The Minnesota Supreme Court found that the White Bear Lake Homeowners Association and the White Bear Lake Restoration Association have a claim under the Minnesota Environmental Rights Act, but declined to extend the public-trust doctrine to find that the Minnesota DNR violated its duty as trustee by issuing groundwater permits.
Background
White Bear Lake, a groundwater-fed lake in Ramsey and Washington Counties, experienced very low water levels in the early 2010s. In response, White Bear Lake Restoration Association (Restoration) sought declaratory and injunctive relief in Ramsey County District Court, arguing that the Department of Natural Resources (DNR), by issuing groundwater appropriation permits to (among others) cities in the White Bear Lakes groundwater-shed, had allowed the lake’s water levels to drop, in violation of the Minnesota Environmental Rights Act, Minnesota Statutes chapter 116 (MERA). White Bear Lake Homeowners Association (Homeowners) intervened, asserting the MERA claim, and that the DNR had violated the common-law public-trust doctrine. Under this doctrine, rooted in ancient Roman law but recognized by modern courts, the state holds certain public resources in trust for the benefit of the people as a whole, and cannot impair that trust responsibility to benefit narrow interests.
2017 Ramsey County District Court order
The district court agreed with Restoration and Homeowners based on their claims that the DNR violated Minn. Stat. §116B.03 and the public-trust doctrine, and granted an injunction directing that the DNR undertake a number of tasks to re-evaluate its groundwater permitting, and forbidding it from issuing further permits pending the directed activity. The DNR appealed, challenging the district court’s application of §116B.03 and the public-trust doctrine, along with other arguments.
2019 Minnesota Court of Appeals decision
The Minnesota Court of Appeals reversed the district court on both grounds. It found that Restoration and Homeowners had brought their MERA claim under the wrong statute - §116B.03 (which creates a facially broad right for citizen suits to prevent or stop environmental degradation) rather than §116B.10 (which provides for challenges to an environmental standard … or permit). And it rejected Homeowners' public trust claim, noting that the application of the public-trust doctrine has been limited to public ownership of navigable waters and has “never been extended to groundwater not directly beneath the lake."
Restoration and Homeowners then appealed this decision to the Minnesota Supreme Court.
2020 Minnesota Supreme Court decision
On July 15, 2020, the Minnesota Supreme Court issued its decision in White Bear Lake Restoration Association ex re. v. Minnesota Department of Natural Resources.
The court reversed the court of appeals on the MERA claim. If ruled that Restoration and Homeowners in fact have stated claims under the citizen-suit section of MERA, §116B.03, subdivision 1, which provides that “[a]ny person … may maintain a civil action in the district court for declaratory or equitable relief in the name of the state of Minnesota against any person, for the protection of … natural resources located within the state, whether publicly or privately owned, from pollution, impairment, or destruction.”
MERA defines “pollution, impairment, or destruction” as “any conduct by any person which violates, or is likely to violate, any environmental quality standard, limitation, rule, order, license, stipulation agreement, or permit” or “any conduct which materially adversely affects or is likely to materially adversely affect the environment." (Emphasis added.)
The court found that Restoration and Homeowners sufficiently alleged with specificity several types of DNR conduct sufficient to make it subject to a claim under §116B.03, notwithstanding that a MERA claim also might have been brought under §116B.10.
The court affirmed the court of appeals' ruling that Homeowners failed to state a claim under the public-trust doctrine, but on different reasoning. The court ruled that because groundwater allocation is exhaustively managed by statute, there is no need to invoke the common-law doctrine to resolve the present issue.
The Minnesota Supreme Court remanded the case to the court of appeals to address the remaining issues raised in the appeal.