We WIN for the WEST
The groundwork has been laid. Many wild spaces in the West remain rugged, varied, and open—largely because they have been designated to stay that way by presidential and congressional decree. A vast network of public lands stretch across the West, protected in theory—but not always in practice.
Managed by the Bureau of Land Management, Forest Service, Fish & Wildlife Service, National Park Service, and other agencies, the federal government oversees hundreds of millions of acres of land—and the air, water and wildlife they hold—in the West.
But too often, the very agencies designated to protect the West’s natural treasures allow grazing, mining, energy development and other destructive practices to pollute, damage, and destroy. We step in to hold these agencies accountable to law and science.
Advocates for the West is the legal voice that speaks up when the environment calls for it. We partner pro bono with conservation groups to help enforce the bedrock environmental statutes now in place to protect our public lands.
We win or favorably settle over 85% of our cases. When we do, it advances the endeavors of every conservation group in the West.
We wield law and science to stand our ground. Nowadays, it’s how the West is won.
Hells Canyon Complex Water Quality
Case: Nez Perce Tribe v. Oregon Department of Environmental Quality, Petition for Judicial Review
August 31, 2021 – The Nez Perce Tribe reached a settlement agreement with the state of Oregon resolving a case that Advocates for the West filed—along with the Tribe’s Office of Legal Counsel—challenging the state of Oregon’s Clean Water Act section 401 water quality certification for the relicensing of the Hells Canyon Complex. The Hells Canyon Complex, owned…
Sheep Experiment Station Followup Case
Case: Western Watersheds Project, WildEarth Guardians, and Center for Biological Diversity v. U.S. Sheep Experiment Station, and USDA Agricultural Research Service
April 16, 2021 — A federal judge ruled in favor of Advocates for the West and against the reauthorization and expansion of domestic sheep grazing in and around the US Sheep Experiment Station in Idaho’s Centennial Mountains on the Idaho-Montana border. With this decision, the Sheep Station is not permitted to graze sheep on the summer…
Air Force Urban Warfare Training
Case: Anne Hausrath, John Wheaton, Joanie Fauci, Meg Fereday, Roger Rosentretter, Kathryn Railsback, Dale Reynolds, and Great Old Broads for Wilderness v. United States Department of the Airforce
October 1, 2020 — The court ruled a sweeping victory for Advocates for the West in our case challenging Air Force urban military training exercises over Boise and other parts of Southern Idaho. March 27, 2020 — Advocates for the West filed our reply brief in this case, as well as our opposition to the Air Force’s…
Willamette River Salmon and Steelhead
Case: Northwest Environmental Defense Center, WildEarth Guardians, and Native Fish Society v. U.S. Army Corps of Engineers and National Marine Fisheries Service
July 3, 2025 — We won a conclusive victory in our Oregon federal court case involving eight U.S. Army Corps of Engineers dams and reservoirs in the Upper Willamette River basin that cause severe harm to Chinook salmon and steelhead by cutting off upstream spawning habitat and impairing downstream water quality and quantity. The Court…
Kilgore Mine Exploration in Centennial Mountains
Case: Idaho Conservation League and Greater Yellowstone Coalition v. U.S. Forest Service
May 4, 2020 — The U.S. District Court in Idaho revoked the Forest Service’s approval of the Kilgore Project and stopped Otis Gold Corp. (now Excellon Resources Inc.) from moving forward with its exploration project. This important decision follows Judge Winmill’s December 2019 ruling that the Forest Service failed to consider Otis’s underground drilling as a…
Wildlife Services Wolf-Killing in Idaho
Case: Western Watersheds Project, Center for Biological Diversity, Friends of the Clearwater, WildEarth Guardians, and Predator Defense
March 11, 2020 — Advocates for the West and our allies secured a strong victory in this case in an agreement that sets strict limits on how and where a federal agency can kill wolves in Idaho, bans the use of M-44 “cyanide bombs” statewide, and prohibits the use of snares to kill wolves on…
Devil’s Corral Water Rights
Case: In the Matter of Application for Permit
January 23, 2020 — Facing mounting pressure in our water right protest, the development company Devil’s Corral backed down and asked to withdraw its old 1980s water right application. On January 23, 2020, the Idaho Department of Water Resources dismissed the application, ending Devil’s Corral’s attempts to circumvent Idaho water law and avoid public involvement. Devils…
Salmon and Steelhead Die-Offs in Columbia and Snake Rivers
Case: Columbia Riverkeeper v. Scott Pruitt, Administrator of EPA
May 19, 2020 — EPA released its TMDL to control heat pollution in the Columbia and Snake rivers. EPA’s plan is further evidence that removing the four Lower Snake River dams is necessary to restore salmon and orcas. March 30, 2020 – The Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals denied the EPA’s petition to rehear this case….
Sage-Grouse RMP Challenge
Case: Western Watersheds Project, WildEarth Guardians, Center for Biological Diversity and Prairie Hills Audubon Society v. David Bernhardt, Joseph R. Balash, Bureau of Land Management, and U.S. Forest Service
February 11, 2021 – U.S. District Judge Lynn Winmill ruled strongly in our favor on this case, overturning a Trump Administration decision to strip protections from 10 million acres, mostly in Nevada and Idaho, to allow mining in critical habitat for greater sage-grouse. The court upheld our claim that the BLM failed to provide a…
Atlanta Gold Followup Case
Case: Idaho Conservation League and Northwest Environmental Defense Center
September 19, 2019 — Chief Magistrate Judge Ronald E. Bush found that Atlanta Gold still has not fully complied with its clean water permit or prior court orders to do so. This action is the latest in a series of suits we first filed in 2011 to force Atlanta Gold to comply with the Clean…
