author: CHRISTENSEN, Senior District Judge.

text:
    Enola E. FREEMAN, on behalf of herself and all others similarly situated v. Rogers C. B. MORTON, Secretary of the Interior, et al., Appellants.
    No. 73-1409.
    United States Court of Appeals, District of Columbia Circuit.
    April 25, 1974.
    Argued Feb. 21, 1974.

      Eva R. Datz, Atty., Dept, of Justice, with whom Wallace H. Johnson, Asst. Atty. Gen., Harold H. Titus, Jr., U. S. Atty. at the time the brief was filed, Leonard Belter, Asst. U. S. Atty., and Edmund B. Clark, Atty., Dept, of Justice, were on the brief for appellants. John A. Terry and James F. McMullin, Asst. U. S. Attys., also entered appearances for appellants.
    Patrick F. J. Macrory, Washington, D. C., with whom Stuart J. Land, Washington, D. C., was on the brief, for appellees.
    Before BAZELON, Chief Judge, Mc-GOWAN, Circuit Judge, and CHRISTENSEN, United States Senior District Judge for the District of Utah.

       Sitting by designation pursuant to 28 U.S.O. § 294(d).

   CHRISTENSEN, Senior District Judge.

This is an appeal by defendants-appellants Rogers C. B. Morton and other officials of the Bureau of Indian Affairs (BIA), from a final order of the United States District Court for the District of Columbia granting summary declaratory judgment in favor of plaintiffs-appellees, Enola E. Freeman and three other employees of BIA, “that all initial hirings, promotions, lateral transfers and reassignments in the Bureau of Indian Affairs as well as any other personnel movement therein intended to fill vacancies in that agency, however created, be declared governed by 25 U.S.C. Sec. 472 .” This section, which was a part of the Indian Reorganization Act of 1934 provides as follows:

Standards For Indians Appointed To Indian Office
The Secretary of the Interior is directed to establish standards of health, age, character, experience, knowledge, and ability for Indians who may be appointed, without regard to civil-service laws, to the various positions maintained, now or hereafter, by the Indian Office, in the administration of functions or services affecting any Indian tribe. Such qualified Indians shall hereafter have the preference to appointment to vacancies in any such positions. June 18, 1934, c. 576, § 12, 48 Stat. 986.

From the passage of the statute until the institution of this suit the Bureau had narrowly applied this preference provision by construing the term “appointment to vacancies” to mean initial hirings only. Appellees were, and presumably still are, employed by the Bureau of Indian Affairs. Each at one or more times during her employment applied for assignment to a vacant position within the Bureau, had been classified at least as “qualified” and in some eases as “well qualified” • or “best qualified” and was denied the position when a non-Indian was given the assignment. In some instances the non-Indian had received a lower qualification rating than the Indian applicant. Challenging this construction as altogether too grudging, appellees asserted in this action that the Indian preference applies to all appointments whether filled from within or outside the Bureau, and whether effected through initial hiring, promotions, reassignments within the same office or lateral transfers from another office.

While this action was pending the Bureau issued a revised policy statement allowing Indians a preference not only in hiring but generally in promotions, transfers from outside the Bureau and reassignments within the Bureau which improved promotion prospects. Purely lateral reassignments within the Bureau, however, were excepted from such policy, as were promotions with respect to which the Commissioner found a “waiver” of the general policy to be in the best interest of the Bureau. Plaintiffs limited their claims for relief to a declaration of their preference rights. The ruling of the district court that the Indian preference did not extend to training opportunities is not in question. Neither party has attacked the preference on civil rights or constitutional grounds. Furthermore, the parties agree that all of the controlling facts appear without dispute of record and that the case was ripe for resolution by summary judgment one way or another. The Tenth Circuit holding that the Indian preference does not apply to reduction-in-force situations has not been questioned in these proceedings. And the parties have accepted the definition of “Indians” as those of one-quarter or more Indian blood as valid and as applying to each of the plaintiffs for the purposes of the statute. As a consequence of these circumstances the issues presented by the parties and to which we shall limit further discussion are narrow and apparently of first impression:

I. Does 25 U.S.C. § 472 apply to transfers and reassignments within the Bureau of Indian Affairs which are purely lateral ?

II. Does that section allow the granting of exceptions to the preference policy with reference to promotions, as well as with respect to lateral transfers or reassignments, for exceptional administrative or management reasons ?

I

The appellants argue that the district court’s order is erroneously broad because it gives Indians preference “even as regards purely lateral reassignments . . . where a job and/or its occupant is merely relocated.” They rely upon statements in Mescalero Apache Tribe v. Hickel, 432 F.2d 956, 960 (10th Cir. 1970), supra, and draw particular attention to a comment ■ that “[t]he language of § 472 was specifically limited to ‘appointments to vacancies’ because of concern that the section as originally drafted would allow qualified Indian applicants to immediately displace ‘white’ employees of the B.I.A.”

But the reason Mescalero did not apply the Indian preference to reduction-in-force situations was simply that no “appointments to vacancies” within the contemplation of the preference statute were involved. The declaratory judgment under review here covers only “personnel movements . . . intended to fill vacancies in that [BIA] agency, however created. . . .” Under the order if no vacancies to be filled exist the preference does not apply, but if there is a vacancy to be filled, whether for initial hiring, or by or as a result of promotions, lateral transfers or reassignments in the Bureau, it does apply. We agree with the district court that this is what Section 472 means, and requires.

Vague reference is made by appellants to “mere” relocations of jobs or reassignments of duties essential to efficient administration, which they imply are undesirably inhibited by the district court’s judgment. It would be inappropriate for us to pursue such generalities not involved in the situations of the plaintiffs nor defined in the record, except to indicate, as did the trial court, that only appointments to vacancies are covered by the preference; readjustments in assignments or tasks not involving the creation of, or appointment to, vacancies are unaffected, unless of course these personnel adjustments are used as mere subterfuges to avoid the statute as interpreted here.

The most persuasive situation for an exception to the preference was specifically presented only after the entry of the court’s order, in connection with the application for its stay: circumstances dictating the transfer of a particular non-Indian employee because of problems beyond his control or when his safety or continued effectiveness is threatened, for example. Even though such a necessity may be thought not to justify disregard of the preference in any lateral transfer to an existing vacancy, appellants argue that at least an exchange of positions would be proper to meet such an emergency. This lateral swapping of positions would bring into more acute question the meaning of “vacancy” as well as “appointment”. Where two employees of identical status, with the approval of their superiors, merely exchange positions it is suggested by appellants that there would be no vacancy with respect to either position. Of course if this device were to be employed to shift an employee contemplating retirement or promotion from a position having an available Indian replacement to a position (on a different reservation for example) having only non-Indian replacements available, obviously the intent of the statute under any view would be defeated. Yet appellees say that the BIA should be permitted to utilize in good faith this theory of exchange of positions without applying the Indian preference.

