Alaska Employment Law

Court-awarded back pay for VA probationary employees:  The 9th Circuit has held that a probationary Veterans Administration employee (here, a VA radiologist) may not rely on either the Administrative Procedures Act or the Back Pay Act to obtain judicially-awarded damages for termination in violation of VA procedures.  As to the APA, first, it doesn’t authorize awards of back pay, and, second, the “comprehensive statutory scheme” governing the VA bars judicial review.  As to the BPA, it waives sovereign immunity only when an “appropriate authority” has held that the federal employee’s rights were violated; a District Court judge is not an “appropriate authority,” according to the 9th Circuit.

Weber v. Department of Veterans Affairs, 2008 WL 126648 (9th Cir. Jan. 15, 2008).

Supplemental EIS for Beaufort Sea Lease Sale:  District Court Judge Ralph Beistline has denied the request of the North Slope Borough and the Alaska Eskimo Whaling Commission to enjoin the Interior Department from proceeding with Lease Sale 202 in the Beaufort Sea.  The plaintiffs had argued that NEPA required Interior to prepare a supplemental Environmental Impact Statement.    Beistline concluded that Interior had taken a “hard look” at the plaintiffs’ concerns before deciding not to do a supplemental EIS, and thus held that Interior’s decision was not “arbitrary and capricious.”

North Slope Borough v. Minerals Management Service, 2008 WL 110889 (D.Alaska Jan. 8, 2008).

Layla Hughes of the Borough’s Law Department represented plaintiffs.  Bruce Landon and Dean Dunsmore of DOJ’s Anchorage office represented Interior.