Pacific Coast Federation of Fishermen's Associations v. Blank

In 2011, the National Marine Fisheries Service (“NMFS”) and the Pacific Fishery Management Council (“Pacific Council” or “Council”) adopted changes to the fishery management plan for the trawl sector of the Pacific Coast groundfish fishery. The changes, adopted as Amendments 20 and 21 to the Pacific Coast Groundfish Fishery Management Plan, are designed to increase economic efficiency through fleet consolidation, reduce environmental impacts, and simplify future decisionmaking.

Plaintiffs-Appellants Pacific Coast Federation of Fishermen’s Associations, et al. (“plaintiffs”) are a collection of primarily non-trawl fishermen’s associations and groups whose longtime participation in the fishery may shrink under Amendments 20 and 21. They argue that the Amendments are unlawful under the Magnuson-Stevens Fishery Conservation and Management Act (“MSA”), 16 U.S.C. §§ 1801-1884 , which imposes procedural and substantive requirements for managing fisheries, and the National Environmental Policy Act (“NEPA”), 42 U.S.C. §§ 4321-4347 , which imposes purely procedural requirements for reviewing the potential environmental effects of proposed agency actions.

The district court, which…