Chapter 3: The Role of Agencies in Natural Resource Management
I. The Federal Natural Resource Agencies
A. The Rise of Federal Natural Resource Agencies
B. The Constitutional Challenge to Agency Action
C. The Basic Missions and Organization of the Federal Natural
Resource Agencies
D. Public Choice Challenges for Agency Management of Natural
Resources
II. Improving Agency Decisionmaking
A. The Administrative Procedure Act
1. Rulemaking
2. Adjudication
3. Judicial Review of Agency Actions
B. The Role of Nongovernmental Organizations
1. Lobbying for legislative and administrative action
2. Citizen Suits
3. Standing
Problem Exercise: Standing to Challenge Draft EIS
4. Ripeness, Exhaustion, and the Timing of Judicial Review
III. Improving Agencies' Environmental Decisionmaking
A. The National Environmental Policy Act
1. NEPA Grows Teeth
2. When Must An Agency Prepare An EIS?
a. Timing
b. The Scale of the Proposed Action and Tiering
c. The Scope of Agency Action
Please note a proofreading error on page 264. The seventh paragraph should
have been deleted because it is a repetition of the fifth paragraph.
d. Significantly Affecting the Environment
Problem Exercise: Winter Park Ski Resort
3. The Essential Elements of an EIS
a. Alternatives Analysis
b. The Adequacy of the Analysis
Problem Exercise: Supplementation of Environmental Analyses
4. Does it Work?
B. Resource Planning on the Public Lands
1. A Brief History of Public Land Planning
2. Planning under NFMA and FLPMA
Problem Exercise: Land Use Planning on the Public Lands
