Opinion ID: 3037886
Heading Depth: 4
Heading Rank: 2

Heading: “Best Scientific Information Available”

Text: Fishery management plans and their implementing regulations must be consistent with “national standards” for fishery management set forth in 16 U.S.C. § 1851(a). A regulation implementing a FMP will be upheld under § 1851(a) unless the Secretary has acted in an “arbitrary and capricious manner promulgating such regulations.” Alliance Against IFQs v. Brown, 84 F.3d 343, 350 (9th Cir. 1996) (internal quotation omitted). Stated another way, we will uphold a regulation against a claim of inconsistency with a “national standard” under § 1851 if the Secretary had a “rational basis” for it. Id.; see also Yakutat, Inc. v. Gutierrez, 407 F.3d 1054, 1071 (9th Cir. 2005). [9] National Standard No. 2 requires that “[c]onservation and management measures shall be based upon the best scientific information available.” 16 U.S.C. § 1851(a)(2). Plaintiffs OREGON TROLLERS v. GUTIERREZ 7411 argue that there is no scientific basis to support an escapement goal that counts only natural spawners as relevant for conservation purposes. However, plaintiffs frame their argument purely in terms of statutory interpretation. They did not introduce any evidence to dispute the scientific basis for the escapement goal. In effect, plaintiffs would have us construe National Standard No. 2 to require as a matter of law that all Klamath chinook must receive the same consideration for management and conservation. But the statute regulates fisheries, see, e.g., 16 U.S.C. §§ 1801(b)(4), 1851(a)(1), and fisheries include “one or more stocks of fish.” Id. § 1802(37). As we have just held, a “stock” may reasonably include only natural spawners. Even if plaintiffs had attacked the evidentiary basis for the escapement goal established in the 1989 regulation, the distinction between natural and hatchery spawners would pass muster on the record before us. “Where scientific and technical expertise is necessarily involved in agency decisionmaking, . . . a reviewing court must be highly deferential to the judgment of the agency.” Nat’l Wildlife Fed’n v. U.S. Army Corps of Eng’rs, 384 F.3d 1163, 1174 (9th Cir. 2004). The relevant administrative record for these purposes is the record compiled in 1989 to support the FMP amendment that established the escapement goal. See 50 C.F.R. § 600.315(b)(2) (providing that an FMP “must take into account the best scientific information available at the time of preparation”). While the NMFS did not file the 1989 record in this case, the 2005 record contains enough excerpts of that record to allow us to defer to the agency’s decisionmaking. A lengthy analysis conducted in 1986 concluded that the 35,000 natural spawner floor “is needed to protect the production potential of the resource in the event of several consecutive years of adverse environmental conditions.” In 1988, the Council found that “[a]n evaluation of available information on the production potential of Klamath River fall chinook indicates that a minimum escapement goal of 35,000 naturally 7412 OREGON TROLLERS v. GUTIERREZ spawning adults must be protected in all years in order to prevent extended periods of low juvenile production.” After a time series modeling test, the Council deemed the 35,000 natural spawner escapement floor “sufficient . . . to protect the stock and reduce the risk of prolonged depressed production,” and to “provide a high probability of attaining sufficient escapement for hatchery production needs.” [10] There is no evidence in the record that the Council’s 1986 and 1988 studies are outdated or flawed. Bereft of any contrary science, plaintiffs’ bare allegation that the agency’s distinction conflicts with the “best scientific evidence available” fails. See Nw. Envtl. Def. Ctr. v. Brennen, 958 F.2d 930, 936 (9th Cir. 1992) (rejecting a “best scientific information available” claim because the challenger “has not pointed to any scientific evidence inconsistent with the Secretary’s decision”); see also Massachusetts v. Daley, 170 F.3d 23, 30 (1st Cir. 1999) (observing that the challenger may have “forfeited” its challenge by not proposing any better science). Cf. Midwater Trawlers Coop. v. Dep’t of Commerce, 393 F.3d 994, 1004 (9th Cir. 2004) (affirming regulation based on best scientific evidence available when “no new information” contradicted the agency’s data).