And on we go! Ugh
Thanks for the update, Jere.

Jim
Riverside, CA

and on, and on, and on!!!! We definitely need to have the "in it for the long haul" attitude for this fight.

Jim, If you are going to be at the Pomona Gold Show stop by the AMRA booth and say hi.

MEDIA RELEASE
Public Lands for the People
FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
Monday, Nov. 23, 2015

The following is a media release issued by Public Lands for the People, a national non-profit organization based in California:

CEQA court casesettlement to cost taxpayers $350,000

Public Lands for the People has recently learned that the state of California has offered to pay $350,000 to a coalition of environmental groups, including the Karuk Tribe and Center for Biological Diversity, to drop a lawsuit over the California Department of Fish & Wildlife’s 2012 suction dredge mining regulations.

The case centers around a flawed study under the California Environmental Quality Act, which requires state and local agencies to identify significant environmental impacts and to avoid or mitigate those impacts, if feasible. The court battle, known in mining circles as the CEQA case, involves two separate lawsuits:

• The Karuk Tribe, Center for Biological Diversity, Environmental Law Foundation, Pacific Federation of Fisherman’s Associations and Friends of the River allege that the regulations adopted in March 2012 were not developed in accordance with the California Environmental Quality Act, fail to mitigate identified impacts and are inconsistent with existing state law. The case was filed April 3, 2012 in Alameda County Superior Court.

• Meanwhile, Public Lands for the People also sued the state, alleging that the Subsequent Environmental Impact Report, which was based on reports from Horizon Water and Environment, a consulting firm based in Oakland, Calif., was improperly and unlawfully conducted and therefore rendered skewed, unscientific findings.

“The 2012 dredging regulations were based on bad science from a deeply flawed environmental report,” said PLP President Walt Wegner. “The SEIR results were used to prop up the case for far more restrictive suction dredge mining regulations because of pressure from these environmental groups.”

The SEIR study claims that suction dredge mining has several “potentially significant impacts” on the environment, even though all previous studies had concluded that dredging causes a “less than significant impact,” Wegner said.

“How does this drastic change in study results happen overnight? The study is bogus and heavily influenced by politics—not science,” said Wegner. “And, now after years of battling the CEQA case, these environmental groups have decided to take the money and run, leaving California taxpayers on the hook for $350,000.”

PLP Attorney James Buchal said it’s a shame that state taxpayers will be stuck with the tab, again.

“It is regrettable that once again the state of California has decided to shovel hundreds of thousands of dollars in fees to entities working to cripple the state’s natural resource economy. To make matters worse, the state agreed to pay that money and allow the tribe and its allies to dismiss their claims without prejudice, meaning they could bring them all over again for a second payoff,” Buchal said. “The Karuks are done; they’ve settled. The state and the tribe have agreed to it, and at this point I think it’s just a pro forma approval by the judge, and the money will be paid.”

PLP’s CEQA case is expected to proceed Jan. 20 in San Bernardino County Superior Court.

“With the tribe dismissing its claims, that leaves only the miners claiming that the environmental analysis of the 2012 regulations was defective. But, what gives this a sort of surreal and Kafkaesque quality is that back in January the judge ruled that the regulations are unconstitutional anyway,” Buchal said, referring to another dredging case heard by California Superior Court Judge Gilbert Ochoa.

Ochoa ruled in January 2015 that the federal Mining Law of 1872 preempts the state ban on dredging under the Supremacy Clause of the U.S. Constitution, which states that federal law supersedes state law. The ruling was deemed a win for miners, however the state continues to cite dredgers and has refused to issue dredging permits to miners.

Clark Pearson, northern director for PLP, said the CEQA case settlement wreaks of cronyism and corruption between the state and environmental groups.

“It doesn’t pass the smell test,” Pearson said. “This was a sweetheart lawsuit ... so basically they were paid off to drop the case. Do you think the same offer will be made to miners? I highly doubt it. No offer has been made to us, and we are the prevailing party. We should be entitled to attorney fees.”

Suction dredge mining has been banned since 2009 in what began as a two-year moratorium imposed under Senate Bill 670, and extended under various legislation.

“That so-called moratorium has become a de facto ban, which is unconstitutional—and small-scale suction dredge miners are paying the price,” Wegner said. “The state has crippled the local economies of many mining towns in California, and is actually making the mercury problem worse. Contrary to the propaganda from some environmental groups that it may harm fish, dredging not only removes mercury and lead from California streams and rivers but it cleans hard-packed, silt-covered gravels that salmon and other fish need to spawn, and it also improves fish habitat by creating refugia.”

