Honestly the system is geared against the common man's ability to fight such groups & the government should be ashamed they have created this unfair practice!!!!


(NOTE: The following article first appeared in the author's blog for
Idaho Farm Bureau News, Oct. 9, 2009, and is reproduced by Man In
Nature with the author's permission.)

Equal Access to Justice Act
Environmental Lawsuits Rake in Billions for Lawyers

By Jake Putnam

http://www.maninnature.com/Bovines/Cattle/Cattle1d.html

Cheyenne: During harsh economic times, rancher Karen Budd-Falen
reached the breaking point on a day last fall. Falen had read about a
huge court settlement the Federal Government paid out to a non-profit
environmental group and after talking to the ranchers in the Western
Legacy Alliance, it set her off.

Falen channeled the frustration into a quest; she wanted to know how
much money the Federal Government had paid out in lawsuit legal fees
over the past decade and what she found is astounding.

In just six years non-profit environmental groups filed more than
15-hundred lawsuits and in turn the Federal Government paid out more
than $4.7 billion in taxpayer dollars in settlements and legal fees
in cases against the U.S. government.

Between 2000 and 2009, Idaho's Western Watersheds Project out of
Hailey filed at least 91 lawsuits in federal district court with 31
appeals in federal appellate court according to Falen, who not only
is a rancher but a former Department of Interior law clerk. She and
husband Frank represent cattlemen in range issues throughout the west.

Falen often wondered how tiny non-profit organizations like Western
Watersheds could afford an attorney like the famed Laird Lucas of
Boise who is known as one of the best natural resource attorneys in
the country.

"We tried to track the fees paid to environmental groups in certain
federal courts. These guys are charging between $350 and $450 an hour
in legal fees." Falen says the Federal government is picking up the
tab and adds: "In Federal District Court in Boise, over the last ten
years, WWP received a total of $999,190 in tax dollars for
'reimbursement' for attorney fees and costs."

"We've had a lot of litigation with WWP," said Assistant U.S.
Attorney Mark Haws of Boise. "We've have a lot of cases with them and
they have prevailed on cases and been awarded Equal Access to Justice
Attorney fees. I don't have a total, but that amount wouldn't
surprise me."

"It's atrocious, as a private operator I can't gather that kind of
money to fight anything like that," said rancher Ted Higley of Malta,
Idaho. "If they're going to fight personal causes it should be with
their personal money, not government money."

Falen's research shows that of the cases filed by Western Watersheds
in Idaho's Federal Court, 19 went before Judge Lynn Winmill; eight
resulted in decisions on merit with WWP prevailing with total
attorney fees awarded to the tune of $746,184; six of the cases were
settled by the feds paying of $118,000. WWP lost six cases but still
managed a payday in two cases, but the payment amount is
confidential. Falen's findings show a pattern: there's a payday in
court, win or lose or draw.

"I'm not going to point fingers at WWP but there are organizations
out there that are just sitting there scrutinizing, watching every
decision an agency makes waiting for that 'low hanging fruit' to jump
on - just to get fees," said U.S. Attorney Mark Haws.

"Nonprofit, tax exempt groups are making billions of dollars in
funding," said Falen. She says the majority of this legal fee money
is not going into programs to protect people, jobs, wildlife, or
endangered species but to fund more lawsuits from 'non-profit
environmental groups.

Farmers and Ranchers that struggle to make a living off the land are
forced to spend money out of their pocket to defend themselves;
that's what happened to ranchers Tim Lowry and Paul Nettleton of
Owyhee County.

The ranchers successfully defended a decade-long fight for water
rights on their land against the BLM. The Idaho Supreme Court ruled
on their side in a precedent setting case but the U.S. Supreme Court
denied them attorney fees under EAJA from the government because the
decision came in state court. That left the ranchers with a $1.5
million legal bill from a case in which the Federal Government
dragged them into court.

"There's a lot of a things wrong with this picture," said Falen. "The
federal government is spending billions in taxpayer dollars without
any accounting of where the money is going or to whom it is going.
There is no oversight in spending this money, especially the money
that's coming out of agency budgets that should be funding programs
to protect public lands, national forests, ranchers, recreationists,
wildlife and other land uses," said Falen.

Falen's research shows that between 2000 and 2009, Forest Guardians
(NKA as WildEarth Guardians) filed 180 lawsuits in federal district
courts with at least 61appeals in the federal appellate courts during
the same time frame the Center for Biological Diversity filed at
least 409 lawsuits in the federal district courts with at least 165
appeals in the federal appellate courts.

In addition she found over the past 15 years that the Wilderness
Society filed 149 federal court lawsuits, the Idaho Conservation
League filed 69 lawsuits, the Oregon Natural Desert Association filed
58 lawsuits, the Southern Utah Wilderness Association filed 88
lawsuits and the National Wildlife Federation filed an astonishing
427 federal court lawsuits.

