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Full-Text Articles in Law
Preservation Is A Flawed Mitigation Strategy, Jessica Owley
Preservation Is A Flawed Mitigation Strategy, Jessica Owley
Journal Articles
The objective of the Clean Water Act is to restore and maintain the chemical, physical, and biological integrity of the nation’s waters. To help achieve that objective, the Clean Water Act limits the ability to dredge or fill a wetland. To do so, one must first obtain a section 404 permit. These permits, which are issued by the Army Corps of Engineers (“Corps”) with coordination and oversight from the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA), require project proponents to avoid, minimize, and compensate the harms of any wetland destruction or modification. Compensatory mitigation is a troubling concept in wetlands regulation because it …
Privatizing Regulatory Enforcement: A Preliminary Assessment Of Citizen Suits Under Federal Environmental Laws, Barry Boyer, Errol Meidinger
Privatizing Regulatory Enforcement: A Preliminary Assessment Of Citizen Suits Under Federal Environmental Laws, Barry Boyer, Errol Meidinger
Journal Articles
This article provides a preliminary assessment of the potential effects of the privatization of regulatory enforcement and speculates on what such a realignment might portend for the regulatory process. Based primarily on an indepth review of the first wave of citizen suits brought under the federal Clean Water and Clean Air Acts, it identifies four key problems that can undermine the citizen suit as a device for regulatory enforcement: (1) Citizen suits must surmount a series of doctrinal barriers that could make it difficult or impossible to mount an effective private enforcement campaign. Courts have generally been able to control …