Background
Cannon Air Force Base used foam containing perfluoroalkyl chemicals to extinguish fires, causing runoff into local groundwater. The New Mexico Environment Department issued a permit designating these chemicals as hazardous waste under the state Hazardous Waste Act. The United States sued in federal district court, arguing the permit exceeded state authority and trespassed on federal sovereign immunity. The district court dismissed the case, finding that the state’s judicial-review mechanisms were binding procedural requirements that impliedly repealed federal jurisdiction, or alternatively, that abstention was appropriate due to parallel state proceedings.
The court’s reasoning
The court held that Section sixty-nine sixty-one of the Resource Conservation and Recovery Act does not impliedly repeal Section one thousand three hundred forty-five of Title twenty-eight. The procedural-requirements language in the statute refers to state mechanisms for enforcing substantive standards, not state judicial-review mechanisms that vest exclusive jurisdiction in state courts. The court found no irreconcilability between concurrent state and federal jurisdiction. Regarding abstention, the court determined the district court misinterpreted the piecemeal-litigation factor of the Colorado River doctrine. The risk of duplicative litigation was not present because the state action was stayed, and the need to apply state law does not justify abstention.
What it means going forward
Federal district courts retain jurisdiction to hear civil actions commenced by the United States challenging state environmental permits, even when state law vests exclusive review authority in state courts. The case was remanded for further proceedings on the merits of the permit challenge.