In an apparent attempt to avoid a protracted legal battle, the judge presiding over the ranching lawsuit last week ordered the National Park Service and a trio of environmental groups to meet with a magistrate judge for a settlement conference. In response, the environmental groups told the judge they would agree to pause part of their suit in an effort to save everyone time and money.
Judge Saundra Brown Armstrong, in an order issued last Friday, explained that the suit—and the anticipated preliminary injunction—could “consume a considerable amount of the parties and the Court’s time and resources.” The injunction, which was supposed to be officially filed Aug. 12, was set to ask the court to both prevent the seashore from releasing a ranch plan or offering new ranching authorizations until it updates its General Management Plan and conducts an environmental review of ranching.
Appeals of future rulings, Judge Armstrong went on, would cost even more money. It is in everyone’s “best interest to engage in a good faith attempt to resolve the action on terms that are mutually acceptable to them,” she wrote.
This week the plaintiffs asked the judge to stay the portion of their suit that challenged whether ranching authorizations had undergone proper environmental review in order to “conserve judicial resources” and “save the parties’ time and expense.” The challenge to the ranch management plan will remain active; the anticipated preliminary injunction will now only cover the ranch plan issue.
A settlement conference will take place in the next month or two.
Meanwhile, ranchers in the Point Reyes National Seashore and the County of Marin have formally requested to intervene in the lawsuit, though the county and some ranchers limited their request, only asking to intervene so they can oppose the preliminary injunction.