Opinion ID: 767093
Heading Depth: 2
Heading Rank: 2

Heading: The Permit Conditions

Text: 24 In addition to maintaining that the Secretary impermissibly delegated his permit-issuing authority to district engineers, the defendants, in district court, also attacked the permit's incorporation, via Special Condition 10, of conditions from the FEIS, arguing that (1) Special Condition 10 does not require that defendants precisely carry out each of the permit conditions; (2) the Secretary has jurisdiction to impose only those conditions that directly relate to the discharge of dredged or fill material into the navigable waters of the United States, and most of the FEIS conditions do not satisfy this test; and (3) because the district engineer lacked power to condition Iroquois' permit on some of the FEIS conditions, he lacked power to incorporate any of them. 25 The district court held that Special Condition 10, which states that Iroquois shall implement the conditions contained in Appendices C and D to the FEIS, clearly incorporated the FEIS conditions into the permit and required that defendants comply with those conditions. See Mango, 997 F.Supp. at 291-92. The court also rejected defendants' all-or-nothing approach to the conditions. See id. at 292. However, the court accepted defendants' argument that most of the FEIS conditions went beyond the Corps' regulatory authority and therefore were invalid. See id. at 296-99. Holding that the Corps could impose only permit conditions that directly relate to the discharge of dredged or fill material into the navigable waters of the United States, the court dismissed counts eight through thirteen and twenty-six through thirty-one of the indictment and precluded the government from relying on any of the permit conditions in proving counts twenty through twenty-five 6 and from relying on all but five of the FEIS conditions to prove counts two through seven. See id. at 299. 26 The district court's decision allows the government to prove violations of permit provisions regulating perennial stream crossing procedures, FEIS Appendix D, I(D)(6)-(8); mandating the use of certain construction equipment where standing water or saturated soils were present; and forbidding the use of dirt, rockfill, tree stumps, or brush riprap to stabilize the right of way in wetland areas, D, II (C)(10), (11). See id. However, the government cannot rely on violations of any of the other permit conditions including requirements that the defendants [i]nstall and maintain sediment filter devices at [the] edge of all wetlands until the right of way revegetation was complete, FEIS Appendix D, II(D)(2); not store hazardous materials, chemicals, fuels, and lubricating oils; refuel construction equipment; or perform concrete coating activities, within 100 feet of streambanks or within any municipal watershed area, id., I(A)(3); and place trench spoil at least 10 feet away from streambanks,id., I(B)(1). 27 The statute authorizes the Secretary to issue permits . . . for the discharge of dredged or fill material into the navigable waters at specified disposal sites. 33 U.S.C. 1344(a). Because the Secretary's jurisdiction is limited to the issuing of permits for such discharges, we agree with the district court that any conditions imposed in a permit must themselves be related to the discharge. Nevertheless, we reach a different conclusion from the district court regarding the nature of the relationship that is required. 28 The CWA does not itself specify how closely the conditions must relate to the discharge. We therefore begin with the familiar premise that where the statute does not expressly speak to an issue, we will defer to the interpretation of the agency charged with enforcing the statute, provided it is reasonable and not in conflict with the expressed intent of Congress. See Riverside Bayview Homes, 474 U.S. at 131. Here deference is due to the reasonable interpretations of the Secretary and the Administrator as contained in the regulations they promulgated jointly, pursuant to 33 U.S.C. 1344(b). These regulations indicate that permit conditions can be indirectly or directly related to the discharge as long as they are reasonably related to it. See, e.g., 40 C.F.R. 230.1(c) (providing that the Secretary must consider whether the discharge will have an unacceptable adverse impact either individually or in combination with known and/or probable impacts of other activities affecting the ecosystems of concern); 230.76(d) (suggesting minimizing the adverse impact of a discharge by [f]ollowing discharge procedures which avoid or minimize the disturbance of aesthetic features of an aquatic site or ecosystem); and 230.74(b) (suggesting [e]mploying appropriate maintenance and operation on equipment or machinery. ..) Moreover, the regulations reasonably interpret the statutory mandate that the Secretary consider the effect of discharges on human health or welfare, ecosystem diversity, and esthetic, recreation and economic values, 33 U.S.C. 1343(c)(1)(A), (B), (C) (as referred to in 33 U.S.C. 1344(b)), and imply that the district court's requirement that permit conditions be directly related to a discharge is unduly restrictive. In our view, permit conditions are valid if they are reasonably related to the discharge, whether directly or indirectly. 7 The CWA is reasonably interpreted to allow the Secretary to consider the cumulative effect of a discharge on an entire ecosystem rather than confining him to consideration of the effects of the permitted discharge on the river into which it is discharged. Like the district court, we are hampered by the government's refusal to explain specifically why each of the permit conditions is related to the permitted discharges. See Mango, 997 F. Supp. at 297. On the record as it stands, we cannot determine with certainty which of the conditions adopted from the FEIS are reasonably related to the discharge and which, if any, are not. Therefore, we remand to the district court for consideration of the permit conditions under the standard announced herein. 29 Because we have not yet found any of the permit conditions to be invalid, it is not necessary to consider defendants' argument that if any of the conditions are invalid, they all must fall. However, defendants cite no authority for this argument, and we have found none. 30 Defendants' final argument is that all of the counts that are dependent on the conditions in Appendix C to the FEIS, which apply to uncultivated and non-wetland areas and residential turfs disturbed by construction, and certain portions of Appendix D regulating non-wetland areas are beyond the Corps' jurisdiction, which is limited to the waters of the United States. 33 C.F.R. 328.1. Insofar as the conditions imposed are not reasonably related to a discharge into the waters of the United States, defendants are correct. However, if a condition requiring the defendants to take measures on dry land reasonably relates to a discharge into the navigable waters, it is valid.