Opinion ID: 1357742
Heading Depth: 2
Heading Rank: 2

Heading: Approval of the A/C Project and Administrative Exhaustion

Text: In 1982, the USFS revised its planning regulations (the 1982 Rules), 36 C.F.R. pt. 219 (1999), which govern USFS management at both the program and project levels. In November 2000, the USFS significantly amended these regulations and replaced them with the 2000 planning rules, codified at 36 C.F.R. pt. 219 (2001). National Forest System Land and Resource Management Planning, 65 Fed.Reg. 67,514, 67,568-81 (Nov. 9, 2000); see UEC III, 443 F.3d at 737. Rather than being immediately promulgated, these new regulations provided that from November 9, 2000, until the promulgation of a new, final rule, the USFS must consider the best available science [or `BAS'] in implementing... [a forest] plan. 36 C.F.R. § 219.35(a) (2001) [hereinafter 2000 BAS standard]. These transition provisions ultimately remained effective until new rules were implemented in January 2005; similarly, these new rules prescribe that the USFS must take into account the best available science. See 36 C.F.R. §§ 219.11 (2008); 70 Fed.Reg. 1023, 1027 (Jan. 5, 2005). As thoroughly explained by the district court, Forest Guardians had argued to the agency that the 1982 Rules were applicable to the USFS's evaluation and approval of the A/C Project. J.App. at 79, 83. Forest Guardians adopted the same position in its initial filings with the district court. See Aplt. Opening Br. Attach. at 31. Now, on appeal, Forest Guardians does not dispute the district court's contrary, accurate conclusion that the 2000 BAS standard, rather than the 1982 Rules, applies to the A/C Project; any projects proposed during the transition period must conform with the best available science standard set forth in the 2000 transition provisions. See UEC III, 443 F.3d at 746-47 (concluding, based on the USFS's interpretive rule adopted in 2004, that during the transition period between November 2000 and promulgation of a final rule, the Forest Service should use the `best available science' under § 219.35(a) for project decisions (internal quotation marks omitted)). [4] Rather, Forest Guardians' primary argument is directed toward the USFS's alleged failure to consider and apply the BAS standard in evaluating the project and the inequity of expecting Forest Guardians to present arguments regarding the BAS standard during the administrative appeal process. We previously have explained why the applicability of the 1982 Rules versus the 2000 BAS standard can be an important distinction in the evaluation of forest plans: Deciding whether the 1982 regulations apply to the Project ... is important because the 1982 regulations and the 2000 transition provisions contain key differences governing species monitoring. The 1982 rules, for example, require the Forest Service to monitor the population trends of the management indicator species and determine relationships to habitat changes. 36 C.F.R. § 219.19(a)(6). And we have held that these obligations apply to project level as well as plan level management actions. Conversely, the 2000 transition provisions contain no such explicit language governing monitoring but merely require the responsible official to consider the best available science in implementing a forest plan. 36 C.F.R. § 219.35(a), (d) (2001); 65 Fed.Reg. 67,514, 67,579 (Nov. 9, 2000). UEC III, 443 F.3d at 744-45 (alterations and citation omitted); see also UEC II, 439 F.3d at 1190 (quoting Forest Watch v. U.S. Forest Serv., 410 F.3d 115, 117 (2d Cir.2005), for the proposition that the standards of the 1982 Rules and the 2000 Transitional Rule areat leastdistinct); Sierra Club v. Wagner, 555 F.3d 21, 25 (1st Cir.2009) (One might think from the name that `best available science' is an unexceptionable standard, but according to [the plaintiff], the 1982 rules provided a set of precise tests for evaluating a project's impact on species that are more rigorous and were intentionally weakened by the 2000 rules.). This court and others have run into confusion in applying the 2000 transition provisions. UEC III, 443 F.3d at 745 (citing cases). Forest Guardians asserts that the USFS failed to properly apply the 2000 BAS standard in planning and approving the A/C Project. Forest Guardians further argues that the A/C Project's approval would be affected by the key differences between that standard and the 1982 Rules. Cf. Wagner, 555 F.3d at 25-26 (finding that the plaintiff had forfeited its argument regarding the applicability of the 1982 Rules when it had neither raised the argument to the district court nor explained whether or how the allegedly more rigorous standards of the 1982 rules would likely have altered the Forest Service's ultimate evaluation of the two projects). The district court, however, determined that because Forest Guardians failed to raise the BAS argument during the administrative appeal processinstead arguing that the 1982 Rules appliedForest Guardians failed to exhaust this claim, as is necessary for judicial review. The district court found that it lacked subject matter jurisdiction over the BAS argument. We review de novo the district court's jurisdictional conclusion. Urban ex rel. Urban v. Jefferson County Sch. Dist. R-l, 89 F.3d 720, 724 (10th Cir.1996). Plaintiffs must exhaust available administrative remedies before the USFS prior to bringing their grievances to federal court. 