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9 PUBLIC HEARING
Draft Programmatic EIS
10 Mountaintop Mining/Valley Fills in Appalachian
Charleston, West Virginia
11 July 24, 2003
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16 Evening Session: 7-11
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1 APPEARANCES:
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Mark A. Taylor, Chairman, US Army Corps of Engineers
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Jeff Coker, Office of Surface Mining
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Mitch Snow, U.S. Fish & Wildlife Service
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Russell Hunter, WV Dept. of Environmental Protection
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William J. Hoffman, US-EPA
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Katherine Trott, U.S. Army Corps of Engineers
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15 The Corps of Engineers, U.S.
16 Environmental Protection Agency, U.S. Fish and
17 Wildlife Service, U.S. Office of Surface Mining, and
18 West Virginia Department of Environmental Protection,
19 joint public meeting was held at 7:00 p.m.,
20 July 24, 2003, at the Charleston Civic Center,
21 Charleston, West Virginia before Michele G. Hankins,
22 Court Reporter.
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CONTENTS
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Introduction
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. Chairman:
Mary Ellen 0' Farrell
Chris Hamilton
Scott Gollwitzer
Larry Emerson
Bill Gorz
Nick Carter
John Snider
Kent DesRosher
Randall Maggard
Michael Morrison
Julia Bonds
Lawrence Beckerle
Nanette Nelson
Larry Maynard
Vivan Stockman
Larry Gibson
Julian Martin
Janet Fout
James Maynard
Donna Price
Frieda Williams
Bill Price
Pam Medlin
Winnie Fox
Patty Sebok
Janice Neese
Chuck Wrostok
Marian Miller
Pauline Cantebury
Melvin Tyrce
Bill McCabe
Florence Twu
Abraham Mwaura
Connie Lewis
Paul Nelson
Monty Fowler
Denise Giardina
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38. Jason Bostic 145
39. John Taylor 149
40. Fred Sampson 151
41. Leon Miller 154
42. Blair Gardner 156
43. Elaine Purkey 160
44. Sharon Murphy 163
45. Maria Pitzer 167
46. John Barrett 171
47. Lisa Millimet 176
48. Bill McCabe 179
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1 PROCEEDINGS
2 MR. CHAIRMAN: Good evening.
3 I would like to welcome you here to the
4 public hearing on the draft Mountaintop Mining
5 Programmatic Environmental Impact Statement.
6 We will begin with some general
7 information about the facilities here.
8 This is a non-smoking facility. We ask
9 that you go outside the building to smoke.
10 Please note the location of the
11 emergency exits. In the event of an emergency,
12 proceed in an orderly fashion as quickly as possible
13 to the nearest exits from the building.
14 The restrooms for the facility are
15 located out the back doors here; to the left, and
16 then to the left again.
17 Approximately every hour, or so, during
18 the course of the hearing, we will call for a
19 five-minute comfort break.
20 Hopefully, this will provide sufficient
21 opportunity for everyone to take a break, and no one
22 will need miss what is said here today.
23 As you entered the forum, you had to
24 have noticed the registration table. We hope that
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1 everyone registered as you came in.
2 If by some chance you didn't, we ask
3 that you take a moment to register before you leave.
4 People will no doubt be coming and going throughout
5 the hearing, and this is the only way that we have to
6 get a reasonable, accurate idea of the public
7 participation at these hearings.
8 Even more importantly, if you came here
9 today with the intent of speaking at the hearing, you
10 must complete a registration card.
11 If you plan to speak and haven't already
12 registered, please go back and register as a speaker
13 now.
14 If there is anyone who cannot come up on
15 the podium to speak, please motion for me, and I will
16 be sitting here at the table and I will bring a
17 wireless microphone down to the front of the stage.
18 Let us all be courteous to the speakers
19 by turning off our cell-phone ringers, and be
20 respectful of the speakers, regardless of their point
21 of view.
22 Everyone's point of view is important,
23 and in fairness to all points of view, please respect
24 each speaker up here this evening.
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1 With that said, let's move to a more
2 substantial part of the public hearing.
