A Public Trust Doctrine Glossary

PUBLIC TRUST DOCTRINE (PTD) GLOSSARY

Public Trust Doctrine - A doctrine originating in ancient Roman law that holds that navigable rivers, bays and the seashore belong to the people, who have an unassailable right to access and use them for traditional purposes such as fishing, swimming, navigation, and recreation. The doctrine has had the force of law in the U.S. since the American Revolution. In its modern form, the doctrine has been held by courts to embody both a right of the people to access, use, and enjoy the water; and a corollary duty on the part of the States to protect and care for the water, waterfront resources, and wetlands.

Administrative consent order - An order resulting from legal action containing specific orders from the court to the parties. Common law - The body of law of a country or state based on custom, usage, and the decisions and opinions upheld by law courts. Existing use zoning - A legally defensible way of protecting open space through zoning. If land currently exists as open space, then it is zoned open space; if it is currently residential, then it is zoned residential, etc. Fiduciary - 1. Designating or of a person who holds something in trust for another; of a trustee or trusteeship, 2. Held in trust , 3. Valuable only because of public confidence and support.

Public nuisance suit - Unreasonable interference with a right common to the general public.

Public permitting process - The legal permission which a private property owner must obtain from a trustee (such as NJDEP or NYDEC) in order to use public trust resources in the estuary. When a private citizen or corporation accepts the conditions for a permit they are essentially agreeing to their responsibility to uphold the provisions of the Public Trust Doctrine.

SLAPP suit - Strategic Litigation Against Public Participation. Used by developers and polluters against public officials and or small non-government organizations to try to limit public debate about zoning or permitting. The typical tactic is to bring a law suit against the zoning board or activist for an outrageous sum of money in the hopes that they will quit the suit.

Takings - An increasingly common allegation by private landowners that government regulation of their property violates the prohibition in the Fifth Amendment to the Constitution prohibiting the government from taking private property for a public purpose without paying just compensation. The Public Trust Doctrine can preclude takings claims on the simple ground that the government cannot "take" from private landowners what they do not own.

Trustee - A person, group or government agency to whom another's property or the management of another's property is entrusted. Watershed-based planning - A planning approach which takes into account the watershed-wide effects of any regulatory or developmental decision upon natural systems and the Public Trust Doctrine rights of all citizens to access, navigation, fishing and recreation.

NATURAL RESOURCE DAMAGES (NRD) GLOSSARY

CERCLA - Comprehensive Environmental Response, Compensation and Liability Act of 1980, also known as the Superfund Law. Addresses any release, or threatened release, of hazardous substances, pollutants, or contaminants that could endanger human health and/or the environment.

NRD - Natural Resource Damages are what polluters are liable to the people for releasing hazardous substances into the environment that result in the injury, destruction, or loss of natural resources. Such resources include watershed uplands, tidal lands, wetlands, waterways, wildlife and fisheries that rightfully belong to all of us.

NRDA - A Natural Resource Damage Assessment is the process of collecting, compiling, and analyzing information, statistics, or data to make a determination of the extent of injury to a natural resource and assessing appropriate ways of restoring and compensating for that injury.

OPA - Oil Pollution Act of 1990. Addresses oil pollution liability and compensation as well as for the Federal government to direct and manage oil spill cleanups. OPA was enacted in response to the Exxon Valdez Alaska oil spill.

Orphan site - A hazardous waste site for which no potentially responsible party can be identified, resulting in the need for the clean up, restoration and/or replacement of the natural resource to be accomplished with taxpayer money.

PRP - Potentially Responsible Parties are individuals, municipalities, corporations or others who have been identified as possibly having contributed to the contamination of a natural resource with hazardous substances.

PTD - The Public Trust Doctrine is a common law legal precedent that says states hold legal title to lands under tidewater and to navigable waterways in trust for the benefit of the public. The PTD says that tidal lands and waters belong to the people for the traditional purposes of boating and fishing. In recent times that definition has been legally extended to include water quality, wildlife, aesthetic values, public access, and recreational uses. The PTD dates to ancient Rome and today is woven into the common law fabric of the states and is especially strong in New Jersey.

Public Nuisance - Allows states to take action when there is an unreasonable interference with a right common to the general public. A public nuisance need not effect the entire community, but must substantially interfere with a public right to use a natural resource. Public Nuisance has been used to justify the collection of NRD in New York State.

Public Trustee - Those government entities that have been given the responsibility for maintaining and protecting natural resources such as waterways, wetlands, ground water and watersheds, that are held in common by the people. Federal and state public trustees also hold the responsibility of restoring/replacing natural resources injured by a polluter, and for collecting NRDs from the polluter.