Opinion ID: 6353575
Heading Depth: 3
Heading Rank: 2

Heading: The Land Exchange Provision

Text: After nearly a decade of debate, Congress included in the 2014 National Defense Authorization Act a provision (the “Land Exchange Provision”) that requires the Secretary of Agriculture to complete a land swap arrangement with Resolution Copper. See National Defense Authorization Act for Fiscal Year 2015, Pub. L. No. 113-291, § 3003, 128 Stat. 3732–41 (2014) (codified at 16 U.S.C. § 539p). Under the Provision’s terms, the Department of Agriculture must convey 2,422 acres of federal land, including Oak Flat, to Resolution Copper in exchange for 5,344 acres of Arizona land currently owned by Resolution Copper (again, the “Land Exchange”). See 16 U.S.C. § 539p(b), (c). 3 3 The Land Exchange is also subject to several conditions not at issue here. See, e.g., 16 U.S.C. § 539p(c)(2)(A), (B) (requiring that the parcels of land conveyed by Resolution Copper to the United States be “acceptable to the Secretary [of Agriculture or the Secretary of the Interior, depending on the parcel,]” and “conform[] to the title approval APACHE STRONGHOLD V. UNITED STATES 11 Once the Forest Service and Resolution Copper exchange the land specified in the Land Exchange Provision, Resolution Copper expects to take “several years” to conduct a “detailed feasibility study” regarding whether to proceed with a mine on the land it receives. Under Resolution Copper’s current proposal, it would use a mining technique called “panel caving”; while Resolution Copper would not need to dig a mine on the surface, the land over the mine would eventually subside, “profoundly and permanently alter[ing]” the landscape. The Land Exchange Provision also requires a series of consultation and mitigation measures. The Secretary of Agriculture must conduct “government-to-government consultation” with all “affected Indian tribes,” 16 U.S.C. § 539p(c)(3)(A), and must also agree with Resolution Copper on “mutually acceptable measures” to “address the concerns of the affected Indian tribes” and “minimize the adverse effects on the affected Indian tribes resulting from mining and related activities,” id. § 539p(c)(3)(B), (B)(i), (B)(ii). The Secretary of Agriculture must also prepare an environmental impact statement under the National Environmental Policy Act of 1969. See id. § 539p(c)(9)(B). This impact statement will guide any further federal government decisions on permitting and other approvals necessary for any development of the transferred land. See id. To that end, the impact statement must “assess the effects of the mining and related activities on the Federal land conveyed to Resolution Copper under [the Land Exchange Provision] on the cultural and archeological resources that standards of the Attorney General of the United States applicable to land acquisitions by the Federal Government”). 12 APACHE STRONGHOLD V. UNITED STATES may be located on [that] land” and “identify measures that may be taken, to the extent practicable, to minimize potential adverse impacts on those resources.” Id. § 539p(c)(9)(C)(i), (ii). Last, after the Department of Agriculture and Resolution Copper complete the Land Exchange, the Land Exchange Provision prohibits Resolution Copper from mining on Apache Leap and obligates Resolution Copper to surrender all rights to mine on or extract minerals from that land. See id. § 539p(g)(3). Apache Leap will be designated the “Apache Leap Special Management Area” with the goal of preserving the area’s “natural character” and “cultural and archeological resources” and protecting the “traditional uses of the area by Native American people.” Id. § 539p(g)(1), (2).