David L. SOKOL, Appellant, v. Roger G. KENNEDY, in his official capacity as Director of the National Park Service; Bruce Babbitt, in his official capacity as Secretary of the United States Department of the Interior; and United States of America, Appellees.
No. 99-1804.
United States Court of Appeals, Eighth Circuit.
Submitted Dec. 16, 1999. Filed April 10, 2000.
210 F.3d 876
Sally Renee Johnson, U.S. Attorney‘s Office, Omaha, NE, for appellees.
Before RICHARD S. ARNOLD and LOKEN, Circuit Judges, and WEBB,1 District Judge.
RICHARD S. ARNOLD, Circuit Judge.
David Sokol, a landowner, appeals from a summary judgment upholding the boundaries for the Niobrara Scenic River area set by the National Park Service under the Wild and Scenic Rivers Act. The District Court held that the Park Service correctly chose which land adjacent to the Niobrara would be included within the protections of the Act. The Park Service, however, did not select the land on the basis of the “outstandingly remarkable values” standard required by the Act. We therefore reverse and remand.
The Wild and Scenic Rivers Act,
In 1992, the Park Service began the decision-making process to establish boundaries for the river area, and to generate the required General Management Plan and Environmental Impact Statement. This process was thorough and lengthy, lasting over four years. The Park Service formed a planning team, led by Natural Resource Specialist William Conrod, to gather and anаlyze information on the Niobrara River area from a wide variety of public and private sources. The planning team also developed its own information from personal observations and field studies of resources along the river. The planning team assembled a large amount of information that was used to create “resource maps.” The team used thesе maps to develop boundary alternatives, seeking to maximize protection of various resources in the area. The Park Service also organized the Niobrara Scenic River Advisory Commission, a body of local residents, businessmen, environmental groups, and state officials, that contributed to the process and received public comment on the plannеd boundaries.
The Park Service did not evaluate the land adjacent to the Niobrara River in terms of “outstandingly remarkable” values. Instead, from the beginning, the planning team analyzed the Niobrara River area in terms of “significant” and “important” values. Park Service officials were more comfortable with the significance and importance standards because they werе familiar with them from other
In 1997, Mr. Sokol brought this suit in the District Court. He alleged that the Park Service had violated the Act by failing to apply an outstandingly-remarkablе-values standard when selecting boundaries for the Niobrara Scenic River area. The defendants replied, first, that this standard did not apply because the Park Service had complete discretion under the Act to establish the boundaries as it saw fit. Second, they maintained that even if the outstandingly-remarkable-values standard was required, the Park Service had in fact used it. The Distriсt Court granted summary judgment for the defendants, upholding the decision of the Park Service. Mr. Sokol brought this appeal. We reverse and remand.
II.
Under the Administrative Procedure Act, we limit our review of the Park Service‘s administrative action to a determination of whether the action was “arbitrary, capricious, an abuse of discretion, or otherwise not in accordance with law.” 5
We reject the defendants’ first argument that the Park Service was free to select land for the river area as it saw fit, without regard for the outstandingly remarkable values that Congress sought to protect in the Niobrara. The defendants rely on
Each river area in the Wild and Scenic River System must be “administered in such manner as to protect and enhance the values which caused it to be included” in the System.
Accordingly, we reject the defendants’ contention that the Wild and Scenic Rivers Act provided no meaningful standard for the selection of detailed boundaries; this interpretation conflicts with the administrative duty clearly set out in Section 1281(a).7 It also contradicts the Park Service‘s own prior interpretation of the Act.8 The defendants argue correctly that the Park Service was not required to include only land with outstandingly remarkable values. The Park Service‘s statutory duty was to establish detailed boundaries, within the acreage limits of Section 1274(b), that would protect and enhance the outstandingly remarkable values that caused the river area to be included in the Wild and Scenic Rivers System. This duty does not always bar the administering agency from including unremarkable land; indeed, the Act could require such inclusion where necessary to protect outstandingly remarkable resources, e.g. because of the need for buffer zones around resources or becаuse of discontinuities in a resource‘s locations. Equally, the Act does not require that the boundaries encompass all the outstandingly remarkable resources; this might be impossible given the acreage limitation. Neither categorical alternative is required by our decision. The Act allows the administering agency discretion to decide which boundaries would best proteсt and enhance the outstandingly remarkable values in the river area, but it must identify and seek to protect those values, and not some broader category.