As tempting as this continued softening of the statute may appear, we cannot approve it. That would require an unacceptable torsion of the term “vacancy” or the word “appointment”, or both. Whether a vacancy exists depends upon whether a position is vacant and susceptible of being filled, not upon how it is filled. According to appellants’ argument, for example, if an employee in office A should retire, his former position would be vacant only if his replacement were either promoted to that position or hired from outside the BIA to fill it; the determination of whether a vacancy occurs would be delayed until the vacancy no longer existed. We be: lieve Judge Corcoran correctly reasoned that when a position is open, needing to be filled, it is vacant in the contemplation of the statute, and if the position is filled by transferring to it an employee from a position of similar status somewhere else within the BIA, that employee’s former position also becomes a vacant position to be filled with due regard for the Indian preference.

Appellants’ approach to the word “appointment” is to say that the word has come to mean, through custom and usage in civil service contexts, “initial hiring from outside”, and it is suggested that this was the meaning intended by Congress in using the word in the statutute. It is interesting to note in passing, as the record indicates, that Civil Service practice now accepts promotions as “appointments”. But here we are not dealing with Civil Service application but practices expressly intended to depart from them. The Secretary is directed “to establish standards . for Indians who may be appointed without regard to civil-service laws . ” Furthermore, to concede, as appellees do, that “appointment” refers not only to initial hiring, but also to promotions, while maintaining that the term does not include lateral transfers, would be to only selectively accept the contended-for meaning, but largely to reject it to coincide with previously announced policies and the exigencies of this suit.

Except in extremely exceptional circumstances a non-Indian would be transferred out of an existing position only if, taking into consideration the Indian preference, he could fill legally another vacancy because of the unavailability of a qualified Indian. If he were thus laterally transferred, then his former position would become vacant, subject to being filled also in a manner consistent with the Indian preference. To bend this interpretation of the statute in an effort to accommodate its contrary terms to extraordinary situations envisaged by appellants would not be justified. Many administrative adjustments already have been necessary, and more should have been made earlier, to achieve the purposes and mandate of the law. If there are no reasonable administrative or management alternatives to violation of the mandated preference for meeting the situations discussed — and the record falls far short of demonstrating that there are not — the problem is a legislative and not a judicial one. In view of the legislative history it does not appear likely that it will be weakened by Congress for insubstantial reason; more to the point, it is not within our province to do so at all.

Relevant legislative history disclosed a congressional intent actively and positively to establish, through an orderly process, Indian control of Indian services. True, Congress did not envision the mass termination of all non-Indian employees, but there can be little doubt that traditional civil service security for non-Indians in the Indian service was deliberately subordinated to the objectives of the Indian preference.

We conclude that the district court correctly determined the reach of Section 472.

II

Even assuming, as we hold, that the Indian preference applies to lateral transfers in connection with which vacancies are to be filled, appellants contend that the Commissioner of Indian Affairs has a discretion to make limited exceptions with reference to lateral transfers, as well as promotions when this is expressly found to be in the best interests of the Bureau. The existing administrative interpretation to this effect, the appellants assert, is entitled to great weight in view of such cases as Udall v. Tallman, 380 U.S. 1, 85 S.Ct. 792, 13 L.Ed.2d 616 (1965). To the contrary, we consider appellants’ contention weakened by the fact that shortly before its present position was taken it was Bureau policy not to recognize promotions as falling within the purview of Section 472 at all. The contention is rendered suspect by the illogic of reading exceptions into the statute with regard to promotions and applying an inflexible rule concerning initial hirings, is further thrown into question by a certain confusing ambivalence in appellants’ position even during the final hearing below, and is dissipated by a comparison of the provisions of prior Indian preference statutes with those of the act controlling in the circumstances of this case. As pointed out by Judge Corcoran, the controlling statute does not say the “ ‘Indians . . . may have preference’. It says: ‘ . qualified Indians shall hereafter have . . . preference’ ”, and “if Congress had intended to write discretionary power into the language of Sec. 472 it would have done so expressly . . . One need only look at various Indian preference' statutes to recognize that Congress was well aware of the distinction between discretionary and mandatory action.”

Any conflicting administrative interpretation to the contrary must yield to the clear provisions of the act. Even though some ambiguities might be perceived under certain situations they should be resolved, reason permitting, in favor of the Indians. Choate v. Trapp, 224 U.S. 665, 32 S.Ct. 565, 56 L.Ed. 941 (1912). But ambiguities, as has been pointed out, are largely confined to the shifting position of the appellees and their predecessors who, in administering a statute designed in 1934 to progressively correct a situation where there was a smaller proportion of Indians in the BIA then than there was in 1900, have achieved little more than the old ratio during the intervening forty years. All of these circumstances are at least as persuasive as those in Morton v. Ruiz, 415 U.S. 199, 94 S.Ct. 1055, 39 L.Ed.2d 270 (1974), against control of judicial interpretation by administrative treatment.

In ‘oral argument appellants’ counsel suggested that the word “preference” connoted “a choice” according to some dictionary definition or rulings in other context. It was implied that this “choice” was to be made by the Commissioner. We reject this play on words, and return to the clear meaning of the Act in context with its purpose, history and wording — qualified Indians, not the Commissioner, have a right to the preference in appointments to vacancies. The statute makes the choice.

In Mescalero Apache Tribe v. Hickel, 432 F.2d 956, 959-960 (10th Cir. 1970), cert. denied, 401 U.S. 981, 91 S.Ct. 1195, 28 L.Ed.2d 333 (1971), Chief Judge Lewis, writing for the court, recognized that the government’s position contained “overtones of the age-old [Indian] complaint of the ‘forked tongue’ . ” and that the objective of Section 472 for the BIA to “gradually become an Indian service predominantly in the hands of educated and competent Indians” was not being realized. That court felt constrained to hold that the Indian preference did not apply to reductions-in-force because “no appointments to vacancies” were involved. Accepting the rationale of Mescalero as applied to the facts there, as we have, and that the promotions and lateral transfers involved in the case before us do involve appointments to vacancies, as we must, for us to hold that the Indian preference established by Section 472 need not be observed if it is determined impractical to do so by the Commissioner, notwithstanding, as we have noted, that Section 472 was intended by the Congress to change prior statutes which theretofore had granted a preference only “insofar as practicable”, would render understandable a disinterment of the ancient grievance against the duality of deceit to which the Indian race so long reacted and which it was to be hoped had been laid to rest by considerate modern legislation, including Section 472. We conclude that this section means what it says, as the trial court determined.

The partial stay heretofore granted is vacated and the judgment and order of the district court affirmed.