7 U.S.C. § 6912(e); [5] 36 C.F.R. § 215.21. To satisfy the exhaustion requirement, plaintiffs generally must `structure their participation so that it alerts the agency to the parties' position and contentions, in order to allow the agency to give the issue meaningful consideration.' Forest Guardians v. U.S. Forest Serv., 495 F.3d 1162, 1170 (10th Cir.2007) (internal quotation marks omitted) (quoting Dep't of Transp. v. Pub. Citizen, 541 U.S. 752, 764, 124 S.Ct. 2204, 159 L.Ed.2d 60 (2004)). Claims not properly raised before an agency are waived, unless the problems underlying the claim are `obvious' or otherwise brought to the agency's attention. Id. (citation omitted). The claim must be presented in sufficient detail to allow the agency to rectify the alleged violation. Id.; see also Kleissler v. U.S. Forest Serv., 183 F.3d 196, 202 (3d Cir.1999) ([T]he claims raised at the administrative appeal and in the federal complaint must be so similar that the district court can ascertain that the agency was on notice of, and had an opportunity to consider and decide, the same claims now raised in federal court.); Idaho Sporting Cong., Inc. v. Rittenhouse, 305 F.3d 957, 965 (9th Cir.2002) (Claims must be raised with sufficient clarity to allow the decision maker to understand and rule on the issue raised, but there is no bright-line standard as to when this requirement has been met....). The exhaustion requirement thus helps prevent premature claims and ensure[s] that the agency possessed of the most expertise in an area be given first shot at resolving a claimant's difficulties. Id. The district court concluded that § 6912(e)'s exhaustion requirement is jurisdictional. Administrative exhaustion is often an affirmative defense, rather than a jurisdictional prerequisite. Jones v. Bock, 549 U.S. 199, 212, 127 S.Ct. 910, 166 L.Ed.2d 798 (2007) ([T]he usual practice under the Federal Rules is to regard exhaustion as an affirmative defense.). Judicially created exhaustion doctrines, in particular, are prudential in nature. McCarthy v. Madigan, 503 U.S. 140, 144, 112 S.Ct. 1081, 117 L.Ed.2d 291 (1992), superseded by statute on other grounds, Prison Litigation Reform Act of 1995, Pub.L. No. 104-134, 110 Stat. 1321 (1996). But a statutory exhaustion requirement may be jurisdictional if it provides more than simply a codification of the judicially developed doctrine of exhaustion. Weinberger v. Salfi, 422 U.S. 749, 765-66, 95 S.Ct. 2457, 45 L.Ed.2d 522 (1975). We must evaluate each statute separately, showing regard for the particular administrative scheme at issue. Id.; see also McCarthy, 503 U.S. at 144, 112 S.Ct. 1081 (Of paramount importance to any exhaustion inquiry is congressional intent. (internal quotation marks omitted)). Among other criteria, we look for sweeping and direct statutory language that goes beyond a requirement that only exhausted actions be brought. Steele v. Fed. Bureau of Prisons, 355 F.3d 1204, 1208 (10th Cir. 2003) (internal quotation marks omitted), overruled in part on other grounds by Bock, 549 U.S. at 214-15, 127 S.Ct. 910; see also Salfi, 422 U.S. at 757, 95 S.Ct. 2457 (noting that the section's language was sweeping and direct and [ ] states that no action shall be brought under § 1331, not merely that only those actions shall be brought in which administrative remedies have been exhausted). The courts of appeals are split as to whether 7 U.S.C. § 6912(e) is jurisdictional. See Dawson Farms, LLC v. Farm Serv. Agency, 504 F.3d 592, 603-06 (5th Cir.2007) (discussing the views of the various circuits). We need not resolve the issue. Regardless of whether it is jurisdictional, the explicit exhaustion requirement in § 6912(e) is, nonetheless, mandatory. Forest Guardians, 495 F.3d at 1170; McCarthy, 503 U.S. at 144, 112 S.Ct. 1081 (Where Congress specifically mandates, exhaustion is required.); see also Bastek v. Fed. Crop Ins. Corp., 145 F.3d 90, 94-95 (2d Cir.1998) (noting that § 6912(e) unambiguously required plaintiffs to exhaust their administrative remedies before bringing suit, and their failure to do so deprived them of the opportunity to obtain relief in the district court). Forest Guardians concedes that it did not exhaust its BAS argument during the administrative process. It suggests that we should excuse the exhaustion requirement, but its arguments are unavailing. Section 6912(e) does not contain any explicit exceptions to the exhaustion requirement. However, judicially created exhaustion doctrines are subject to numerous exceptions, McKart v. United States, 395 U.S. 185, 193, 89 S.Ct. 1657, 23 L.Ed.2d 194 (1969), and