Wetland? Nah. More Like a Perfect Spot for a Dream Home

In 2005, Mike and Chantell Sackett bought a 0.63-acre lot near Priest Lake in Idaho for $23,000 and began making plans for the rural retreat they wanted to build there. They finally started getting their hands dirty two years later, readying the land for a three-bedroom home. But as Greg Stohr reported in Businessweek, soon after the work began the couple got an unexpected visit from federal officials ordering them to stop their project because the property is actually a wetland protected under the Clean Water Act.

So began a five-year legal battle in which the Sacketts tried to get several courts to rule that the lot isn’t a wetland. They couldn’t get a judge to do so because the EPA hadn’t asked any court to enforce its order. Talk about swamps and thickets. The matter ultimately made its way to the Supreme Court, which came down yesterday with a ruling in the couple’s favor.