“A coalition of environmental advocates on Monday moved to beef up their complaint in federal court in Washington D.C. against the U.S. Department of the Interior, whose secretary they accuse of unlawfully keeping deputies at the helm of two of its agencies, the National Park Service (NPS) and the Bureau of Land Management (BLM), rather than seeing that Senate-confirmed directors take the reins.
Public Employees for Environmental Responsibility (PEER) and the Western Watersheds Project filed a supplemental complaint to eject NPS’ David Vela and BLM’s William Pendley from acting as their agencies’ directors by adding claims that the DOI violated the Federal Vacancies Reform Act (FVRA) by formally ordering their succession as the bodies’ leaders. The groups filed their motion in federal court in Washington D.C. to reflect new developments since they first sued in May.”
