Wetlands: The Large/Small Handle Issue

Last month, in an interesting take on the large handle/small handle issue, the federal district court in the Southern District of Florida enjoined the Corps from issuing a CWA 404 permit based on inadequate NEPA compliance.  The Corps had analyzed only the effects of the filling of the 20+ acres of jurisdictional wetlands and not the cumulative and synergistic impacts of the development of the 1900+ acre biotechnology park proposed by Scripts Research Institute.  Florida Wildlife Federation v. Corps, 2005 WL 3418302 (S.D.FL 2005).