Wilderness advocate sues Forest Service over motorboats in Minn. canoe area
2023 ENVIROBRF 0022
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By Michael Nordskog
WESTLAW TODAY Environment Briefing
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February 7, 2023
(February 7, 2023) - Conservation group Wilderness Watch has sued the U.S. Forest Service over its continued authorization of motorized commercial towboat operators within the Boundary Waters Canoe Area Wilderness in northeastern Minnesota.
Wilderness Watch v. Hall et al., No. 23-cv-284, complaint filed (D. Minn. Feb. 3, 2023).
The group's Feb. 3 complaint asks the U.S. District Court for the District of Minnesota to halt towboat permitting in the Boundary Waters until the Forest Service demonstrates compliance with the Wilderness Act and other federal laws.
In addition to the USFS, the suit names Superior National Forest Supervisor Tom Hall as a defendant.
'Long-term and utter failure'
The canoe area was among the first public lands designated for protection under the 1964 Wilderness Act, 16 U.S.C.A. § 1131.
The act generally prohibits visitor use of motors or machines, but lawmakers nonetheless allowed established motorboat use to continue in the BWCAW.
Congress in 1978 passed additional legislation, Pub. L. 95-495, 92 Stat. 1649, calling for "the orderly and equitable transition" away from motorized recreational uses that had continued on certain lakes, streams and portages in the Boundary Waters.
Wilderness Watch says it is suing due to the Forest Service's "long-term and utter failure" to heed these mandates and reduce motorized use through stricter limits on special-use permits for commercial towboat operators.
The suit likens the towboats, which carry canoes and passengers instead of towing them, to "shuttle buses driving canoe-capable clients further afield."
The most recent USFS figures from 2018 for private and commercial motorboat operation in some areas show nearly double the amount of use allowed under the agency's regulatory scheme, the complaint says.
Wilderness Watch says it previously sued the agency in 2015 before settling based on its pledge to assess and correct the towboat problem.
"It has been over five years, and the agency has yet to even fully satisfy the assessment task agreed to in the settlement," the plaintiff says.
In addition to exceeding Congress's 1978 statutory cap on motorboat use in the BWCAW, the agency's actions run afoul of the National Forest Management Act, 16 U.S.C.A. § 1604(d), and the wilderness character mandate and commercial enterprise prohibition of the Wilderness Act, 16 U.S.C.A. § 1133, the suit says.