several circuits have extended these exceptions to § 6912(e). See Dawson Farms, 504 F.3d at 606 (discussing § 6912(e) and the extraordinary circumstances and limited bases warranting an excuse of administrative exhaustion); Ace Prop. & Cas. Ins. Co. v. Fed. Crop Ins. Corp., 440 F.3d 992, 1000 (8th Cir.2006) (noting that exhaustion under § 6912(e) may be excused if the complaint involves a legitimate constitutional claim, if exhaustion would cause irreparable harm, if further administrative procedures would be futile, or if the issues to be decided are primarily legal rather than factual (citation omitted)); McBride Cotton & Cattle Corp. v. Veneman, 290 F.3d 973, 980-82 (9th Cir. 2002) (excusing a failure to exhaust under § 6912(e) where the suit alleged a constitutional claim that was colorable, collateral to the substantive claim, and its resolution would not serve the purposes of exhaustion because exhaustion would be futile); see also Marcia R. Gelpe, Exhaustion of Administrative Remedies: Lessons from Environmental Cases, 53 Geo. Wash. L.Rev. 1, 26, 64-65 (1984) (discussing judicially created exceptions to exhaustion in the environmental litigation context, observing that exceptions to the exhaustion requirement are not clearly delineated, and arguing that courts should be more insistent on requiring exhaustion of administrative remedies in environmental cases and, more specifically, that if there is significant doubt whether the facts fall into an exception [to the exhaustion doctrine], courts should require exhaustion). [6] We have never decided which, if any, of these exceptions are applicable, nor need we do so now. Even assuming that we could bypass § 6912(e)'s express direction, no exception is warranted on the facts of this case. Forest Guardians argues that it would have been futile to present its BAS challenge to the agency, because the USFS already had adopted the position that the A/C Project complied with the 2000 BAS standard when Forest Guardians filed its administrative challenge, i.e., the USFS had predetermined the issue before it. See Frontier Airlines, Inc. v. Civil Aeronautics Bd., 621 F.2d 369, 370-71 (10th Cir.1980) (excusing a statutory exhaustion requirement because that statute's reasonable grounds exception was met and the question was one of pure statutory interpretation). But despite the USFS's perceived stance on that issue, exhaustion of the BAS argument would not have been futile in the sense in which courts have applied this exhaustion exception. Specifically, there is no argument that: the USFS lacked the authority or the ability to resolve the challenge to the project approval, see McBride Cotton & Cattle Corp., 290 F.3d at 982; Ace Prop. & Cas. Ins. Co., 440 F.3d at 1000-01; this is purely a question of statutory interpretation, see Frontier Airlines, 621 F.2d at 371; or the court would not benefit from allowing the USFS to develop a full administrative record on the issue for our review, see Ace Prop. & Cas. Ins. Co., 440 F.3d at 1000-02; see also Salfi, 422 U.S. at 765, 95 S.Ct. 2457 (Exhaustion is generally required as a matter of preventing premature interference with agency processes, so that the agency may function efficiently and so that it may have an opportunity to correct its own errors, to afford the parties and the courts the benefit of its experience and expertise, and to compile a record which is adequate for judicial review.). Thus, assuming arguendo we could excuse § 6912(e)'s exhaustion requirement, Forest Guardians has not proffered reasons that demonstrate that an exception is warranted. Forest Guardians further argues that administrative exhaustion of the BAS argument should not be required because it would be unfair to require exhaustion of a claim that it did not know that it had at the time it filed its administrative appeal. Forest Guardians reasons that when it filed its appeal with the USFS in July 2004, Tenth Circuit case law indicated that the 1982 Rules would be applicable to the A/C Project. Forest Guardians points to Utah Environmental Congress v. Bosworth ( UEC I ), 372 F.3d 1219 (10th Cir. 2004), which was issued on June 23, 2004. Related decisions in this circuit dealing with the application of the 1982 Rules and the 2000 BAS standard were not released until after the administrative appeal was decided in August 2004. It is true that in UEC I, we applied the 1982 Rules under the stated rationale that they were the regulations in effect in December 2000, the time of the USFS decision at issue. UEC I, 372 F.3d at 1222 n. 1. We also noted, however, that the regulations had changed in 2000. Id. In addition, Judge Baldock's concurrence observed that the Forest Service's adoption of new planning regulations effectively moots the issue [of interpreting the 1982 Rules] in future cases. Id. at 1232 n. 1 (Baldock, J., concurring). Accordingly, even though the 1982 Rules were applied in UEC I, that same case provided Forest Guardianspre-administrative appealwith notice that the 1982 Rules