Legal News

Delta smelt controversy spawns a new lawsuit

By Richard Binder

The Pacific Legal Foundation, a Sacrament-based conservative legal organization, filed a lawsuit Thursday on behalf of three San Joaquin Valley farming operations, claiming that the federal government has no constitutional authority to oversee the endangered smelt.

The suit goes on to say that the smelt has no commercial value and is not involved in interstate commerce. Furthermore, it claims that a smelt management plan issued in December fails to show how the pumping reductions from the Sacramento-San Joaquin Delta would benefit the smelt.  The plan has resulted in a reduction of water deliveries to west side farmers and urban users in the Bay Area and Southern California.

The lawsuit, filed in U.S. District Court in Fresno, seeks to invalidate the smelt management plan, and asks the federal courts to "retain jurisdiction over this matter until such time as defendants have fully complied with the U.S. Constitution [and] the Endangered Species Act." Pacific Legal Foundation attorney Damien Schiff says a "policy that puts people behind fish" is "flat-out unconstitutional."

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Full post as published by Legal Pad | LA on May 22, 2009 (boomark / email).