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IU McKinney Professor Writes in Defense of 'Magna Carta' of Environmental Law
05/17/2018
In 1970, Congress passed the National Environmental Policy Act (NEPA), representing a turning point in thinking about environmental protection.
The idea that the federal government should take a hard look at the environmental impact of its actions, consider reasonable alternatives and allow community input was so revolutionary at the time that NEPA has been called the “Magna Carta of environmental law.”
NEPA—and the Trump administration’s recently announced proposed changes to the laws and rules that guide federal agencies carrying out NEPA reviews—are the subject of an article “Trump Proposal to Weaken Project Reviews Threatens the Magna Carta of Environmental Law” on The Conversation website by IU McKinney Professor of Practice Janet McCabe.
Professor McCabe and co-author Cynthia Giles, Executive Fellow and Director of Strategic Initiatives, Energy & Environment Lab, University of Chicago, were attorneys who held senior positions at the Environmental Protection Agency during the Obama administration, including managing the agency’s NEPA office.
“Over more than four decades, NEPA has helped government agencies make smarter choices about public infrastructure, reducing damage to both natural environments and communities and avoiding the costs of correcting ill-considered projects,” the co-authors write.
As examples, Professor McCabe and Giles point to a case in Michigan in the 1990s, when that state’s transportation agency wanted to build a four-lane highway across a huge swath of important wetlands. Using NEPA, citizens forced the state to consider alternatives. Ultimately the state decided to expand an existing highway instead, dramatically reducing environmental harm and saving $1.5 billion.
Similar stories have occurred throughout the country, requiring government agencies to “think before they act,” avoiding countless harmful and ill-considered ideas, according to McCabe and Giles.
“Critics have long used “NEPA is slowing projects down!” as their rallying cry. Independent experts have looked at the evidence and reached a different conclusion,” the co-authors write.
Professor McCabe served as Deputy Assistant Administrator for the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency’s Office of Air and Radiation (OAR) from 2009 to 2013, and as Acting Assistant Administrator for OAR from 2013-2017. She is a senior law fellow at the Environmental Law and Policy Center and Assistant Director for Policy and Implementation at IU’s Environmental Resilience Institute.
