Nelson v. County of Kern

In this action under the California Environmental Quality Act (Pub. Resources Code, § 21000 et seq.; CEQA), 1 Renee D. Nelson and Clean Water and Air Matters (petitioners) challenged the adequacy of the environmental analysis performed by respondent County of Kern (County) concerning a proposed surface mining operation on 40 acres of foothill property in the County. Carlton Global Resources (Carlton), the real party in interest, submitted a proposal that included mining of calcite marble from the site for a 30-year period and a reclamation plan to restore the land thereafter. 2 The reclamation plan was required by the provisions of the Surface Mining and Reclamation Act of 1975 (§ 2710 et seq.; SMARA). 3 County limited its environmental review to the reclamation plan only and did not consider or *260 analyze the potential impacts of Carlton’s proposed mining operations. County took that approach because the mining would take place on federally owned land and, as such, the Bureau of Land Management (BLM) was considered to be the sole permitting agency for purposes of mining operations and responsible to perform its own environmental review pursuant to the National…