ARTICLES

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Nebraska’s Voluntary Program Garners Regulatory Compliance PDF

by John F. Bender

Although Nebraska recognizes all wetlands as “waters of the state,” it has no administrative wetland regulatory program independent of federal jurisdiction. Since the SWANCC decision, however, the state has discovered that voluntary compliance can work-with the right carrot and stick.

John F. Bender supervises the Water Quality Planning Unit with the Nebraska Department of Environmental Quality in Lincoln. He has worked with the department’s surface water quality program for the past 24 years.

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Banks and Fees Mitigation Study Reveals an Industry Transformed PDF

by Jessica Wilkinson, Christina Kennedy, Kelly Mott, Meg Filbey, and Sarah King

Mitigation banking and in-lieu-fee operations were a small piece of the wetland compensatory mitigation pie just a short time ago. Now they constitute a substantial nationwide commercial enterprise that continues to grow every year. A new report by the Environmental Law Institute examines the industry today and highlights its exemplary as well as its more worrisome aspects.

The authors are staff of the Environmental Law Institute, based in Washington, DC. Jessica Wilkinson is director of the Wetlands Program, Christina Kennedy is a staff science and policy analyst, Meg Filbey is a legal fellow, and Kelly Mott and Sarah King are senior research associates.

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Lower Courts Untangle the Finer Points of the SWANCC Decision PDF

by Robin Kundis Craig

The Supreme Court’s decision in the SWANCC case left many questions still to be answered regarding federal jurisdiction over wetlands. Responsibility for finding answers now falls into the hands of the nation’s lower courts, where two majority opinions seem to be emerging.

Robin Kundis Craig is an associate professor of law at Indiana University School of Law in Indianapolis. She received a J.D. in 1996 from the Lewis and Clark School of Law in Portland, Oregon, and a Ph.D. in 1993 from the University of California at Santa Barbara.

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How to Improve a State Wetland Program? Oregon Says Integrate and Streamline PDF

by Eric D. Metz

For a state like Oregon, which already has an independent wetland program, the SWANCC decision had little effect. But the state is still working to improve wetland regulation by assuming the federal regulatory program and implementing a programmatic general permit.

Eric D. Metz, P.W.S., is an expert in wetland and sensitive area regulation and permitting, with 24 years of combined public and private sector experience. He currently works for the Oregon Division of State Lands, based in Salem.

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