would not necessarily apply to the A/C Project. It is not inequitable to require Forest Guardians to have made an argument about the 2000 BAS standard in July 2004, even if there was some confusion as to the proper standard. Forest Guardians' reliance on Bowen v. City of New York, 476 U.S. 467, 482-87, 106 S.Ct. 2022, 90 L.Ed.2d 462 (1986), for the proposition that exhaustion would be unfair, is misplaced. In Bowen, the Supreme Court waived the administrative exhaustion requirement because plaintiffs had been subjected to an unrevealed policy that was inconsistent in critically important ways with established regulations. Id. at 485, 106 S.Ct. 2022. Here, by contrast, the published federal regulation in effect on the date Forest Guardians filed its administrative appeal indicated that during the transition period beginning November 9, 2000, the responsible official must consider the best available science in implementing and, if appropriate, amending the current plan. 36 C.F.R. § 219.35(a) (2004); see also Forest Watch, 410 F.3d at 118 ([T]he plain language of the 2000 Transitional Rule dictates that the `best available science' standard applies when the agency is `implementing' a forest plan during the relevant time period.). Thus, rather than being victimized by an unpublished policy, Forest Guardians was provided notice by the plain language of the regulation that the applicability of the 2000 BAS standard was, at the very least, a pertinent issue. In addition, the ensuing uncertainty regarding the application of the 1982 Rules and the 2000 BAS standard was commented upon publicly by courts as well as the USFS prior to the filing of Forest Guardians' administrative appeal. See, e.g., Citizens for Better Forestry v. U.S. Dep't of Agric., 341 F.3d 961, 967-69 (9th Cir.2003) (noting concerns that arose regarding the 2000 transition provisions); National Forest System Land and Resource Management Planning; Extension of Compliance Deadline, 66 Fed.Reg. 27,552 (May 17, 2001). If anything, we would expect such public commentary to convey to a litigant the potential applicability of the BAS standard to a project in July 2004 and, consequently, the reasonableness of advancing an argument relating to that standard, even if only as an alternative to a 1982 Rules argument. Therefore, because Forest Guardians did not argue during the administrative process that USFS failed to consider and apply the 2000 BAS standard when it implemented the A/C Project, we conclude that Forest Guardians failed to adequately present the BAS argument in its administrative appeal and thus has forfeited it. See Forest Guardians, 495 F.3d at 1171; cf. Utah Envtl. Cong. v. Troyer (UEC IV), 479 F.3d 1269, 1288, 1292 (10th Cir.2007) (McConnell, J., dissenting in part) (At no point has plaintiff UEC argued that the projects violated the `best available science' standard.... If UEC had argued that the decisions in question were deficient under the `best available science' standard, the Forest Service would have been able to respond, and the district court would have been able to make appropriate findings.). Therefore, we do not reach the merits of Forest Guardians' BAS claim. [7]
The Supreme Court's decision in SEC v. Chenery Corp. stands for the proposition that a reviewing court may not affirm an agency decision based on reasoning that the agency itself never considered. See SEC v. Chenery Corp., 318 U.S. 80, 87, 63 S.Ct. 454, 87 L.Ed. 626 (1943). The Partial Dissent characterizes our decision as holding: Forest Guardians is barred from challenging the Agua-Caballos project on the ground that the agency changed its rationale when the project was challenged in court. See Partial Dissent at 1131. The Partial Dissent thus suggests that our holding bars Forest Guardians from raising a Chenery challenge. We respectfully disagree. Chenery is largely inapposite, and the Partial Dissent's misguided reliance on its analytic rubric results in an incorrect interpretation of our holding. Forest Guardians' appeal does not center on the district court's failure to apply Chenery. Instead, it has presented a merits challenge based upon the purported failure of the USFS to consider and apply the 2000 BAS standard; it has contended that this failure effected a NFMA violation. It raises Chenery in an effort to bolster its merits argumentspecifically, to prevent the USFS from defending the project on the basis of the 2000 BAS standard. Aplt. Opening Br. at 44-45 (noting that it was undisputed that the USFS consistently applied the 1982 NFMA regulations throughout the planning and decision-making processes for the A-C project and, consequently, there can be no doubt that the USFS's A-C project decision must be vacated pursuant to the Chenery rule). The district court simply determined that Forest Guardians' overarching BAS merits argumentnot its subsidiary Chenery contentionis barred because Forest Guardians failed to exhaust it. And we agree, detailing in this decision the administrative developments related