3 As you may well know, as part of the
4 December 1998, Settlement Agreement, the agencies
5 represented here on stage today, agreed to
6 participate in the preparation of a Programmatic
7 Environmental Impact Statement, on the impact of
8 mountaintop mining and their associated valley fills.
9 The purpose of this Programmatic EIS, as
10 specified in the settlement agreement, was:
11 "... to consider developing agency
12 policies, guidance, and coordinated agency
13 decision-making processes to minimize, to the maximum
14 extent practicable, the adverse environmental effects
15 to waters of the United States, and to fish and
16 wildlife resources, affected by mountaintop mining
17 operations, and to environmental resources that could
18 be affected by the size and locations of excess spoil
19 disposal sites in valley fills."
20 In the time period since the settlement
21 agreement, the agencies have diligently worked on the
22 EIS. The agencies' efforts accumulated in the
23 development and release of this draft EIS document
24 for public review on May 29th.
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1 The usual review period for a draft EIS
2 is 45 days.
3 However, recognizing the widespread
4 interest in the document, and the need to provide
5 additional time for the public work their way through
6 the complexities of its content, we have extended the
7 time frame for review and comment.
8 A 90-days public review period, and
9 comment period, will close at the end of business on
10 August 29, 2003.
11 This is the second of two public
12 hearings in association with the development of this
13 document.
14 The purpose of these hearings is to hear
15 your comments on the draft EIS.
16 We cannot respond to your comments
17 during the hearing.
18 Your comments will be transcribed, and
19 we will respond to them in writing as part of the
20 final EIS.
21 We are here today to listen to you. To
22 hear what you have to say relevant to the continued
23 development of the EIS document.
24 We recognize that many organizations,
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1 and individuals, want to comment. So we have
2 structured these sessions to offer as many as
3 possible the opportunity to do so.
4 This session runs from 7 to 11 p.m.,
5 this evening. So we may be sure that we have
6 provided everyone who may choose to speak an
7 opportunity to do so, we must limit your speaking
8 time to five minutes.
9 Some of you may have more comments than
10 can be addressed in five minutes.
11 If so, you are encouraged to submit
12 these additional thoughts and comments in writing.
13 You do not need to speak here tonight to
14 submit comments.
15 You may submit written comments to
16 Mr. John Forren, U.S. EPA, 1650 Arch Street,
17 Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, 19103, through the close
18 of the comment period, on August 29, 2003.
19 This address is located on the flyer
20 that you received at the registration table.
21 We have also provided a comment box at
22 the registration table.
23 If you choose to, you may place your
24 written comments on the draft EIS, in that box, and
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1 we will see that they are considered, along with the
2 other written and oral comment.
3 As we continue with today' s public
4 hearing, we would like to take a few minutes to make
5 you aware of some of the ground rules for this
6 hearing, and describe how we intend to proceed.
7 As indicated on the sign-in into
8 building, for safety reasons, and so that all of the
9 participants can see at the public hearing, we have
10 asked that everyone please refrain from bringing in,
11 or displaying signs, banners, or posters, into the
12 building.
13 We ask that you please be courteous as
14 others are speaking, and refrain from expressions of
15 support, or opposition, to comments a speaker is
16 making.
17 One of the things that I noticed, when
18 you applaud for a speaker, in the earlier sessions
19 today, you take away from their time, let's please
20 not do that.
21 As we proceed through the hearing, if
22 you have a need, for whatever reason, to reference
23 the draft EIS, or appendices, copies of these
24 documents are available for reference in the foyer,
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1 entrance way.
2 Also, if you did not already receive a
3 CD version of the draft EIS document, a limited
4 number of CD' s of the draft document are available at
5 the reference table at a first-come, first-serve
6 basis.
7 If we run out, and you would like to
8 receive a copy of the CD, you may also leave your
9 name, and address, with the person at the reference
10 desk, and a CD of the draft document will be mailed
11 to you.
12 As previously stated, in order to speak
13 at this hearing, you must register at the
14 registration desk in the foyer, or the entrance way
15 indicating your desire to speak.
16 If you did not come here intending to
17 speak, but change your mind during the course of the
18 hearing, you, too, must register at the registration
19 desk.
