Wisconsin's Environmental Decade, Inc. v. Department of Industry, Labor & Human Relations

This is a review of an order of the circuit court for Dane county, P. CHARLES JONES, presiding.

The issue in this case is whether the Wisconsin Environmental Policy Act (WEPA), sec. 1.11, Stats. 1979, requires the Department of Industry, Labor and Human Relations (DILHR), to take environmental factors into account when reviewing the plans of a building project for code compliance. We conclude that, while WEPA requires DILHR to consider environmental factors when promulgating building codes, WEPA does not apply to individual code approval decisions.

In 1978, the James Building Corporation…