President Donald Trump has nominated Kathleen M. Sgamma, a 20-year advocate of the oil and gas industry, as the Director of the Bureau of Land Management (BLM). BLM, an agency within the U.S. Department of the Interior (DOI), is responsible for administering 245 million acres of federal public land and…
By Kerry Shapiro and Daniel Quinley On January 20, 2025, President Donald J. Trump issued the “Unleashing American Energy” Executive Order to, among other things, establish the United States as a “leading producer and processor of non-fuel minerals.” (“Executive Order”) The Executive Order emphasizes key energy policies, including the removal…
On December 9, 2020, the California Energy Commission (CEC) appointed nine members of the new Blue Ribbon Commission on Lithium Extraction in California (Lithium Valley Commission). The appointments were made pursuant to Assembly Bill 1657 (Garcia, Chapter 271, 2020) (AB 1657), which was signed into law by Governor Newsom on…
Just what makes a decision “final” enough to support a Fifth Amendment takings claim? In his article, “‘Finality’ may be the next key issue in takings litigation,” published by the Daily Journal, Daniel Quinley of JMBM’s Natural Resources and Mining Group, addresses a recent Ninth U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals’…
On Tuesday, March 31, 2020, San Francisco and six other Bay Area counties and one city each issued a virtually identical Shelter-in-Place Order (collectively, the “Order”) that is, in many ways, more restrictive than (i) Governor Newsom’s March 19, 2020 Stay-Home Executive Order N-33-20, and (ii) San Francisco’s March 16,…
This blog provides important updates to the analysis in our March 20 and March 23 blogs addressing the impact on workers in the construction and industrial materials industries of Governor Newsom’s March 19, 2020 Executive Order N-33-20 (“Order”) mandating, subject to certain exceptions, that “all individuals living in the State of…
This blog provides important updates to the analysis in our prior blog addressing the impact on workers in the construction materials industry of Governor Newsom’s March 19, 2020 Executive Order N-33-20 (“Order”) mandating, subject to certain exceptions, that “all individuals living in the State of California to stay home.” For background,…
On March 19, 2020, Governor Newsom issued Executive Order N-33-20 (“Order”) “ordering all individuals living in the State of California to stay home or at their place of residence”. As discussed below, the Order allows workers in certain industry sectors to continue working. There are several categories of workers who…
On May 1, 2019, Petitioner San Joaquin Tributaries Authority, a Joint Powers Authority (Petitioner/Authority) filed a petition for writ of mandate in Sacramento County Superior Court against the State Water Resources Control Board (SWRCB). The Authority includes the City and County of San Francisco as petitioners. The petition challenges SWRCB’s…
On April 25, 2019, the California Construction and Industrial Materials Association (CalCIMA) filed a petition for writ of mandate and complaint for declaratory and injunctive relief (“Petition”) in Ventura County Superior Court challenging the County of Ventura’s approval of a proposed “Habitat Connectivity and Wildlife Corridor” Project and its implementing…