Conservationists and Native American groups sued the Bureau of Land Management in federal court Tuesday to stop a project by Cadiz Inc that would draw billions of gallons of water a year from aquifers in the Mojave Desert East of Twentynine Palms.
In two separate lawsuits, the Center for Biological Diversity, the Native American Land Conservancy and others accuse BLM in U.S. District Court for the Central District of California of wrongly fast-tracking a decision, during the waning days of the Trump administration, to grant Cadiz rights-of-way needed for the project. The groups make claims under several statutes including the National Environmental Policy Act and the National Historic Preservation Act.
