Martinek

I. BACKGROUND

In 1986 Martinek was devised eleven unpatented gold- mining claims comprising 191.07 acres within what is now Denali Park, Alaska. In 1980 Congress expanded Denali Park’s boundaries to encompass the eleven claims, which thereby came under the National Park Service’s surface man- agement jurisdiction pursuant to the Mining in the Parks Act, 16 U.S.C. § 1901 et seq. In 1985 the United States District Court for the District of Alaska entered an injunction against the Park Service in a separate case that halted all mining oper- ations in Denali Park until the Park Service completed an Environmental Impact Statement (EIS). See N. Ala. Envtl. Ctr. v. Hodel, 803 F.2d 466 (9th Cir. 1986). The injunction was lifted in 1991 after the Park Service issued the EIS. See N. Ala. Envtl. Ctr. v. Lujan, 961 F.2d 886 (9th Cir. 1992).

The Park Service also formulated a plan for acquiring the mining claims in Denali Park, see 16 U.S.C. § 410hh-1(3)(b), and submitted to Congress the plan and an accompanying report that recommended acquiring the mining claims over a phased, four-year period but gave no indication when this period would begin.

On March 10, 1998, the United States…