Sue-and-settle cases
Friendly lawsuits, or sue-and-settle cases, have been the subject of investigations in Washington, D.C. In fact, the Center for Biological Diversity is listed as fourth on the list of most frequent environmental group plaintiffs in sue-and-settle cases in a 54-page report, “Sue and Settle, Regulating Behind Closed Doors,” published by the U.S. Chamber of Commerce in 2013.

U.S. Chamber of Commerce “Sue and Settle, Regulating Behind Closed Doors” report:
https://www.uschamber.com/sites/default/files/documents/files/SUEANDSETTLEREPORT-Final.pdf

The Karuk Tribe is based in the northwestern corner of the state in Humboldt and Siskiyou counties and has opposed suction dredging mining along with environmental groups, such as the Center for Biological Diversity.

Public Lands for the People is a 501[C](3) nonprofit corporation whose mission statement is “to represent and assist outdoor user groups and individuals interested in keeping public and private lands open to prospecting, mining and outdoor recreation through public education, scientific data and legal means.”

-30-

NOTE: (Kafkaesque refers to Franz Kafka and his novels about arbitrary bureaucracy.)

For more information, contact:
PLP President Walt Wegner
Phone: (818) 887-5970
Website: www.PublicLandsForThePeople.org
Email: info@publiclandsforthepeople.org
Public Lands for the People
20929 Ventura Blvd., Ste. 47-466
Woodland Hills, CA 91364

Public Lands for the People is a 501[C](3) nonprofit corporation: #95-4521318 & 1880483

Jere, The long haul is the truth!

The wife and I may or may not be back from a trip to Arizona in time for the Pomona show. If we are, we (at least I ) will be there for sure. I've been wanting to get to either Pomona or Vegas for the past couple years....just have not made it yet.

Hopefully we can meet there!
I appreciate what you are doing. Thank you.

Jim Locke

Brad,
Thanks for the update (release)

Take Care all...

Brad, thanks for all you do to keep us informed. If everyone just kept up to date on what the politicians are attempting to slide through there would be more than enough people to run them out of office.

PLP has been instrumental from the beginning and in it for the long haul.

MEDIA RELEASE
PUBLIC LANDS FOR THE PEOPLE
JANUARY 20, 2016

Judge Ochoa Stays CEQA Ruling in Remarkable Court Proceeding

In San Bernardino Superior Court, Judge Gilbert Ochoa candidly admitted that the mining community is being denied justice in his own courtroom by deferring a decision on the CEQA case. In what amounts to a judicial olé, Judge Ochoa is kicking the can down the road until the California Supreme Court rules on the Brandon Rinehart case.
-PLP Editor

Comments from Attorney James Buchal:

This morning was the scheduled time for Judge Ochoa to hear and rule upon CEQA and Administrative Procedure Act challenges to the Department’s FSEIR on suction dredging, as well as the time set for a hearing on a motion for summary judgment (and the Department’s counter-motion for judgment on the pleadings) concerning the question whether AB 120 and SB 1018 were unconstitutional for violation of the “one subject” rule in the California Constitution.

The hearing was delayed because the Judge was in the process of preparing his tentative ruling (poor quality camera copy attached—I’m still at the airport): he would not decide anything; everything would be stayed pending a ruling in People v. Rinehart. I was given the opportunity to contest the tentative ruling, and pointed out to the Judge that while there was some limited overlap between the federal preemption issues and the CEQA arguments, the “one subject” case had nothing to do with People v. Rinehart.

I explained that we were in the process of getting water quality permits or waivers, but even if we got them, the unconstitutional provisions of AB 120 and SB 1018 would still require certifications about birds, noise, wildlife and historical/cultural issues, such that we could not get suction dredging permits even to run under the restrictive 2012 regulations. Striking down AB 120 and SB 1018 would remove all legal obstacles (other than water quality certifications) to the Department’s issuance of permits under the 2012 regulations without regard to any federal preemption issues. I was interrupted in mid-argument as I then strayed into the merits of the CEQA baseline argument (which also has nothing to do with federal preemption).

At the end of the hearing, after hearing from the Department, which reversed its earlier position that we needed to decide these issues, I said that of course the Department and Tribe were happy for delay, that justice delayed is justice denied, and this was unfair. The Judge remarked that he agreed with my last observation, it was unfair, but there was nothing he could do about it.

Whether or not a federal court will recognize the extraordinary nature of our treatment in the California courts as, in substance, a concerted effort to frustrate federal civil mining rights, remains to be seen. This morning’s developments are certainly more evidence in support of that position.

James L. Buchal
Murphy & Buchal LLP