      . In addition to declaratory relief the amended complaint sought prohibitory and mandatory injunctions, as well as damages. For purposes of their motion for summary judgment, however, plaintiffs waived all relief other than a declaration of their preferential rights in the areas of promotion, lateral transfers and training.

      . The district court rejected appellees’ claim that the preference rights included preferential designation for training assignments. Appellees took no cross-appeal. See Fed.R.App. P. 4(a).

      . During the proceedings below a three-judge court in New Mexico, not reaching the constitutional issue presented, ruled that the statute construed here was impliedly repealed by the Civil Rights Acts of 1964 and 1972 (42 U.S.C. § 2000e-2 as amended). Mancari v. Morton, 359 F.Supp. 585 (D.N.M.1973). The application of that ruling has been stayed pending appeal to the Supreme Court, where probable jurisdiction has been noted. 414 U.S. 1142, 94 S.Ct. 893, 39 L.Ed.2d 99 (1973). Except as it documents the shared position of all parties before this court that the Indian preference, however, it is construed to resolve the issue here, is valid, it may be more interesting than significant to note that both appellants’ counsel and counsel representing appellees are asking the Supreme Court to reverse 2Ian-oari. See 42 U.S.L.W. 3158, No. 73-362 (1973); Id., No. 73-364.

      . There were extensive demands for admission which were largely undenied except as they called for conclusions of law.

      . Mescalero Apache Tribe v. Hickel, 432 F.2d-956 (10th Cir. 1970), cert. denied, 401 U.S. 981, 91 S.Ct. 1195, 28 L.Ed.2d 333 (1971).

      . Employees eligible for Indian preference are those with one-fourth or more degree Indian blood, regardless of the type of appointment they have received, and those employees with lesser degree of Indian blood to whom preference was extended at the time of appointment. 44 BIA Manual 713, 1.2. It is noted in the Manual that there are a few individuals in the latter category who were appointed before the one-fourth Indian blood requirement went into effect.

      . This court’s decision in Fass v. Gray, 91 U.S.App.D.C. 28, 197 F.2d 587, cert. denied, 344 U.S. 839, 73 S.Ct. 39, 97 L.Ed. 653 (1952), involved a reduetion-in-force problem of veterans in the context of a significantly different statute and the rule making power of the Civil Service Commission. Mescalero Apache Tribe v. Hickel, 432 F.2d 956 (10th Cir. 1970), cert. denied, 401 U.S. 981, 91 S.Ct. 1195, 28 L.Ed.2d 333 (1971), supra, also was a reduction-in-force case although involving Indians; the court held that “appointments to vacancies” were not involved so as to invoke control by Section 472. Mancari v. Morton, 359 F.Supp. 585 (D.N.M.1973), supra, expressly excludes our problem from consideration by the following language: “The United State District Court for the District of Columbia . . . had before it the question of whether or not section 472 gave the plaintiff a preference over all non-Indian employees in the Bureau of Indian Affairs .with respect to promotions, reassignments to vacant positions within the BIA, and to assignments to available training positions . . . The district court in Freeman held that section 472 required the preference be given in promotions and reassignments to vacant positions within the Bureau . . . We do not decide whether the preference is as broad as the court in Freeman v. Morton indicates. It is sufficient to permit consideration of the basic issue to observe that no one challenges the application of the preference, acts to initial hiring and indeed the wording does not permit such a challenge.” 359 F.Supp. at 589.

      . I. e., movements of personnel which do not entail promotions or changes in salary, responsibility or promotion potentials, the latter element of which appellants concede also would justify considering the transfer as a promotion. AVe see difficulties in any such differentiation : the practical one of predicting promotional opportunity or lack of it in any shift; the control superiors would have through judgmental or discretionary action over the application of the Indian preference, by reason of this uncertain aspect, and the opportunities for thwarting the preference itself by transfers of current non-Indian employees from positions having no available qualified Indian replacements to vacant positions for which there are qualified Indians available. These problems are reduced or eliminated by the district court ruling.

      . “A ‘vacancy’ is a ‘vacancy’ ”, its opinion observed, “no matter how created. Congress drew no distinction — as it could easily have done had it so intended.”

      . The McKune affidavit in support of the request for a stay on appeal stated: “Lateral reassignment of Bureau of Indian Affairs’ employees to vacant positions are frequently made because of a breakdown in relationships between an employee at the agency level and the tribes that he serves. Such breakdowns usually result from conditions over which an employee has no control. These situations require that the employee be moved as quickly as possible to avoid further alienation of the tribe, and occasionally, the threat of physical violence to the employee and his family. When a qualified Indian candidate is available for the position to which a non-Indian employee may be reassigned under these circumstances, it becomes impossible to move the non-Indian employee.”

      . “The result [of present civil service rules] has been that the Indians have been given no opportunity to handle their own affairs or to be trained in their own affairs. This bill, we think, gives them the opportunity to which they are entitled . . . [T] o make the Indians the principal agents in their own economic and racial salvation and progressively reduce and largely decentralize the powers of the Federal Indian Service.” Memorandum on S. 2755 by John Collier, Commissioner for Indian Affairs, reprinted in Hearings on S. 2755 Before Senate Committee on Indian Affairs, 73d Cong., 2d Sess., 1, 19 (1934).
      “The definite goal [of the Act] is to have Indians eventually handling everything. . . . ” Testimony of Commissioner Collier, Senate Hearings, 322.
      “Indian progress and ambition will be enormously strengthened as soon as we adopt the principle that the Indian service shall gradually become, in fact as well as in name, an Indian service predominantly in the hands of educated and competent Indians.” Rep. Howard, 78 Congressional Record 11731 (1934).
      “[Section 472] directs the Secretary of the Interior to establish the necessary standards of health, age, character, experience, knowledge and ability for Indian eligibles and to appoint them without regard to civil service laws . . . This provision in no way signifies a disregard of the true merit system, but it adapts the merit system to Indian temperament, training and capacity.” Id.

      . “This does not mean a radical transformation overnight or the ousting of present white employees. It does mean a preference right to qualified Indians for appointments to future vacancies in the local Indian field service and an opportunity to rise to the higher administra-1 tive and technical posts.” Id.

      . “ . . . [W]e must not blind ourselves to the fact that the effect of this bill if worked out would unquestionably be to replace white employees by Indian employees, I do not know how fast, but ultimately it ought to go very far indeed.” Comm’r Collier, Hearings on H.R. 7902 Before House Committee on Indian Affairs, 73d Cong., 2d Sess., 39 (1934).

