Opinion ID: 2585012
Heading Depth: 4
Heading Rank: 7

Heading: Insufficiency of the Sustained Yield Plan Approval

Text: EPIC contends that the SYP should not have been approved because it lacked the information identified above not only at the public review stage but in its final form. As indicated above, a number of CDF officials pointed out the inadequacy of Pacific Lumber's watershed analysis. This inadequacy was not remedied before the SYP was approved. The dissatisfaction was expressed at the executive level by Douglas Wheeler, Director of the Resources Agency of California, who sent a letter to Pacific Lumber on December 8, 1998, a few months before the SYP was approved, stating: Specifically, the watershed assessment areas should be described and reduced in size; and the assessment must then consider past, present, and future impacts. EPIC also points to the comments during the public review process by Robert Hrubes, a forester and resource economist in its employ, that explain the significance of the lack of planning watershed analysis: Planning watersheds, which averaged [10,000] to 20,000 acres, have been delineated by state water resource personnel and are correlated with topographic and drainage patterns across the landscape. At the scale of the planning watershed, it is possible to ascertain the potential contributory effects of plan ground disturbing activities in conjunction with other activities as well as whether resource sensitivity is within a geographic area united by common watershed drainage patterns. In contrast, the Pacific Lumber watershed assessment areas range in size from 55,000 acres to 426,000 acres and each [watershed assessment area] encompasses numerous planning watersheds. At the highly aggregated scale of a [watershed assessment area], it is impossible to assess the extent to which individual planning watersheds are being cumulatively impacted by [Pacific Lumber's logging activities] and other industrial timber harvesting and road building activities. As discussed, Assembly Bill 1986 specifically contemplates deferred watershed analysis to be completed after the SYP and HCP are approved. That statute and the HCP prescribe a five-year period after the SYP's and HCP's approval in which the watershed analysis will be accomplished. But this fact does not entirely resolve the issue before us. As noted, under the Forest Practice Rules, an SYP shall not replace a THP. However, to the extent that sustained timber production, watershed impacts and fish and wildlife issues are addressed in the approved SYP, these issues shall be considered to be addressed in the THP; that is the THP may rely upon the SYP. (FP Rules, ง 1091.2, italics added.) In approving the SYP, the CDF director also approved a conifer harvest level of an average of 178.8 mmbf per year for the first decadeโand specifically found that Pacific Lumber may rely on that estimate in its future timber harvest plans. EPIC argues that, apart from the question whether substantial evidence supports that estimate, CDF failed to proceed according to law because it approved that estimate before it had gathered critical information necessary to understand the effects of Pacific Lumber's timber harvesting on the environment, and therefore necessary to arrive at an accurate long-term sustained yield estimate. It points to the provision of Forest Practice Rules and the Forest Practice Act itself, that the achievement of maximum sustained production of high-quality timber products (FP Rules, ง 1091.1, subd. (b)) that is the goal of the act must be consistent with the protection of soil, water, air, fish and wildlife resources. (FP Rules, ง 1091.45(a); see Pub. Resources Code, ง 4513, subd. (a).) It also points to Forest Practice Rules section 1091.6, subdivision (c): The SYP shall contain a description of the individual planning watersheds in sufficient detail to allow a review of the analysis of impacts. Without sufficient information about the environmental impacts of Pacific Lumber's contemplated intensive logging, EPIC argues, there can be no reliable long-term sustained yield estimate which, as discussed, signifies a timber harvest that is, among other things, environmentally sustainable. All parties appear to agree that the long-term sustained yield estimate is at the core of a sustained yield plan, and EPIC argues that in the absence of a reliable estimate, the SYP itself must be invalidated. Moreover, EPIC argues, in essence, that the issue of this insufficiency is not excused or addressed by Assembly Bill 1986. CDF contends that the watershed planning and assessment was adequate to comply with the Forest Practice Rules. It points to Forest Practice Rules section 1091.6, subdivision (a), which provides that [t]he minimum assessment area shall be no less than a planning watershed. The assessment area may include multiple watersheds.... Section 1091.6, subdivision (d) further provides: The SYP submitter shall utilize any one or a combination of methods to assess adverse watershed impacts including but not limited to: [ถ] ... [ถ] (3) Other methods proposed in the SYP and approved by the Director. (11) Yet the fact that section 1091.6, subdivision (a) of the Forest Practice Rules refers to assessment area and provides that the minimum assessment area shall be no less than a planning watershed but may include multiple watersheds does not modify the obligation found in section 1091.6, subdivision (c) to describe individual planning watersheds in sufficient detail to allow a review of the analysis of impacts. An assessment area generally refers to the total geographic area over which environmental review must be conducted, and the controversy surrounding such areas generally concerns whether a government agency and the plan submitter have selected areas that are too small to fully encompass the environmental impacts of a project or logging activity on an endangered or threatened species. (See Ebbetts Pass Forest Watch v. California Dept. of Forestry & Fire Protection (2008) 43 Cal.4th 936, 945-951 [77 Cal.Rptr.3d 239, 183 P.3d 1210].) Here, the question is not whether the overall assessment area referenced in section 1091.6, subdivision (a) was sufficiently large in scope, but whether watershed assessment areas were too large to permit the individual watershed analyses required by the Forest Practice Rules. Although Pacific Lumber contends that the watershed assessment contained information for individual planning watersheds consistent with the [Forest Practice