Opinion ID: 3066458
Heading Depth: 1
Heading Rank: 5

Heading: analysis

Text: Oklahoma contends the Indian Country NSR Rule is arbitrary and capricious, in violation of the Administrative Procedure Act (APA), 5 U.S.C. § 706(2)(A), for two reasons: First, the regulatory gap upon which the EPA premised the Rule simply does not exist; each state’s SIP applies to all nonreservation Indian country within its geographic borders except where a tribe has demonstrated its inherent jurisdiction. Because non-reservation Indian country is always covered by a SIP unless it has been displaced by a tribal implementation plan (TIP), there is no regulatory gap to be filled by a FIP. Second, the EPA was without authority to implement a nationwide FIP; the EPA, Oklahoma contends, may establish a FIP only upon finding that a specific 7 jurisdiction’s plan is inadequate. Because we grant Oklahoma’s petition based upon its first argument, we do not reach its second point. A. Threshold Objections Before we may consider the merits of the parties’ arguments, we must address a series of threshold issues, the first two of which are jurisdictional. First, the EPA questions whether Oklahoma has standing to bring the challenge at hand. Second, the EPA contends Oklahoma’s claim that its SIP presumptively applies over non-reservation Indian country is time-barred because the issue was decided by the Tribal Authority Rule issued in 1998. Third, the EPA argues that the same claim is forfeit because Oklahoma failed to raise it in the rulemaking proceeding for the Indian Country NSR Rule now under review. Although there is something to each of these objections, none is ultimately a bar to our reaching the merits of this case. 1. Standing The “irreducible constitutional minimum of standing contains three elements”: (1) injury in fact, (2) causation, and (3) redressability. Lujan v. Defenders of Wildlife, 504 U.S. 555, 560–61 (1992). Oklahoma alleges it is injured by the Indian Country NSR Rule because the Rule “divests [Oklahoma] of regulatory authority over areas otherwise within [its] purview,” to wit, non-reservation Indian country, and that injury would be redressed if the court were to vacate the Rule in relevant part. In supplemental briefs ordered by the court after oral argument, the EPA challenged this straightforward account of standing on the ground that Oklahoma’s injury is self-inflicted 8 and could be redressed by the state itself pursuant to the Safe, Accountable, Flexible, Efficient Transportation Equity Act (SAFETEA) of 2005, Pub. L. No. 109–59, 119 Stat. 1144, section 10211(a) of which provides: [I]f the Administrator of the [EPA] determines that a regulatory program submitted by the State of Oklahoma for approval by the Administrator under a law administered by the Administrator meets applicable requirements of the law, and the Administrator approves the State to administer the State program under the law with respect to areas in the State that are not Indian country, on request of the State, the Administrator shall approve the State to administer the State program in the areas of the State that are in Indian country, without any further demonstration of authority by the State. Because the EPA has already approved Oklahoma to administer its SIP “with respect to areas in the State that are not Indian country,” the EPA suggests Oklahoma can obtain regulatory authority over Indian country merely by seeking the EPA’s approval of an application pursuant to the SAFETEA; therefore Oklahoma’s alleged injury is caused not by the Rule but by the State’s own failure to seek relief under the SAFETEA. See Petro-Chem Processing, Inc. v. EPA, 866 F.2d 433, 438 (D.C. Cir. 1989) (“[T]o the extent that this injury is self-inflicted, it is so completely due to the complainant’s own fault as to break the causal chain” (internal quotation marks and brackets omitted)). We do not think relief under the SAFETEA is so certain or complete as to render Oklahoma’s injury self-inflicted. As the State points out, the EPA might attach a condition to its approval of Oklahoma’s SIP as applied to Indian country that is “inconsistent with Oklahoma’s current SIP authority.” And 9 if the EPA does interpret the SAFETEA as authorizing it to attach conditions, then the agency might well be entitled to judicial deference under Chevron U.S.A., Inc. v. Natural Resources Defense Council, Inc., 467 U.S. 837, 842–43 (1984). Lest one think this concern merely speculative, we note that although the EPA argues the “SAFETEA provides a remedy to the State’s alleged injury,” it has stopped short, both in its brief and at oral argument, of stating that Oklahoma would be entitled to approval without conditions of an application under the SAFETEA. Clearly, Oklahoma has alleged an injury caused by the rule it challenges and redressable by our vacatur of that rule. The possibility of an alternative remedy, of uncertain availability and effect, does not render its injury self-inflicted. Cf. Cmty. Nutrition Inst. v. Block, 698 F.2d 1239, 1247 (D.C. Cir. 1983) (“Consumers have been injured economically, even if they could ameliorate this injury by purchasing some alternative product”), rev’d on other grounds, 467 U.S. 340 (1984). Oklahoma therefore has standing to bring this petition for review. 2. Timeliness The EPA argues Oklahoma comes to this court more than a decade too late to argue its SIP presumptively applies in non-reservation Indian country because the EPA “made crystal clear in the Tribal Authority Rule” it issued in 1998 “that it interpreted past SIP approvals as not applying in