      . “ . . . It is the policy for promotional consideration that where two or more candidates who meet the established qualification requirements are available for filling a vacancy, if one of them is an Indian, he shall be given preference in filling the vacancy. In accordance with the policy statement approved by the Secretary, the Commissioner may grant exceptions to this policy by approving the selection and appointment of non-Indians, when he considers it in the best interest of the Bureau.” 44 BIA Manual 335, 3.1 (as amended June 23, 1972).

      . Appellants assure us in their brief that “it is not contended that there is discretion to make exceptions as regards initial hiring” but do not attempt to reconcile this long standing position with their view of discretion as to promotions, although they now concede in general that promotions are covered by the Section.

      . On June 22, 1972, Secretary Morton expanded the recognition of preferences to promotions and training. By December 8, 1972, when the motions for summary judgment came before the district court the position of the defendants was modified; ■ they apparently contended that while the Indian preference could be applied by the Bureau to promotions, such application was not required but that the Bureau could accommodate the preference to special circumstances justifying exceptions, as was their contention concerning lateral assignments. In the course of the argument below they then seemed to withdraw somewhat from the concessions of that statement by arguing that the statute did not necessarily require the preference to be applied in cases of promotion but it may be “extended administratively into the area of promotions”, and that non-Indians “may be promoted other than as a last resort.” Later in the argument appellants’ counsel argued generally that Congress did not intend to cover promotions as distinguished from initial hiring, and finally the claim seemed to be that while the preference statute did generally apply to promotions and lateral assignments, as well as initial hiring, a discretion resided in the Bureau to make exceptions in cases of administrative convenience or necesity. Counsel for appellants then said: “In a situation where selecting someone who is qualified but whose qualifications simply don’t match someone else’s and where a program might be jeopardized, the commissioner may make an exception; but, virtually, that is it. A qualified Indian gets preference for promotion.” Later counsel for appellants said: “With respect to promotion we are saying the statute says vacancies, it must apply across the board . . . Now in the area of training the statute says vacancies; it is inapplicable to training.”

      . 25 U.S.C. § 44, originally enacted in 1894, 28 Stat. 313, provided that in the Indian Service Indians shall be employed as herders, teamsters, and laborers, “and. where practicable in all other employments in connection with the agencies and the Indian Service. . ” Section 45, derived from the Act of June 30, 1834, 4 Stat. 737, provides that in all cases of the appointments of interpreters or other persons employed for the benefits of the Indians, a preference shall be given to persons of Indian descent, “if such can' be found, who are properly qualified for the execution of the duties.” Section 46, derived from the Act of May 17, 1882, 22 Stat. 88 provides ‘that “[p] reference shall at all times, as far as practicable, be given to Indians in the employment of clerical, mechanical, and other help on reservations and about agencies. In contrast, Section 472, the most recent Congressional mandate on the subject, provides that the Indians involved here, without regard to Civil Service laws “shall hereafter have the preference to appointment to vacancies. . . . ”

      . “But in the government’s dealings with the Indians the rule is exactly the contrary. The construction, instead of being strict, is liberal; doubtful expressions, instead of being resolved in favor of the United States, are to be resolved in favor of a weak and defenseless people, who are wards of the nation, and dependent wholly upon its protection and good faith. This rule of construction has been recognized, without exception, for more than a hundred years. . . . ” 224 U.S. at 675. See also Choctaw Nation v. Oklahoma, 397 U.S. 620, 631, 642, 90 S.Ct. 1328, 25 L.Ed.2d 615, (1970) (interpretation of treaties), and Haley v. Seaton, 108 U.S.App.D.C. 257, 281 F.2d 620, 623 (1960) (interpretation of executive orders).

      . “Thirty four years ago, in 1900, the number of Indians holding regular positions in the Indian Service, in proportion to the total positions w-as greater than it is today.” (Memorandum on S. 2755 submitted to the Senate Committee on Indian Affairs by John Collier, Commissioner of Indian Affairs, reprinted in Senate Hearings, supra.)

      . The record indicates that Indians comprised 51%.of the total number of employees in 1941 but that this percentage decreased to 48% in 1969. In 1970 only a little more than half of all employees were Indians and the majority of these were employed in the lower ranking jobs.

      . “We have recognized that the weight of an administrative interpretation will depend, among other things, upon ‘its consistency with earlier and later pronouncements’ of an agency. In this instance the BIA’s somewhat inconsistent posture belies its present assertions. In order for an agency interpretation to be granted deference it must be consistent with the congressional purpose.” (Citations omitted.)

      . The district court refused any stay of its order, but upon application of appellants we allowed a stay pendente lite but limited to the effect of the order upon lateral transfers.


source: Caselaw Access Project

author: BAZELON, Chief Judge:

license: Public Domain

text:
    Dick JONES et al., Appellants, v. DISTRICT OF COLUMBIA REDEVELOPMENT LAND AGENCY et al. (three cases).
    Nos. 73-1507, 73-1638 and 73-1754.
    United States Court of Appeals, District of Columbia Circuit.
    Decided April 26, 1974.
    Argued July 24, 1973.

      Florence Wagman Roisman, Washington, D. C., for appellants.
    Larry G. Gutterridge, Atty., Dept, of Justice, with whom Wallace H. Johnson, Asst. Atty. Gen., Harold H. Titus, Jr., U. S. Atty., Nathan Dodell, Asst. U. S. Atty., and Carl Strass, Atty. Dept, of Justice, were on the brief for federal appellees. No brief was filed on behalf of federal appellees in No. 73-1638.
    Bernard S. Cohen, Alexandria, Va., on brief for Washington Ecology Center, amicus curiae.
    Before BAZELON, Chief Judge, and ROBINSON and WILKEY, Circuit Judges.
   BAZELON, Chief Judge:

In November, 1972, plaintiffs filed suit in the District Court challenging the legality of certain actions of the defendants — the District of Columbia Redevelopment Land Agency (RLA), the National Capital Planning Commission (NCPC), and the U. S. Department of Housing and Urban Development (HUD) — in formulating and executing plans for the urban renewal of the 14th Street area of the District. Plaintiffs, residents of the area, applied to the Court for preliminary injunctive relief, asking the Court, inter alia, (1) to enjoin the defendants from taking any action pursuant to the Neighborhood Development Programs for the second, third and fourth “action years” until thé defendant agencies had complied with the procedural requirements of the National Environmental Policy Act; (2) to enjoin defendant RLA from displacing area residents without providing the benefits mandated by the Uniform Relocation Assistance and Real Property Acquisition Policies Act; and (3) to enjoin defendant RLA from failing to maintain residential properties it has acquired in the area in accordance with the provisions of the District of Columbia Housing Code.

In a series of orders the District Court denied the requested preliminary injunctive relief in all respects save one, granting an injunction only as to further actions under the second and third-year Neighborhood Development Programs. This injunction, however, the Court stayed, and ultimately dissolved after defendant HUD had filed with the Court a final environmental impact statement concerning the programs. In response to this series of orders plaintiffs filed these appeals.