20 Our planned five-minute comfort break,
21 approximately every hour, should provide an
22 opportunity for you to register to speak, if you
23 haven't already done so.
24 You may not register to speak, and then
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1 give any portion of your speaking time to anyone
2 else.
3 If you speak, and do not take the full
4 five minutes allotted, we will proceed with the next
5 speaker on the list.
6 No one person may speak more than once.
7 We will be calling out the names of those people who
8 signed up to speak in the order of which we received
9 them.
10 I will announce each person, as well as
11 the next name.
12 In order to keep things moving as
13 efficiently as possible, as a speaker is coming up on
14 the podium to speak, the next person to speak is
15 asked to move towards the podium, and sit here at the
16 bottom of the stairs.
17 Again, you must limit your comments to
18 no more than five minutes.
19 At the four-minute mark, we will hold up
20 a card indicating that you have one minute remaining,
21 so that you can begin winding up your comments.
22 In fairness to everyone who wishes to
23 speak, when we hold up the card indicating that your
24 time has expired, please end your comments.
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1 If you have more comments, or just want
2 to submit written comments, you may place them in the
3 box at the registration table that was provided for
4 receiving written comments, or mail them to the
5 previously identified EPA Philadelphia address.
6 Again, all comments will be transcribed.
7 We ask those that are speaking to please
8 speak clearly, loudly enough to be heard, and be
9 mindful of the fact that the transcriber is trying to
10 catch everything you are saying.
11 Also, please direct the microphone
12 towards you, it is kind of directional, so please do
13 that, each person that comes up.
14 If the transcriber is having difficulty
15 hearing, or understanding what you are saying, they
16 may stop you, and ask you to speak up or repeat what
17 you have said.
18 We ask that you begin speaking by
19 clearly stating your first and last names, and
20 indicating the community, and state that you are
21 from.
22 When transcribed, the oral comments and
23 written comments will be incorporated into a Comment
24 Summary Document, and will be a part of the final EIS
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1 document.
2 All comments will be considered in
3 development of the final EIS document.
4 Copies of the Comment Summary Document
5 will be available upon request in association with
6 the publication of the final EIS document.
7 Again, I would like to emphasize that we
8 all be courteous to the speakers.
9 The first speaker tonight is
10 Mary Ellen O'Farrell.
11 The second speaker will be
12 Chris Hamilton.
13 If you all would like to come on
14 forward.
15 While they are doing that, I will ask
16 that each of the agency representatives up here at
17 the table to please introduce themselves.
18 MR. COKER: I am Jeff Coker with the
19 Office of Surface Planning.
20 MR. SNOW: Mitch Snow. U.S. Fish &
21 Wildlife Service.
22 MR. HUNTER: I am Russ Hunter with the
23 West Virginia Department of Environmental Protection.
24 MR. HOFFMAN: I am Bill Hoffman, with
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1 the Environmental Protection Agency.
2 MS. TROTT: Catherine Trott, with the
3 Corps of Engineers.
4 MR. CHAIRMAN: Thank you.
5 MS. O'FARRELL: Good evening.
6 My name is Mary Ellen O'Farrell.
7 I have lived almost all my life here in
8 Charleston. I am a native West Virginia.
9 This year, I am the President of West
10 Virginia Environment Council, and I consider myself
11 an environmental extremist.
12 I cannot claim to represent the points
13 of view of everyone in the Environmental Council, but
14 I think the ideas that I will present, are certainly
15 understood by the membership of the Environment
16 Council.
17 I think the most silent fact about
18 mountaintop removal mining, as it is practiced in our
19 state, is that in our state alone -- according to
20 current practices -- over 900 miles of mountain
21 streams and waters have been destroyed.
22 This is morally indefensible.
23 Coal mines do not have the right to
24 squander the future of our children.
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1 Our children and grandchildren will
2 depend on these waters for health, for beauty, for
3 recreation, and perhaps for life itself.
4 In the Middle East, people are murdering
5 each other over water rights.
6 In the western states, in our country,
7 people are in court over water rights.
8 This is only going to get worse.
9 God has blessed our state richly with
10 abundant waters.
