WOTUS Struck Down, What Does that Mean for Montanans?

In case you missed the news right before the Memorial Day weekend...the United States Supreme Court weighed in against the "Waters of the US" (WOTUS) regulations that were first pushed by Obama, then pushed by Biden and protected throughout by liberal Senator Jon Tester (D-MT).

The WOTUS rules were heavily opposed by farm and ranch groups here in Montana, as well as the Republican members of Montana's Congressional Delegation. The Republican controlled US House of Representatives voted to block the rules earlier this year.

Jonathan Wood is the Vice President of Law and Policy for the Bozeman-based PERC, the Property and Environment Research Center. He joined us on the radio on Friday to give us his read on the Supreme Court decision in Sackett vs EPA:

Jonathan Wood: It's a big win for the Sacketts and for landowners across the country. And what's most interesting about the decision is that it was unanimous. Every single justice on the court thought that what has happened to the Sacketts over the past nearly 20 years has been an unforgivable abuse, and it was a total rebuke of what EPA has been doing to landowners across the country.

Montana Governor Greg Gianforte also called it a big win for small business owners, farmers, and ranchers.

Aaron Flint: What are the ripple effects could you see come as a result of this Supreme Court ruling?

Jonathan Wood: The biggest ripple effects in the short term will likely be that states will begin to change the way they regulate wetlands. Because the Clean Water Act has been so controversial, it's actually politicized what states do. You have a lot of states, especially in the Midwest, that have basically said that state regulators can't go further than federal regulation. I suspect that'll change. Now that federal regulation has been significantly curtailed. But the biggest opportunity is now we can shift to protecting wetlands through voluntary and market based systems rather than regulation. The fundamental flaw of the Clean Water Act has always been- you're turning a wetland, a prairie pothole, or any other feature that does serve a really useful purpose for wildlife or water quality into a liability that landowners are punished for protecting. A better way is to allow private conservation groups to compensate landowners, negotiate with landowners, turn those into assets that landowners have an incentive to protect and conserve.

You can read more of Wood's reaction by clicking here. Click below for the full audio starting about 3/4 of the way into the podcast: