Rocketry Planet

WASHINGTON, District of Columbia USA -- Responding at the eleventh hour to a mandate established by U.S. District Court Judge Reggie B. Walton, attorneys for the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives (BATFE) today filed with the court the administrative record of the testing results they conducted in conjunction with the Air Force Research Laboratory in support of the government's case that ammonium perchlorate composite propellant is properly classified as an explosive.

The lawsuit, brought by the National Association of Rocketry (NAR) and Tripoli Rocketry Association (TRA), challenges those test results.

In a hearing earlier this month, Judge Walton specified the time line that the parties to the lawsuit would follow with regard to the submission of supporting documentation, the procedural responses to those submissions and the schedule to file for summary judgments.  The initial date on that time line, October 31, 2006, was the date the BATFE was required to have filed the documentation supporting their position that resulted from the testing they conducted.

The original indication that the BATFE supporting documentation was in excess of 900 pages turned out to be significantly lower than stated.  According to the documentation file in district court today, the report is in excess of 1200 pages.  A note in the record indicated that "[d]ue to a numbering error, and not an omission of any material, defendant notes that the administrative record does not contain pages 1242-43."

More significantly, the agency elected not to file an electronic copy of the documentation, instead noting that "[d]ue to its length, the administrative record is being submitted to the Clerk’s Office in paper form only and will be available for public viewing in the Clerk’s Office between 9:00 a.m. and 4:00 p.m., Monday through Friday."  This is an obvious attempt to block extended, in-depth, review of the documentation by all concerned parties, and may be seen as an attempt to obfuscate the truth.  No doubt, plaintiff will vehemently argue the necessity of reviewing the document thoroughly, in its entirety, without having to send industry experts individually into the court itself for review of the record.  So much for the government's commitment to the Paperwork Reduction Act.

While the escapades of procedural parrying should be nothing new to veterans of the nation's court rooms, the net result is that the plaintiff is only left with 48 days to review the documentation and submit a supplemental complaint to the court by the December 18, 2006 deadline of the court's scheduling order.  As a result, it will be a busy holiday season for hobby rocketry's national organizations, since in addition to responding to this filing, they also have to continue to orchestrate the submission of public comments to the Notice of Proposed Rulemaking regarding Propellant Actuated Devices (PADS) that must be submitted no later than November 9, 2006. 

A copy of today's U.S. District Court filing follows:

"Filed 31 October 2006:

DEFENDANT’S NOTICE OF FILING OF ADMINISTRATIVE RECORD
Pursuant to the remand of this matter from the United States Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit and this Court for reconsideration, the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives respectfully gives notice of the filing of the administrative record relating to its decision that ammonium perchlorate composite propellant (“APCP”) is an explosive as defined in Title 18, Chapter 40 of the United States Code. Due to its length, the administrative record is being submitted to the Clerk’s Office in paper form only and will be available for public viewing in the Clerk’s Office between 9:00 a.m. and 4:00 p.m., Monday through Friday. The record’s certification and index are also included. Due to a numbering error, and not an omission of any material, defendant notes that the administrative record does not contain pages 1242-43. A copy of the administrative record is being served on counsel for plaintiffs on this date."

Reader comments:

#1

Folks, click on the pretty doggie in the right-hand window and contribute to the legal fund...

crontab on 10-31-2006 07:13 PM

#2

Just ordered four Doggies for myself, the wife, the daughter, and her friend at college .

TWRackers on 11-03-2006 05:53 PM

#3

One of my concerns with the 1000+ page gorilla is those of us who have given meaningful feedback to the legal team do not get feedback themselves (even in private) so futher secondary work can be of help. I hope they are reading this. They are not replying to private email at this time.

Just Jerry on 11-03-2006 09:20 PM

#4

You can bet they are reading it. The modus operandi at the present is full-on mushroom theory: keep 'em in the dark and feed 'em $hit.

I expect that they are busy, and that's understandable. But even an Internet moron can set up an autoresponder that says "I'm busy."

I even wrote to say I had set up a t-shirt of the month program where 100% of my proceeds were being donated to the legal fund. We are already in the double digits on orders, so it's going well. But did I get a "thank you"? No. I didn't even get a response.

So, you are correct, the only way to get even a private response is to pi$$ them off.

ddmobley on 11-04-2006 01:36 AM

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