Rules], it cites to a portion of the SYP that merely lists the individual planning watersheds within each watershed assessment area. This is plainly insufficient to meet the descriptive requirements of section 1091.6, subdivision (c). CDF also points to the definitional section of the Forest Practice Rules, section 895.1, defining planning watershed (see fn. 15, ante ) and in particular to the language that [timber harvest] Plan submitters may propose and use different planning watersheds, with the director's approval. But nothing in the record suggests that the Director approved any different planning watershed in this case, or that the permitted use of watershed assessment areas at the SYP stage displaced Pacific Lumber's obligation under section 1091.6, subdivision (c) to assess impacts on individual planning watersheds. (12) CDF further seeks to justify its manner of proceeding by pointing to the fact that the SYP is a large scale planning document[s] similar to a programmatic environmental impact report. The CDF contends that the relationship between an SYP and a THP is analogous to the relationship between a programmatic EIR and a site-specific EIR. In other words, CDF and Pacific Lumber argue, echoing the Court of Appeal, that the SYP engaged in the common practice in environmental analysis of tiering. Tiering is a process by which an agency prepares a series of EIRs or negative declarations, typically moving from general, regional concerns to more site-specific considerations with the preparation of each new document. (Remy et al., Guide to CEQA (11th ed. 2006) p. 601.) We recently articulated the appropriate role of tiering: While proper tiering of environmental review allows an agency to defer analysis of certain details of later phases of long-term linked or complex projects until those phases are up for approval, CEQA's demand for meaningful information `is not satisfied by simply stating information will be provided in the future.' [Citation.] As the CEQA Guidelines explain: `Tiering does not excuse the lead agency from adequately analyzing reasonably foreseeable significant environmental effects of the project and does not justify deferring such analysis to a later tier EIR or negative declaration.' (Cal. Code Regs., tit. 14, ง 15152, subd. (b).) Tiering is properly used to defer analysis of environmental impacts and mitigation measures to later phases when the impacts or mitigation measures are not determined by the first-tier approval decision but are specific to the later phases. For example, to evaluate or formulate mitigation for `site specific effects such as aesthetics or parking' ( id., ง 15152 [Discussion]) may be impractical when an entire large project is first approved; under some circumstances analysis of such impacts might be deferred to a later-tier EIR. ( Vineyard Area Citizens for Responsible Growth, Inc. v. City of Rancho Cordova, supra, 40 Cal.4th 412, 431, fn. omitted.) Stated another way, CEQA contemplates consideration of environmental consequences at the `earliest possible stage, even though more detailed environmental review may be necessary later.' [Citation.] The requirements of CEQA cannot be avoided by piecemeal review which results from `chopping a large project into many little onesโeach with a minimal potential impact on the environmentโwhich cumulatively may have disastrous consequences.' ( Rio Vista Farm Bureau Center v. County of Solano (1992) 5 Cal.App.4th 351, 370 [7 Cal.Rptr.2d 307].) On the other hand, `[W]here future development is unspecified and uncertain, no purpose can be served by requiring an EIR to engage in sheer speculation as to future environmental consequences. [Citation.]' ( Id. at p. 372.) In the present case, there is no indication that analysis of planning watershed assessments was infeasible under the principles of tiering cited above, i.e., that the lack of specific details about Pacific Lumber's projected activities made it infeasible to do individual watershed planning analysis. In fact, the completion of the watershed analysis within five years was not tied to any particular THP and was not contingent on Pacific Lumber formulating the siting and other details of its logging activity more precisely. Rather, as Pacific Lumber admits, the deferral of a more specific analysis of smaller `planning watersheds' was because more detailed site-specific information was not readily available at that smaller scale by the conclusion of the administrative review process on March 1, 1999.... As discussed above, the March 1, 1999 deadline was imposed by federal funding legislation, and did not mark a natural stopping point in the environmental analysis. What was done in this case is best characterized not as tiering of environmental analysis but rather as deferring a portion of the analysis in order to approve the SYP by a statutory deadline. As noted, the Forest Practice Rules provide that to the extent that sustained timber production, watershed impacts and fish and wildlife issues are addressed in the approved SYP, these issues shall be considered to be addressed in the THP; that is the THP may rely upon the SYP. (FP Rules, ง 1091.2.) The position of CDF and Pacific Lumber has been that future THP's may not rely on the SYP's watershed impacts analysis, because it is admittedly incomplete, but that it may rely on its analysis of long-term sustained yield. But the above categories of environmental analysis, although distinct, are interrelated, and the substantial informational and analytic gap in the analysis of watershed impacts, which directly affect fish and wildlife issues, may also call into question the reliability of the long-term sustained yield estimate, which depends in part on an assessment of watershed and wildlife impacts. In any case, whether or not there was adequate justification in 1999 for deferring individual watershed planning analysis, we perceive no justification for further delay. As discussed, we hold that an identifiable SYP was never properly approved and must be resubmitted for approval. We hold also that the document must include individual planning watershed analyses, which CDF agrees is necessary to address the cumulative effects of Pacific Lumber's logging practices on the 211,000 acres in question. In considering whether to approve the resubmitted SYP, moreover, CDF must decide whether the information on individual planning watersheds complies with the Forest Practice Rules and is adequate to support Pacific Lumber's long-term sustained yield estimate.