Sierra Club v. Leslie Salt Co.

MEMORANDUM OF DECISION

These two consolidated actions are brought for injunctive and declaratory relief under the Rivers and Harbors Act of 1899 ( 33 U.S.C. § 401 et seq.) and the Federal Water Pollution Control Act of 1972 ( 33 U.S.C. § 1251 et seq.).

In No. 72-561, plaintiffs Sierra Club and Save San Francisco Bay Association, conservation organizations, and plaintiff Kent Dedrick, an individual member of the Sierra Club, sue defendants, Leslie Salt Co., Leslie Properties, Inc., and defendant Mobil Oil Estates. These defendants own many thousand acres of property along the shores of San Francisco Bay including diked evaporation ponds used for the production of salt. The plaintiffs seek a declaratory judgment that the dikes in and around the portion of defendants’ (hereinafter “Leslie’s”) property known as Bair Island were illegally built and a permanent injunction ordering their removal or in the alternative prohibiting further construction or maintenance of dikes at Bair Island.

In No. 73-2294 the plaintiff is Leslie Salt Co., suing defendants the Secretary of the Army, the Chief of the United States Army Corps of Engineers, and the District Engineer of the Corps, San…