Historic Green Springs, Inc. v. Bergland

Historic Green Springs, Inc. (HGSI) (plaintiff) filed suit to stop mining company VVL (defendant) from obtaining a loan guarantee that would finance vermiculite mining operations in the Historic Green Springs District (District); VVL filed a counter-claim and third-party complaint to stop the District from being listed on the National Register of Historic Places and being named a national historic landmark under the Historic Sites Act (HSA). The District over which the parties were in dispute encompassed approximately 14,000 acres in central Virginia that included many well-preserved 18th and 19th century buildings, along with farmland and modest commercial development. VVL and another mining company also possessed mining rights over the land in and around the District. In an effort to preserve the District, HGSI lobbied for historic designation on the state and federal level and also acquired preservation easements that prohibited new industrial and commercial building or development over a large portion of the District. HGSI offered the preservation easements to the Federal Department of the Interior (Department). The Department initially rejected the easements but maintained interest in their acquisition for several years until 1977, when the Department designated the District as a national landmark and accepted the easements from HGSI. VVL filed its objections to the landmark designation and acceptance of the easements on the grounds that the Department lacked the authority to make the designation or acquire the easements under the HSA. VVL claimed that the Department had improperly applied the broader standards of the National Historic Preservation Act of 1966 (NHPA) to take an action only authorized under the HSA.