to the implementation of the 2000 BAS standard and noting that those developments should have put Forest Guardians on notice that the 2000 BAS standard might be applicable and that, consequently, it should challenge before the agency the USFS's purported failure to consider and apply that standard. Chenery probably would have been directly at issue if (1) the district court instead of resolving the matter on exhaustion groundshad reached the merits of the USFS's argument that the USFS in fact properly applied the 2000 BAS standard and endorsed this view; and (2) we then subsequently affirmed on that basis. But that is not the situation here. The district court did not reach the merits. See Aplt. Opening Br. Attach. at 39 (The Plaintiffs failed to exhaust the administrative process, and because exhaustion of the administrative process is mandatory, the Court will not address the merits of the Plaintiffs' claims that the USFS did not apply the `best available science' standard); see also Aplt. Opening Br. at 32-33 (recognizing that the district court did not reach the merits). As noted above, we also have expressly declined to reach the merits and do not affirm on that basis. In other words, we do not uphold the USFS's decision on reasoning that was never presented to and considered by the agency which would run afoul of Chenery. Like the district court's, ours is an exhaustion ruling. And it bears underscoring that this ruling relates to Forest Guardians' merits argument concerning the 2000 BAS standard; beyond that, we do not stray. Therefore, we need not quarrel with the Partial Dissent's assertion that a Chenery claim is never barred for failure to exhaust administrative remedies, Partial Dissent at 1132, because our exhaustion ruling does not relate to any purported Chenery claim by Forest Guardians. The exhaustion and Chenery doctrines involve distinct but related inquiries. The exhaustion doctrine furthers this [Chenery] principle by ensuring that an agency always has an opportunity to justify its action. Etelson v. Office of Pers. Mgmt., 684 F.2d 918, 925 n. 9 (D.C.Cir. 1982); cf. Skubel v. Sullivan, 925 F.Supp. 930, 944 (D.Conn.1996) (reflecting a relationship between Chenery and exhaustion by noting that the agency defendants' substantive arguments ... in their briefs technically fall into the category of impermissible post-hoc rationalizations under the Chenery principle, but presuming that the agency defendants would have raised the arguments in a denial of a petition for rulemaking given that this Court has excused the plaintiffs' failure to exhaust their remedies by petitioning for rulemaking), aff'd as modified on other grounds sub nom. Skubel v. Fuoroli, 113 F.3d 330, 335 (2d Cir.1997) ([W]e find that the district court properly exercised its discretion in excusing plaintiffs' failure to exhaust their administrative remedies.). The exhaustion doctrine, however, is independently operational and may in fact eliminate the need for further inquiry into a possible Chenery problem. For instance, it seems quite clear as a matter of logic that if the agency rationale that is alleged to be late-blooming as contemplated by Chenery relates to a claim that a plaintiff has not exhausted and the agency asserts exhaustion as a defense, then this would be at least one situation where application of the exhaustion doctrine might well negate the need to reach the possible Chenery problem. That is the situation before us here. [8] In large part, our disagreement with the Partial Dissent relates to the framing of the question in light of the two distinct inquiries (i.e., concerning exhaustion and Chenery ). As the Partial Dissent would have it, the question is the following: whether the district court may affirm the USFS on a substantive rationale that the USFS did not raise before the agency. The Partial Dissent suggests that our holding prevents Forest Guardians from raising the Chenery problem to bar this district court action. We respectfully submit that the Partial Dissent is asking the wrong question and that doing so leads it to incorrectly interpret the effect of our holding. Generally, the question is whetherpossessing adequate notice of a claim for relief, i.e., the possible applicability of the 2000 BAS standard and USFS's purported failure to consider and apply it Forest Guardians is precluded from pursuing that claim in federal court, when Forest Guardians failed to raise the claim before the administrative agency. Under this framing of the question, there is no Chenery problem. The district court simply answered the question in the affirmative through a straightforward application of exhaustion principles, and we affirm on the same basis. These exhaustion rulings do not relate to any purported Chenery claim of Forest Guardians, and neither the district court nor we reach the merits of the BAS argument. For the foregoing reasons, we believe that our exhaustion holding is sound and respectfully disagree with the approach of the Partial Dissent.