Environmental Law Clinic students recently took a three-day trip to the Medicine Lake Highlands, an unspoiled area located in the Modoc National Forest in northeastern California that the clinic is trying to protect from geothermal fracturing or “fracking.”

Besides being sacred to the Pit River and other Native American Tribes for over 10,000 years, the Highlands are filled with ancient lava flows, intact forests and watersheds, and threatened and sensitive plants and animals.

Full-time clinic students Rose Stanley  (JD ’16), Philip Womble (JD ‘16), Heather Kryczka (JD ‘16), Caroline Parke (JD ‘16), Liz Jones (JD ‘16), Raza Rasheed (JD ‘15), and Abigail Barnes (JD ‘15), along with advanced clinic students Amanda Prasuhn (JD ‘15) and Elizabeth Hook (JD ‘15), toured the area, together with clinic director Debbie Sivas and clinical supervising attorneys Matthew Sanders and Alicia Thesing. The clinic members attended a Pit River Tribal Council meeting, conferred with members of the clinic’s non-profit clients to learn about the twenty-year history of the case, and discussed opportunities for protecting this unique area from industrial development.

The clinic continues to pursue its case against the extension of geothermal leases in the Medicine Lake Highlands on behalf of the Pit River Tribe and non-profit clients. The case has been briefed before the United States Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit, and the clinic looks forward to oral argument.   ◊