Courting Liberty

Harold Johnson and Jonathan Wood revisit PLF’s defense of Andy Johnson, who felt the weight of the EPA’s overreach when he built an environmentally beneficial stock pond on his property in Wyoming. In 2012, Wyoming farmer Andy Johnson dammed a stream on his private property, creating a stock pond to provide water to his livestock. The pond was constructed to maximize its incidental environmental benefits, including creating habitat for fish, wildlife, and migratory birds, establishing wetlands, and cleaning the water that passes through the pond. Nevertheless, in January, 2014, the EPA issued a compliance order against him, claiming that the deposit of dredge and fill materials to create the dam violates the CWA, and threatening him with fines of $37,500 per day that he doesn’t do what EPA demands.