## Facts

- Pere Marquette State Park, created in 1932 near the confluence of the Illinois and Mississippi Rivers, was Illinois’s largest state park at the time of suit.
- Camden Hollow, within the park, was used mainly for hiking and equestrian trails.
- In 1974, an accidental, human-caused wildfire burned about 345 acres of Camden Hollow. No immediate remedial action was taken, and natural regeneration began.
- By the time litigation was filed, new growth and surviving trees had refilled much of the area; the burn area included largely oak and hickory, with other species such as maple, ash, and elm.
- In 1978, the Illinois Department of Conservation proposed, for the first time in any Illinois state park, a commercial timber harvest and sale within the burn area.
- The proposed sale contemplated cutting 438 dead trees and 1,638 live trees.
- The Department justified the project as a salvage and sanitation measure, asserting that dead timber would lose value if not removed and that removal of dead and damaged trees would reduce the risk of disease or insect infestation.
- A master management plan for the park classified the burn area within a “Natural Resource Zone” and listed rehabilitation of the fire-damaged area as including “intensive logging.”
- Sierra Club and others sued in the Circuit Court of Jersey County seeking to enjoin the Department from logging or soliciting bids for the timber sale.
- The circuit court refused to issue an injunction, though it delayed the Department’s proposal pending review of the successful bidder’s plans.
- A divided Illinois Appellate Court reversed, concluding there was no statutory authority for the proposal and entering an injunction that barred cutting trees in state parks.
- The Department appealed to the Illinois Supreme Court.

## Issues

1. Whether Illinois statutes governing state parks authorized the Department of Conservation to conduct a commercial timber harvest and sale in Pere Marquette State Park as a salvage/sanitation or rehabilitation measure.

## Decision

- The Illinois Supreme Court held the Department lacked statutory authority, under then-existing law, to carry out the proposed commercial timber harvest and sale in Pere Marquette State Park.
- The court agreed that the statutory scheme for state parks did not permit the Department to undertake a commercial timber operation in a park absent specific legislative authorization.
- The court rejected the appellate court’s sweeping relief that effectively barred all tree cutting in all state parks.
- The judgment of the appellate court was vacated, and the cause was remanded with directions to enter a narrower injunction aimed at stopping the specific proposed Pere Marquette logging plan unless and until authorized by the legislature.

## Legal Principles

- An administrative agency has only the powers the legislature grants; significant resource-extraction activity on public land requires clear statutory authorization.
- Statutes governing state parks are directed to preservation of natural conditions and public recreation, not timber production or revenue-generating forestry.
- General management authority to care for parks does not, without more, authorize large-scale commercial timber harvesting and sales.
- Statutory separation between state parks and state forests matters: where the legislature addresses forestry and timber management in one context, courts are reluctant to infer the same authority in the state-park context.
- Some tree cutting in a park may be lawful when incidental to safety, maintenance, or limited management consistent with park purposes; courts should tailor injunctive relief to the challenged plan rather than impose a categorical ban untethered to the record.

## Conclusion

The Illinois Supreme Court concluded that the Department of Conservation could not proceed with its proposed commercial timber sale in Pere Marquette State Park because the state-park statutes did not authorize that type of operation, and it ordered a limited injunction directed at the specific logging plan rather than a blanket prohibition on all tree cutting in state parks.


Sierra Club v. Kenney, 429 N.E.2d 1214 (1981)