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A federal judge late Wednesday temporarily blocked further work on a new border fence and barrier through the San Pedro Riparian National Conservation Area.

U.S. District Judge Ellen Huvelle accepted the arguments by Defenders of Wildlife and the Sierra Club that construction, which already has started, needs to be halted immediately. She concluded the organizations showed there was strong evidence of irreparable environmental damage if the project is completed as planned.

The judge also noted that the assessment of environmental effects of the project prepared by the Bureau of Land Management took just three weeks in August, with no opportunity for public comment. Construction started less than a month later.

She questioned whether federal agencies were deliberately rushing the process and the construction to get it done before anyone had a chance to object.

But Huvelle's ruling does not mean the fence, or something like it, never will be built.

Instead, it simply buys some time for the two opposition groups to prepare legal arguments that federal agencies did not follow environmental laws in designing the nearly two-mile stretch through the conservation area. The judge ultimately still could give the go-ahead to complete the work.

Brian Segee, an attorney for Defenders of Wildlife, said Wednesday's decision is still a victory because it recognizes "the irreparable harm that the border wall construction would cause."

But Russ Knocke, spokesman for the U.S. Department of Homeland Security, said his agency is convinced "that this one-mile-plus area along the Arizona border will not be adversely impacted by fence construction." Knocke said an appeal is being considered.

"Arizonans, and quite frankly Americans everywhere, have been clear that they want more border security," he said. "Today's ruling will not diminish our resolve to deliver it."

Central to the legal fight is the decision by the BLM, which manages the conservation area, to conduct only an informal "environmental assessment" of the effect of the fence design on the area.

That assessment proposes an impenetrable fence through much of the conservation area. It also concluded there would be no harm to the environment if a vehicle barrier built from old railroad ties were used instead of a fence in the 1,500 feet of the San Pedro River floodway as well as washes leading into it.

It is that plan that the Department of Homeland Security started constructing about two weeks ago.

Segee, however, said federal law requires a full-blown environmental-impact statement for all "major federal actions significantly affecting the quality of the human environment." He said such a study would show what Homeland Security is building will cause additional sedimentation and erosion, wiping out plants and, in turn, affecting the birds and animals that live in and around the conservation area.

Gregory Page, an assistant U.S. attorney who handles environmental cases for the government, said the assessment that was done is legally sufficient.

But Segee said the judge noted during Wednesday's hearing that the government already has agreed to prepare an entire environmental-impact statement for a similar project in the Rio Grande Valley of Texas.

Find this story and other border stories online at azstarnet.com/border