“The future ain’t what it used to be.” —Yogi Berra

The Eagles won the Super Bowl. (That bears repeating: The Eagles won the Super Bowl.) The Flyers and the 76ers made the playoffs (and the Sixers actually won a series). And the Phillies are above .500, at least at the time of this writing. The future certainly ain’t what it used to be for Philadelphia sports. The same can be said for Pennsylvania environmental law. While Philadelphia’s sporting teams have spent the last year making themselves relevant again, Pennsylvania’s Environmental Rights Amendment (ERA), Article I, Section 27 of Pennsylvania’s Constitution, has in the last year gained the relevance its framers had originally intended. Thanks to the Pennsylvania Supreme Court’s June 2017 decision in Pennsylvania Environmental Defense Foundation (PEDF) v. Commonwealth, 161 A.3d 911 (Pa. 2017), over 40 years of Pennsylvania jurisprudence on the ERA has been turned on its head. What the Supreme Court’s decision portends for state and local governments, businesses and environmental protection in general is unclear. What is certain, though, is that things ain’t what they used to be for Pennsylvania environmental law.

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