The state Attorney General’s office isn’t opposing Republican lawmakers from filing briefs in a lawsuit over the state’s Freshwater Wetlands Act, but the state is taking the opportunity to disagree with Assemblyman Andrew Molitor’s interpretation of the way the law has been applied to Chautauqua Lake.

State Supreme Court Justice Richard Platkin of state Supreme Court in Albany ruled earlier this week that state lawmakers will be allowed to file what are known as amicus curie, or friends of the court, briefs in separate lawsuits filed by the Chautauqua Lake Property Owners Association and the Chautauqua Lake Partnership seeking to have the Freshwater Wetlands Act ruled unconstitutional. Briefs filed by the village of Lakewood and Bemus Point Business Association as well as by Riverkeeper Inc. and Save the Sound will also be accepted.

“Given that these cases involve ‘questions of important public interest’ coupled with the lack of opposition, the motions are granted and the proposed amicus submissions are accepted as filed,” Platkin wrote in his order.

Amicus briefs are written arguments submitted by individuals or groups who are not parties to a case but have a strong interest in the subject matter. These briefs offer expertise, provide a broader perspective on legal, social, or economic impacts, and offer outside information that may not be covered by the parties involved.

While documentation is still being submitted, Molitor and the Attorney General’s office are trading arguments in legal filings over whether or not parts of Chautauqua Lake should have been regulated as wetlands last summer. Molitor said in a letter to Platkin that New York lands or waters more than 12.4 acres and which meet the statutory definition of a freshwater wetland under Environmental Conservation Law Section 24 should be regulated as wetlands whether or not they also have characteristics of “unusual importance” under state law.

“The issue, however, is that the DEC is attempting to assert regulatory jurisdiction over millions of acres in New York, including the littoral zones of Chautauqua Lake and other lakes that fail to meet the definition of a freshwater wetland as listed in (Environmental Conservation Law) merely because those areas might have some characteristics that apply only to smaller wetlands of ‘unusual importance.'”

Meredith G. Lee-Clark and Ayah F. Badran, assistant state attorneys general, said that while they do not oppose the filing of the briefs, they do disagree with Molitor’s argument in his amicus brief that the DEC improperly deemed some portions of lakes, including Chautauqua Lake, as freshwater wetlands under the law.

Molitor’s brief argued that the Freshwater Wetland Regulations, as applied to any land or water regardless of size, completely disregard Article 24 of the Environmental Conservation Law and are inconsistent with the Environmental Conservation Law as a whole. Molitor said lands and waters that do not fit under the Environmental Conservation Law’s Article 24 definition, like many areas in and around lakes, including many parts of Chautauqua Lake that abut steep hills, forested land, parks, etc., cannot arbitrarily be defined by regulation as freshwater wetlands. He also argued that the DEC is without the authority to regulate entire lakes as freshwater wetlands.

Lee-Clark and Badran argued that Molitor’s argument “makes no sense” because many areas within shallow lakes, including Chautauqua Lake, have been regulated for years because they contain contiguous areas of lands and submerged lands that fit the definitions in state Environmental Conservation Law Section 24.

“Under the amended regulations, including wetlands in Chautauqua Lake that are submerged lands, are at least 12.4 acres, and support the aquatic and semi-aquatic vegetation listed in (Environmental Conservation Law Section 24),” the attorneys general wrote in their letter to the court. “The fact that an area is over 12.4 acres and may also have some of these ‘unusual importance’ characteristics does not somehow exclude the wetland from that definition. Indeed, many ‘lands and waters’ in New York, including many lakes, are within the meaning of ‘freshwater wetland’ because they satisfy several criteria of that definition, yet they are not excluded from protection under the Freshwater Wetlands Act. There is simply no legal, biological or logical basis to do so.”