We reverse the District Court’s orders only insofar as they rested on a determination that the Uniform Relocation Assistance Act directs no mandate to defendant RLA. Although we have grave doubts concerning the District Court’s handling of certain aspects of the NEPA issues in its initial order, we think these problems substantially resolved, and to some extent rendered moot, by the subsequent actions of the defendant agencies and the subsequent orders of the Court. We therefore find no cause to disturb the District Court’s orders as to the remainder of the issues presented for our review.

I.

An understanding of the issues before us requires a somewhat extensive account of the facts underlying this litigation and the complex course the litigation has. thus far taken. In setting out upon the redevelopment of the 14th Street area, the District of Columbia chose to proceed under the Neighborhood Development Programs provisions of the federal Housing Act, under which communities propose urban renewal activites to be undertaken in particular “action years,” thus allowing HUD to fund, or decide not to fund, such activities in annual increments rather than years in advance of need. In the District, Neighborhood Development Programs (NDPs) for each action year must follow what the District Court termed “a tortuous route from conception to execution.” After consultation with area residents and other interested parties, RLA formulates the action year program, the set of physical steps to be taken during the year in’ conformity with and in furtherance of an overall “workable program” for community development previously certified by HUD. RLA then submits its proposed action year program to NCPC for adoption or modification. If NCPC adopts the program, either as submitted or as modified, it is presented to the District’s City Council, which holds public hearings on the program and decides whether to empower RLA to apply to HUD for federal funding. If the Council approves the program, NCPC certifies it to RLA for implementation the District applies to HUD for funding, and RLA proceeds to execute the provisions of the program. Thus, each action year program must, before execution, be passed upon by four distinct governmental bodies, three of which, RLA, NCPC and HUD, are federal agencies.

Renewal activities in the 14th Street area began in 1969 with the adoption of a general land use plan. By November, 1972, when this suit was instituted, NDPs 1, 2 and 3 had been fully approved in the manner described above; the fourth action year program, NDP 4, had been formulated by RLA, approved by NCPC, and forwarded to the City Council for its consideration. At the same time, pursuant to the action year programs already approved, RLA began to execute “Package I,” preparing a prospectus to solicit bids and issuing notices to quit to residents of the site. It was apparently these actions of RLA that stimulated plaintiffs to bring this suit, plaintiffs objecting, in the main, to the ratio of low to moderate-income housing planned for Package I and in NDPs 2, 3 and 4 generally, and fearing that low-income residents of the area would be displaced despite the shortage of low-income housing elsewhere in the District.

On January 31, 1973, the District Court denied in all respects plaintiffs’ motion for preliminary injunctive relief. Thereafter, perhaps in part in response to this suit, NCPC issued on February 16 an environmental impact statement concerning NDP 4, thus making it available shortly before City Council hearings were held on the plan. On March 7, the District Court vacated its order of January 31 and, in its stead, issued the first of the several orders before us on appeal. In this order, the District Court held that, under Section 102(2) (C) of the National Environmental Policy Act (NEPA), an environmental impact statement is required for each action year plan. Despite this holding, the Court refused to enjoin further action on NDP 4, finding that, because the plan had not yet been approved by the City Council nor funded by HUD, no irreparable harm to the environment was imminent. The Court did, however, enjoin further actions under NDPs 2 and 3, but stayed issuance of this injunction for sixty days “to afford the defendants the opportunity to complete and file formal environmental impact statements . . . . ” Finally, the Court refused to direct compliance with the Relocation Assistance Act and the District Housing Code, holding that the provisions of neither applied directly to defendant RLA.

Plaintiffs appealed from this order and, on May 7, filed emergency motions asking this Court (1) to vacate the stay of the preliminary injunction with respect to NDPs 2 and 3; (2) to reverse summarily the District Court’s denial of a preliminary injunction with respect to NDP 4, the Uniform Relocation Assistance Act and the Housing Code; or, in the alternative, (3) to enter an injunction as to these matters pending disposition of the appeal. We denied these motions on June 8, the parties at that time agreeing to submit the case to the panel on the merits.

In the meantime, the following events had transpired: the District City Council approved NDP 4 on March 29, and the plan was submitted to HUD for funding; HUD issued a final environmental impact statement concerning the plan on May 25 and, in June, approved its funding. The plaintiffs thereupon applied once more to the District Court for a preliminary injunction, contending that, because the approval process had been completed, harm was now imminent. By order dated June 28, the Court again refused an injunction, on the ground that, since an appeal from its March 8 order was pending in this Court, it lacked jurisdiction over the NDP 4 question. On July 2, the District Court granted defendants’ motion to dissolve the preliminary injunction with respect to NDPs 2 and 3, primarily because shortly before, HUD had issued and filed with the Court a final environmental impact statement concerning the plans. Plaintiffs filed appeals from both of these orders, and we consolidated these appeals with the earlier appeal for argument and decision.

II

Because these cases are before us on appeals from the denial and dissolution of preliminary injunctions, matters that call, ordinarily, for the exercise of judicial discretion, the scope of our review is somewhat constricted. As we said recently in Maryland National Capital Park and Planning Commission v. U.S. Postal Service, “[tjhis court ordinarily will not disturb the order of the District Court except for abuse of discretion or clear error, . . . and we do not consider the merits of the case further than necessary to determine whether that discretion was abused. . . ” With this general standard of review in mind, we turn first to plaintiffs’ claims under the Uniform Relocation Assistance Act and the District Housing Code, neither of which, we think, requires any very extended discussion.

In declining to enjoin RLA from “allowing or effecting the displacement of any resident of the 14th Street NDP area for whom relocation housing and other benefits have not been provided as required by the [Uniform Relocation Assistance] Act,” the District Court held that the Act’s requirements are directly imposed only on federal agencies and, in particular, HUD; and that, by express provision of the Act, RLA is deemed a state rather than a federal agency. We think the District Court’s construction of the Act was correct. We do not agree, however, that this construction in any way precludes the grant of preliminary relief against defendant RLA.

Section 210 of the Act provides that “ * * * the head of a federal agency shall not approve any grant to, or contract or agreement with, a State agency, under which Federal financial assistance will be available to pay all or part of the cost of any program or project which will result in the displacement of any person * * * unless he receives satisfactory assurances” that the state agency will provide relocation assistance equivalent to that required of federal agencies. Thus, it is true, as the District Court held, that the legal duty created by Section 210 falls on the “head of a federal agency,” in this case the Secretary of HUD, rather than on state agencies directly. But it is equally clear, we think, that to receive federal aid, state agencies — including RLA — must give assurances that relocation assistance will be made available and, in accepting federal aid, they incur an obligation to carry such assurances out.