We also reject the defendants’ second argument—that the Park Service did, in fact, identify and seek to protect the outstandingly remarkable values of the Niobrara River area. As the defendants admit, the planning team consistently analyzed resources in the Niobrara for their “significance” and “importance.” These terms are not synonymous with “outstandingly remarkable.” Significance and importance are much broader terms. They include far more than the “unique, rare, or exemplary” qualities that the defendants themselves have recognized are denoted by the outstandingly-remarkablе-values standard. See Technical Report of the Interagency Wild and Scenic Rivers Coordinating Council, J.A. at 79. In any given group, many things can be significant or important. By definition, however, only a
The Park Service did not choose the terms “significance” and “importance” because they were synonyms for “оutstandingly remarkable.” These terms were derived from a separate legal standard used by Park Service officials to evaluate potential park lands,9 a standard with which they were more familiar than the Wild and Scenic River Act‘s outstandingly-remarkable-values standard. J.A. at 48. The defendants now contend that while the terms of the park standard were used, the planning team meant “оutstandingly remarkable” when it used them. But the team captain, who was responsible for interpreting the Act, stated that the team used significance and importance in the same sense that these terms were used to evaluate potential parks. J.A. at 61-62. Since no one suggests that the park standard is the same as the Act‘s standard, it is hard to understand the defendants’ contention that all these terms have meant the same thing all along. Instead, we conclude that the Park Service simply used the wrong standard from the beginning.
The values identified by the Park Service for protection likewise demonstrate that the planning team confused the standards appropriate for choosing potential parks and for selecting boundaries under the Wild and Scenic Rivers Act. In 1992, the planning team set out in “significance statements” the values it would seek to protect in selecting boundaries. In addition to using the significance standard to evaluate resources along the Niobrara, the team noted that the same “significance statements” should “be repeated again” when “included in the national park study.” J.A. at 1342. The record provides no evidence that the planning team later corrected its confusion, or that it assigned a special meaning to the terms “significance” and “importance,” equivalent to the statutory terms. Mr. Conrod, the team captain, admitted no such conscious decision had ever occurred. Indeed, Mr. Conrod went so far as to express what almost amounted to contempt for the terms of the statute.10 Officials of the Executive Branch, like judges, are free to have their own private view of what Congress has said and done. But they are not free to put these views into practice. A statute is the command of the sovereign. The Park Service must follow it. Instead, Park Service officials applied the standard with which they were more familiar from other regulatory contexts, ignoring the outstandingly-remarkable-values standard required under the Wild and Scenic Rivers Act.
The defendants argue that whatever errors may have been made in the initial process were corrected in the draft and final boundary alternatives and in the Record of Decision. It is true that, after Mr. Sokol complained that the wrong standard was being used, editorial changes were made to the draft and final boundary alternatives. Specifically, a few sentences were added noting that “significant” and “important” were to be understood to mean outstandingly remarkable. These post hoc re-definitions, however, were not sufficient to correct past errors upon which the boundary alternatives and Record of Decision were based. Not surprisingly, the record shows that the re-definitions in the
No attempts at re-analysis of information or judgments accompanied these re-definitions. After Mr. Sokol‘s complaints, the team changed a few sentences in the boundary alternatives but never reexamined its prior work in light of the new standard. Apparently, the planning team was never convinced that the outstandingly-remarkable-values standard was correct. Even after the Record of Decision had been published, Mr. Conrod stated that the оutstandingly-remarkable-values standard did not apply to the selection of boundaries, but applied only initially “in the context of consideration of new sites.” J.A. at 48. The Park Service analyzed the river area under the wrong standard, failing to use the outstandingly-remarkable-values standard required by the Act in selecting boundaries; it failed to correct its initial mistakes.11 Therefore, we revеrse the decision of the District Court on this issue, and hold that the Park Service‘s boundary selection violated its statutory duty under the Act.
Mr. Sokol also argues that the Park Service failed to establish sufficiently detailed boundaries. Mr. Sokol argues that the Park Service was required, under
III.
Accordingly, we reverse and remand to the District Court with instructions to remand to the Park Service. On remand, the Park Service should select boundaries that seek to protect and enhance the outstandingly remarkable values of the Niobrara Scenic River Area.