Federal District Court Judge Postpones Hearing In CWA Rule Delay Suits

摘要

A federal district judge in New York is postponing until December a hearing in states' and environmentalists' suits over EPA's two-year delay on implementing the Obama-era Clean Water Act (CWA) jurisdiction standard, while the agency scrambles to overturn a South Carolina federal district judge's ruling scrapping the delay. The South Carolina ruling had the effect of reinstating the 2015 CWA rule nationwide, but if EPA can succeed in having the decision overturned then attention would shift to the case the New York judge is overseeing as the next option for critics of the two-year delay to challenge it on its merits. In orders dated Oct. 12 and 15, Judge J. Paul Oetken of the U.S. District Court for the Southern District of New York grants environmentalists' request to postpone a hearing on summary judgment motions in the CWA rule delay challenges from Oct. 25 to Dec. 12 - meaning there will be no decision on the cases until at least that point.