Here, plaintiffs contend that, in fact, RLA has not provided the assurances required by Section 210 and by HUD regulations, that, nonetheless, the defendant HUD has continued to fund the 14th Street project and that, in consequence, residents are being displaced without the relocation assistance that Section 210 mandates. There is no question that the Secretary’s duty under Section 210 is, in proper circumstances, subject to judicial enforcement. If, however, the Secretary fails in that duty, and if, therefore, federal funds have already been distributed, a preliminary injunction directed against the state agency, rather than the Secretary, may be the only means available to ensure that the funds are not used to displace area residents without provision of the assistance that Congress clearly intended them to have.

Defendant agencies argue on this appeal, as they did below, that contrary to plaintiffs’ representations, RLA is now in full compliance with Section 210. This is, of course, a matter for the District Court to resolve. In reversing the Court’s order on this point, we hold only that if, on remand, the Court finds that plaintiffs’ representations are correct, there is no statutory bar to a preliminary injunction against defendant RLA, if the Court thinks such an injunction necessary to achieve the purposes of the Act.

In its March 7 order, the District Court also refused to enjoin RLA “from maintaining any of its residential properties in the 14th Street NDP area otherwise than in compliance with the D.C. Housing Code.” In doing so, the Court relied on the principle of statutory construction that “a general statute imposing restrictions does not impose them on the Government itself, without a clear expression or implication to that effect. . . . ” The Court found no implication in the statute delegating to the District Government the power to “[m]ake and enforce building regulations” that Congress intended such regulations to apply to buildings acquired by defendant RLA. RLA is not authorized to operate the properties it acquires as permanent residences; instead, its authority extends only to the acquisition of blighted properties, and these, eventually, must either be demolished for redevelopment or completely rehabilitated. Hence, RLA maintains its properties as residences only temporarily, until relocation housing for residents becomes available and redevelopment or rehabilitation can be undertaken. Given the nature of RLA’s functions, we agree with the District Court that it would be unreasonable to construe the Housing Code as immediately and directly applicable to FLA’s temporary residential properties.

In any event, plaintiffs appear on this appeal to have abandoned their original position. They now contend that although RLA may not be bound to abide the detailed regulations of the Code, it is required to maintain its residential property in a decent, safe and sanitary condition. We do not see, however, how the District Court’s order can in any way be taken to reject this contention. On the contrary, the Court stated that, in denying preliminary relief, it did not mean to say “that the requirement that the housing be ‘decent, safe and sanitary’ is in any way softened but only that the standard need not be synonymous with the often technical long-term requirement of a housing code.” Moreover, RLA has fully acknowledged that it is obliged to comply with the “decent, safe and sanitary” standard. In short, both parties seem now to agree on the applicable standard, and the dispute between them has apparently reduced to a matter, essentially, of fact: whether RLA is now in compliance. And this, of course, is a question for the District Court to resolve, after full presentation of the evidence and the illumination of trial.

Ill

A. We turn, then, to the NEPA issues presented in these appeals and, more particularly, to the questions whether the District Court erred in (1) denying a preliminary injunction, on NEPA grounds, as to NDP 4, and (2) in staying and ultimately dissolving the preliminary injunction it granted as to NDPs 2 and 3. As we noted above, the grant or denial of preliminary relief is a matter that calls for the exercise of judicial discretion. At the same time, however, “[n]ot only the avowed forecast as to probability of success on the merits, but also the analysis of injury to either or both parties, the public interest, and the balancing of interests may depend on an assumption of underlying legal premise.” Were we confronted in this case with the District Court’s March 7 order alone, we would have substantial doubts that the Court had correctly identified the legal premises on which exercise of its discretion necessarily depended and, consequently, we might have found it appropriate to remand for further consideration.

The now familiar provisions of Section 102(2) (C) of NEPA require that “to the fullest extent possible” all federal agencies must include a detailed environmental impact statement “in every recommendation or report on proposals for legislation and other major Federal actions significantly affecting the quality of the human environment .this environmental impact statement is to “accompany the proposal through the existing agency review processes. . . . ” In its March 7 order, the District Court held, and the defendants do not here contest, that “a NEPA statement for each NDP is required.” The Court failed, however, to provide any indication as to when, in the complex NDP approval process, NEPA statements must be prepared. It is this question, and its relevance to the propriety of granting or denying injunctive relief, that has become the focus of contention on this appeal.

The federal defendants argue that they must be allowed discretion in determining the points in the NDP approval process at which NEPA statements can most effectively and profitably be prepared. They say they have reasonably concluded that the requirements of NEPA can best be fulfilled by having NCPC prepare.a draft statement concerning each action year program; this draft would be submitted, together with the program proposal, to the City Council and, if the Council approves, to HUD; and HUD would then prepare and issue a final environmental impact statement. We think this application of NEPA to the NDP approval process reasonable as far as it goes. But we find it deficient in one important respect: it makes no provision for RLA to prepare a draft impact statement for submission to NCPC.

Although we have said that it is, in the first instance, the responsibility of the agencies to mesh NEPA’s requirements with their decision-making processes, we have emphasized, at the same time, “that an agency’s duties to issue a statement on a project and to consider environmental factors at each stage of agency decision-making . are not inherently flexible or discretionary.” The great majority of cases concerning the timing of impact statements have dealt with the process of decision-making within a single agency. But we think the principles they have formulated entirely applicable to the situation here, where decision-making is accomplished by three federal agencies — RLA, NCPC and HUD — acting seriatim. As noted above, RLA submits a fully formulated NDP to NCPC for its consideration. We think it clear that RLA’s submission is a “distinctive and comprehensive stage of the . . process,” i. e. that it is itself a proposal for federal action requiring an environmental impact statement.

The federal defendants argue, however, that to require RLA to submit an environmental impact statement to NCPC together with its action year plan would be inefficient, since NCPC may well modify the plan and thus render RLA’s impact statement an anachronism. But, in our view, this argument proves too much. Indeed, it radically misconceives the purposes of the impact statement requirement. Such statements were not to be merely post hoc environmental rationalizations of decisions already fully and finally made. Rather their purpose is to ensure “meaningful consideration of environmental factors at all stages of agency decision making,” and to inform both the public and agencies implicated at subsequent stages of decision-making of the environmental costs of the proposal. Thus, it is precisely because NCPC has the power to modify RLA’s action year proposals that impact statements accompanying the proposals are necessary. NCPC’s decisions on whether to approve the proposals as presented or to modify them may be, and should be, vitally affected by the information contained and the conclusions drawn in RLA's impact statements. Equally important, perhaps, the public will be afforded an opportunity, prior to NCPC’s decision, to inform it of data and views contrary to those submitted by RLA, thus ensuring that NCPC’s decision and NCPC’s own environmental impact statement will be premised on the fullest possible canvassing of environmental issues, and that environmental factors will be taken into account before the action year plans take on the perhaps irreversible momentum of NCPC approval.