Falen says she found cases in which the Federal Government paid legal
fees for both sides of a case - just so they could turn around and
sue the federal government who in turn will force ranchers off the
range.

In 2001 the Western Watersheds Project sued Verl Jones of Challis
claiming that the rancher violated the Endangered Species act by
diverting water from a creek on his ranch to irrigate an alfalfa
field, killing endangered bull trout. Federal District Court Judge
Winmill ordered Jones to stop diverting water, which cut into the
families hay production and nearly bankrupted the ranch. But the
harshest blow came when Jones was ordered to pay $36,000.00 to
Watershed's attorney Laird Lucas. In the end the 9th Circuit Court of
Appeal overturned Winmill's decision and the order to pay Lucas, but
the family was left with a $50,000 bill from their attorney.

Falen also documented numerous cases in which the federal government
agreed to pay attorney fees, but hid the exact amount from public
view. "Somewhere this has to stop and the government has to be held
accountable for the money it's spending," adds Falen.

"If you just look at the raw number and say 'why in the world is the
United States paying a million dollars bankrolling them to sue us,'
well that's what congress set up through EAJA. That's the law, we're
bound by it," said Mark Haws.

"My firm did this because it makes me so mad," said Falen. She says
agrees with Haws, these groups have mastered the art of filing suits
and collecting taxpayer money from the Federal Government by
"prevailing" in litigation. They can prevail either by winning the
case on the merits or by the Justice Department agreeing that the
group "prevailed" in a settlement.

The main funding source is called the "Judgment Fund." It's a
Congressional line-item appropriation that's used for Endangered
Species Act cases, Clean Water Act cases, and with other statutes
that directly allow plaintiffs like Western Watersheds to recover
attorney fees just by filing, even if there's no hope in winning.

"I wish we could get a payday just for showing up," said rancher Ted
Higley. Falen uncovered six years of paydays for 'non-profit'
lawyers, she found:

In fiscal year 2003, the federal government made 10,595 individual
payments from the Judgment Fund to federal court plaintiffs for a
price tag of $1,081,328,420.00.

In 2004, the federal government made 8,161 payments from the Judgment
Fund for $800,450,029.00.

In 2005, 7,794 payments were made from the Judgment Fund for a total
of $1,074,131,007.00.

In 2006, the federal government made 8,736 payments from the Judgment
Fund for $697,968,132.00.

In just the first half of fiscal year 2007, the federal government
made 6,595 payments from the Judgment Fund for $1,062,387,142.00.

In total, $4,716,264,730.00 (that is billion with a "b") in total
payments were paid in taxpayer dollars from the Judgment Fund from
2003 through July 2007 for attorney fees and costs in cases against
the federal government.

Falen says another major source of payments to "winning" litigants
against the federal government is the Equal Access to Justice Act.
Equal Access funds are taken from the "losing" federal agencies'
budget. So if the BLM loses a case in Federal District Court attorney
fees are paid from the "losing" BLM office's budget. "That's money
that could be used for range improvement, habitat enhancement, timber
projects, and archeology and cultural clearances and other agency
programs," adds Falen.

Between 2003 to 2005, Region 1 of the Forest Service (Montana, North
Dakota, northern Idaho) paid $383,094 in Equal Access to Judgment
fees.

Between 2003 to 2005, Region 2 of the Forest Service (Wyoming, South
Dakota, Colorado, Nebraska, Oklahoma) paid $97,750 in EAJA fees.

Between 2003 to 2005, Region 3 of the Forest Service (Arizona, New
Mexico) paid $261,289.85 in EAJA fees.

Between 2003 to 2005, Region 4 of the Forest Service (southern Idaho,
Utah, Nevada) paid $297,705 in EAJA fees.

Between 2003 to 2005, Region 5 (California) of the Forest Service
paid $357, 023 in EAJA fees.

Between 2003 to 2005, Region 6 (Washington State, Oregon) of the
Forest Service paid $282,302 in EAJA fees.

Out of the 44 total cases in which the Forest Service paid EAJA fees
between 2003 and 2005, 35 payments went to 'nonprofit' environmental group plaintiffs.

This is a large part of what always makes me wonder what an environmental group's TRUE objective is in bringing these nebulous lawsuits.

Are they truly interested in "saving" some creature?

Or is the lawsuit really a fund raising project and the "saving of the creature" is merely a convenient side benifit?

I think that we all know the answer.....

Pete

Too right Donnie. Wonder if the Government will wake up?

I would bet that the agencies already know. It's our "Congress Critters" that would be required to make the change.

And Congress won't do it if it would cut back on contributions they get from the special interest groups!

Pete

It is very similar to a presidential hopeful owning a sports team. Buy it for 50 Million and sell it a couple years later to a "Group" for 100 Million. Legalized money laundering. Nobody knows where all those donations to save the Owl, Wolf,Whooping Crane, (Insert latest Fad) come from.