § 1871 et seq. The Act defines an eighty-five mile stretch of the Allagash River as the AWW, id. § 1872(12), and establishes a restricted zone extending between a minimum of 400 feet and maximum of 800 feet in width around the watercourse to preserve, protect and develop the maximum wilderness character of the watercourse, id. § 1873(3). The Act leaves administration of the AWW largely to Maine's Bureau of Parks and Lands. Id. § 1874. The Bureau is empowered to enact rules and regulations governing the AWW to preserve the natural beauty, historic integrity and character of the Allagash Wilderness Waterway. Id. § 1803. Before 2006, the state Act further provided that [t]he bureau may determine the location of access points, control stations and watercourse crossings within the waterway. Id. § 1882 (2005). In this suit, FitzGerald challenges the amendments made to § 1882 in 2006. The AWW was included for protection under section 2(a)(ii) of the WSRA in 1970. On April 10, 1970, then-Maine Governor Kenneth M. Curtis requested that then-Secretary of the Interior Walter J. Hickel designate a portion of the AWW as a state-administered wild river under section 2(a)(ii) of the WSRA. On May 4, 1970, Governor Curtis asked Secretary Hickel to include the entire AWW under the WSRA and submitted a report on the AWW in support of the state's application. On July 13, 1970, Secretary Hickel determined that the entire Allagash Wilderness Waterway meets the requirements for classification as a wild river area under the provisions of the Wild and Scenic Rivers Act, 35 Fed.Reg. 11,525, 11,525 (July 17, 1970), and approved the AWW as a wild river area to be administered by the State of Maine, id. at 11,526. In the Notice of Approval, Secretary Hickel recognized that there were three small dams on the AWW, six established areas for water aircraft traffic, various private logging roads, and trails for snowmobile use along the AWW. Id. With respect to public access to the AWW, Secretary Hickel noted: Public access over private roads will be permitted to and along a portion of Telos Lake at the southern end of the waterway and to the northern boundary at West Twin Brook. Existing private roads within the waterway which have been developed for logging purposes will be closed to public use. These private roads do not create a substantial impact on the overall wilderness character of the river. Id. As to bridges over the AWW, Secretary Hickel stated that [t]emporary bridges for short-term logging purposes may be authorized by the State. Any such crossing is designed to provide minimum impact on the wilderness character of the waterway. Id. Secretary Hickel also found that [t]here is no substantial evidence of man's intrusion within the 400- to 800-foot restricted zone adjoining the watercourse. Id. After the 1970 designation of the AWW as a state-administered wild river, the Maine Park and Recreation Commission, and later the Maine Bureau of Parks and Lands, continued to administer the AWW under the terms of the state Allagash Wilderness Waterway Act of 1966. On April 26, 2006, Maine amended part of the Allagash Wilderness Waterway Act, the relevant section of which is now codified at Me.Rev.Stat. Ann. tit. 12, § 1882, to provide for the maintenance of six seasonal motor vehicle access points to the edge of the AWW, id. § 1882(1), five seasonal motor vehicle access points to short trails leading to the AWW, id. § 1882(2), and six permanent bridges over the AWW, id. § 1882(4). The motor vehicle access points and bridges described in the statute existed before the AWW's designation as a wild river under the WSRA, and thus the challenged state law maintains what was there before the designation and allows for the reconstruction of certain preexisting bridges. On February 1, 2007, FitzGerald filed a federal suit against Harris, the state official charged with managing the AWW, alleging that Me.Rev.Stat. Ann. tit. 12, § 1882, as amended in 2006, is preempted by the WSRA. Specifically, FitzGerald contended that the Maine statute would degrade the value which caused the AWW to be included in the National Wild and Scenic Rivers System and erode[] the AWW's wild condition, contrary to the mission of the WSRA. On March 19, 2007, Harris moved to dismiss the case, arguing that the suit was barred by the Eleventh Amendment, that the WSRA did not preempt the Maine statute, and that FitzGerald's requested injunctive relief was not a permissible remedy under the Supremacy Clause. On August 20, 2007, a magistrate judge recommended that the case be dismissed under Fed.R.Civ.P. 12(b)(6) because the Maine statute was not preempted by the WSRA. On February 11, 2008, the district court affirmed the magistrate judge's recommended decision and granted Harris's motion to dismiss. FitzGerald timely appealed.