B. We hold, therefore, that to meet the requirements of NEPA, both RLA and NCPC must include impact statements in their proposed action year programs, and that HUD must prepare and issue final statements when the programs are finally approved. This was not, of course, the procedure that the defendant agencies followed here. As of March 7, when the District Court issued its original order, NCPC had, as we have noted above, issued a draft statement concerning NDP 4; no statement had previously been issued by RLA. In denying an injunction as to NDP 4, the District Court said that “ ‘federal action significantly affecting the quality of the human environment’ has not yet taken place nor is it imminent.” On its face, this appears to be a conclusion that none of the federal agencies had, as of March 7, a matured obligation under NEPA. Such a conclusion, in light of what we have said above, would be clearly erroneous.

But this is not, apparently, what the District Court had in mind. Instead the Court seems to have been referring to the absence of imminent, irreparable harm flowing from the defendants’ failure to comply with NEPA. NDP 4 was, according to the Court, only in the preparatory stage; no final decision concerning it had been reached. The Court continued: “Preparatory activities alone do not have the effect of triggering rights to preliminary injunctive relief for governmental failure to comply with NEPA. Only affirmative action that is likely to have direct tangible consequences of an environmental character . will do this; i. e., the commitment of resources or the entry into an enforceable obligation to commit resources in such a way as to ensure environmental consequences.” In short, unless defendant agencies were about to take, or were taking, physical steps to carry out the action year program, a preliminary injunction requiring compliance with NEPA could not issue.

We think that the District Court defined too narrowly the kind of harm that, under NEPA, may be sufficient to warrant the intervention of a court of equity, even at a preliminary stage. The harm against which NEPA’s impact statement requirement was directed was not solely or even primarily adverse consequences to the environment; such consequences may ensue despite the fullest compliance. Rather NEPA was intended to ensure that decisions about federal actions would be made only after responsible decision-makers had fully adverted to the environmental consequences of the actions, and had decided that the public benefits flowing from the actions outweighed their environmental costs. Thus, the harm with which courts must be concerned in NEPA cases is not, strictly speaking, harm to the environment, but rather the failure of decision-makers to take environmental factors into account in the way that NEPA mandates. And, for purposes of deciding whether equitable relief is appropriate, we think that this harm matures simultaneously with NEPA's requirements, i. e., at the time the agency is, under NEPA, obliged to file the impact statement and fails to do so.

We do not mean to say, however, that, because RLA had failed to file an impact statement with its NDP 4 proposal, the District Court was compelled to issue a preliminary injunction requiring it to do so. As we explain more fully below, the District Court may conclude that a declaration of the agencies’ NEPA obligations is sufficient to ensure compliance, especially if the agencies promise remedial action before actual, physical steps are contemplated. Moreover, when the deficiency concerns matters of timing, the required remedial actions need not necessarily be the equivalent of strict compliance. Adjustments in light of the circumstances may be made to the extent that the public interest demands. We hold only that, under NEPA, the imminence of physical steps is not an indispensable condition to preliminary injunctive relief.

Our second area of doubt concerning the District Court's March 7 order centers on the Court’s treatment of plaintiffs’ motion for preliminary relief as to NDPs 2 and 3. Because these programs had been fully approved and action pursuant to them was about to be undertaken, the Court said that “the prospect of imminent action promising significant environmental consequences” required “preliminary injunctive relief barring the RLA from completing this implementation until corrective action is taken.” Although it granted the preliminary injunction, however, the Court found it appropriate to stay the injunction’s effect for sixty days to allow the defendants to prepare and file impact statements, It did so because of its view that it would “be disastrous . to forthwith halt all activity in the 14th Street area . . . only to find that a NEPA statement, when submitted, points to no substantial change in goals or methods.” We think this approach unsound. The purpose of equitable intervention in cases in which federal agencies have failed to comply with NEPA’s requirements is to ensure that such compliance will take place before there has been an “irretrievable commitment of resources.” It may be that preparation pf the statement will, in the end, not move the .agency from adherence to decisions it has already made. But it is not for the courts to prejudge. So long as the status quo is maintained, so long as the environmental impact statement is not merely a justification for a fait accompli, there is a possibility that the statement will lead the agency to change its plans in ways of benefit to the environment. It is this possibility that the courts should seek to preserve.

This is not to say, of course, that the District Court erred in taking into account the public interest militating against even a temporary halt in the program. We think, however, that rather than stay the effect of its injunction as to the program in its entirety, the Court should have followed the approach taken by the First Circuit in Jones v. •Lynn, a case closely similar to this. In short, we think that the court should have engaged in a more particularized analysis, staying the injunction only as to those elements of the project delay of which would demonstrably result in injustice or substantial public harm

C. Despite our doubts about the premises of the District Court’s March 7 order, we do not find a remand appropriate. Final environmental impact statements have been filed, in May as to NDP 4, and in June as to NDPs 2 and 3. On June 28, the District Court again refused to enjoin actions under NDP 4. Although it did so on jurisdictional grounds, the Court went on to say that the actions of NCPC and HUD, in issuing, respectively, draft and final statements on the plan, had achieved the substance of compliance with NEPA. On July 2, the Court dissolved the preliminary injunction as to NDPs 2 and 3, finding that the corrective measures [defendants] have taken . . . have led to a belated but obviously thorough examination of environmental factors and have gone far to correct any damage which may have arisen from [the earlier] violation, i. e., the unwitting creation of an adverse environmental impact.”

The Court’s June 28 and July 2 orders were in no way based on a misconception that the defendants’ remedial actions were the equivalent of strict compliance with NEPA’s requirements. On the contrary, the Court acknowledged that, as we have held above, “[p] referred practice would be for a draft impact statement to accompany each NDP from its inception.” Thus, as this litigation has evolved, the primary question now confronting us is whether the District Court abused its discretion in deciding that something less than strict compliance with NEPA was sufficient to avoid a preliminary injunction against further actions under the NDPs.

In most cases, perhaps, it is possible and reasonable for the courts to insist on strict compliance with NEPA, and actions can, consistently with the public interest, be enjoined until such compliance is forthcoming. But we think the District Court had strong reason to conclude that this was not the case here. The action-year programs, as the District Court found, are bound by exigencies of time and funding; unless they are carried out within a reasonable time, it may prove impossible to carry them out at all. Delay may prove fatal. Moreover, insofar as they apply to the 14th Street area, the programs are, the Court found, a vitally needed effort to renew a particularly blighted area of the District.

Of course, these factors in no way excuse the defendants’ failure, in the first instance, to comply with NEPA. But they may, we think, properly be taken into account by a court of equity in deciding whether and what sort of relief is appropriate. Here, the Court concluded that, in order to preserve the efficacy of the programs, it was necessary to allow the defendant agencies to telescope their compliance with NEPA. In doing so., however, the Court was convinced that the defendants’ remedial actions achieved the substance of NEPA’s requirements and purposes. Moreover, plaintiffs do not contend, at this point at least, that the impact statements as finally issued are deficient in comprehensiveness. Their objection goes solely to the statements’ timing. We deem it important to recognize that, once decisions have been made, it may, as a practical matter, be impossible to duplicate the kind of staged infusion of environmental information and consideration that NEPA contemplates.

The District Court found, in short, that requiring the defendant agencies to repeat the complex NDP approval process in a manner that comports fully with NEPA would not, in all probability, better serve NEPA’s purposes than the remedial actions already taken, and that any such requirement would be distinctly contrary to the public interest. It is enough to say that, in the particular circumstances of this case, we find no abuse of discretion in this decision.

Accordingly, we affirm the District Court’s orders except with respect to the denial of relief under the Uniform Relocation Assistance Act. On that point we reverse and remand to the District Court for further consideration.

So ordered.

      . This area, in the District’s northwest quadrant, bounded on the south by Florida Avenue, on the north by Spring Road, and on the east and west by 11th and 16th streets respectively, was the scene of serious civil disturbances in April, 1968, following the death of Dr. King. As related in Part I, infra, community and government efforts to reconstruct the area were begun shortly thereafter.

      . 42 U.8.C. § 4321 et seq.

      . 42 U.S.C. § 4601 et seq.

      . 42 U.S.C. §§ 1469-1469c. These provisions were added to the Code by § 501 of the Housing and Urban Development Act of 1968, P.L. 90-448, 82 Stat. 518.

      . Jones, et al. v. D.C. Redevelopment Land Agency et al., C.A. 2258-72, 5 ERC 1139 (D.D.C. March 7, 1972), hereinafter referred to as March 7 Order.

      . 42 U.S.C. §4332(2) (C).

      . 5 ERC at 1142-43. This stay was subsequently extended to June 15 and then to June 22.

      . 28 U.S.C. § 1292(a) (1).

      . 159 U.S.App.D.C. 158, 487 F.2d 1029, 1035 (1973) (citations omitted).

      . 42 U.S.C. § 4601.

      . 42 U.S.C. § 4630.

      . 42 U.S.C. §'4625.

      . 24 C.F.R. Parts 41 and 42 (April 1, 1973).

      . Plaintiffs’ Points and Authorities in Support of Motion for Preliminary Injunction, at 2.

      . E. g„ Lathan v. Volpe, 455 F.2d 1111, 1119-1120 (9th Cir. 1971); LaRaza Unida v. Volpe, 337 F.Supp. 221, 233-234 (N.D.Cal.1971); Western Addition Community Org. v. Weaver, 294 F.Supp. 433, 440-441 (N.D.Cal.1968).

      . 5 ERC at 1140.

      . United States v. Wittek, 337 U.S. 346, 359, 69 S.Ct. 1108, 1115, 93 L.Ed. 1406 (1949).

      . 1 D.C.Code § 228.

      . Appellants’ Motion to Vacate Stay, for Summary Reversal, or, in the Alternative, for an Injunction Pending Appeal, at 20-21.

      . 5 ERC at 1144.

      . E. g., Appellees’ Supplement to Memorandum in Opposition to Motion to Vacate Stay, for Summary Reversal or in the Alternative, for an Injunction Pending Appeal, at 29-30.

      . The District Court’s approach here in no way conflicts with that of this Court in Knox Hill Tenant Council v. Washington, 145 U.S.App.D.C. 122, 448 F.2d 1045 (1970). There, of course, the Court dealt with permanent public housing; and even with respect to such housing, the Court said that whether the Housing Code should be held applicable in full force or should be employed as a point of reference in elaborating the “decent, safe and sanitary” standard could be determined only after trial on the merits. Here, by the same token, we think that the housing regulations can and should be employed as a starting point in determining the precise content of the standard with which RLA must comply, with practical adjustments made in response to the purposes of RLA and the nature of its functions.

      . Natural Resources Defense Council, Inc. v. Morton, 148 U.S.App.D.C. 5, 458 F.2d 827, 832 (1972).

      . Id.

      . 42 U.S.C. § 4332(2) (C).

      . 5 ERC at 1142.

      . See Scientists’ Institute for Public Information, Inc. v. AEC, 156 U.S.App.D.C. 395, 481 F.2d 1079, 1092 (1973); Citizens Ass’n. of Georgetown, Inc. v. Zoning Comm’n. of D.C., 155 U.S.App.D.C. 233, 477 F.2d 402, 408 (1973).

      . Scientists’ Institute for Public Information, Inc. v. AEC, supra note 27, 481 F.2d at 1091. See Calvert Cliffs’ Coordinating Comm., Inc. v. AEC, 146 U.S.App.D.C. 33, 449 F.2d 1109, 1118 (1971).

      . Greene County Planning Board v. FPC, 455 F.2d 412, 420 (2d Cir. 1972).

      . Scientists’ Institute for Public Information, Inc. v. AEC, supra note 27, 481 F.2d at 1091. See Calvert Cliffs’ Coordinating Comm., Inc. v. AEC, supra note 28, 449 F.2d at 1114.

      . See Lathan v. Volpe, supra note 15, 455 F.2d at 1121 (9th Cir. 1971).

      . 5 ERC at 1142.

      . Id.

      . See Calvert Cliffs’ Coordinating Comm., Inc. v. AEC, supra note 28, 449 F.2d at 1115.

      . See Lathan v. Volpe, supra note 15, 455 F.2d at 1116-1117.

      . 5 ERC at 1142.

      . Id.

      . See, e. g., Lathan v. Volpe, supra note 15, 455 F.2d at 1020-1021.

      . See, e. g., Jones v. Lynn, 477 F.2d 885, 891-892 (1st Cir. 1973); City of New York v. United States, 337 F.Supp. 150, 160 (E.D.N.Y.1972).

      . There was no question here, of course, that an environmental impact statement was required. Hence, this case is fundamentally unlike our recent decision in Arizona Public Service Co. v. F.P.C., 157 U.S.App.D.C. 273, 483 F.2d 1275 (1973), in which we gave the FPO ninety days to conduct whatever further proceedings it deemed necessary to prepare either an impact statement or a statement as to why no impact statement was necessary.

      . 477 F.2d at 892-893.

      . See F. Anderson, NEPA in the Courts 49-55 (1973).