11 What will we say to our children when
12 they ask us why we allowed this squandering to take
13 place? We can say, Honey, I'm sorry, but the Coal
14 Association said that it just had to be this way.
15 Or maybe we could answer, Yes, it is a
16 shame, but Massey said that it would be so much
17 harder to do it any other way.
18 Mountaintop removal mining, as it is
19 currently practiced in our state, is obscene. It is
20 a blasphemous sacrilegious offense against this world
21 that God has made.
22 Thank you very much for these five
23 minutes.
24 MR. CHAIRMAN: Chris Hamilton.
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1 And then after Mr. Hamilton,
2 Scott Gollwitzer.
3 MR. HAMILTON: Good evening.
4 I am Chris Hamilton. Vice President of
5 the West Virginia Coal Association.
6 Lifelong resident of West Virginia, and
7 I currently live in Charleston here.
8 I speak to you tonight to urge the
9 adoption and implementation of Alternative 3, which
10 contemplates a mine permitting process, which is
11 based on the idea that all proposed mining permits
12 are considered Nationwide Permit 21.
13 Central to this alternative approach,
14 the overall permitting responsibility, rests with the
15 state's SMRCA agency. This is the best possible
16 strategy, to maximize efficiencies among government
17 agencies, and within the mine permitting process
18 itself.
19 We maintain that matters involving
20 administrative control, accountability, and
21 consistency, are also optimized through this
22 approach.
23 Furthermore, the alternative benefits,
24 for all parties involved, being government, citizens'
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1 groups, coal miners, alike, here in West Virginia.
2 Before proceeding further with my
3 specific remarks, I would like to first of all
4 compliment all four Federal agencies, and the State
5 agency, for a job well done.
6 In large measure, due to your diligence
7 and professional approach with this comprehensive
8 study, we now have a document before us that provides
9 the needed scientific evidence, and regulatory
10 justification to assure that West Virginia's coal
11 industry, will remain a viable part of the country,
12 and the world's energy mix.
13 The EIS, as drafted, will also assure
14 that thousands of West Virginia coal miners are
15 earning a living here, put their children through
16 school, food on the table, and continue to work and
17 live in our mountain state.
18 Incidently, they also hunt, and fish,
19 and enjoy all of the recreational benefits that we
20 have.
21 We support the draft EIS. We believe it
22 embraces current regulatory, and compliance
23 programming.
24 It clearly upholds existing extraction
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1 technologies, and recognizes that they're minimal and
2 temporary impacts can be adequately addressed.
3 Finally, it recognizes that you can
4 develop your energy-rich resources and tourism
5 industries, while maintaining a high level of
6 environmental laws.
7 Under the third alternative, which we
8 advocate, the program and agency best qualified and
9 situated to review and issue mining permits, would
10 finally be empowered to do so.
11 The State's SMRCA authority, has the
12 expertise to train personnel, and most importantly,
13 the practical, on-the-ground knowledge of mining in
14 West Virginia, that qualify them as the most logical
15 agency to lead the permitting process.
16 Under Alternative 3, these attributes
17 are finally quantified by Federal agencies, realizing
18 that West Virginians are best suited to make
19 decisions that affect the future environmental state,
20 as well as the state of the local statewide economies
21 here in West Virginia.
22 In fact, the only real difference that
23 we ascertained between Alternative 2, which tends
24 to -- at least it appears for them to say -- be the
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1 government's preferred outcome — and Alternative 3,
2 which the coal industry is advocating, is the
3 consolidation of permitting authority under the
4 State's SMRCA agency.
5 All of the environmental process
6 benefits, such as fill minimization, the development
7 of reforestation guidelines, enhanced flooding
8 evaluation procedures, will continue, if Alternative
9 3, is implemented.
10 If one considers the technical
11 complexity of this SMRCA permit application, and
12 regulatory review in conjunction with the findings of
13 the EIS, implementation of Alternative 3, is clearly
14 the logical conclusion.
15 The SMRCA process in and of itself, is
16 one of the most detailed and complex environmental
17 regulatory reviews in existence.
18 The State of West Virginia has added
19 details and complex rules to its mine regulatory
20 program, that clearly exceeds corresponding mining
21 Federal regulations, or any other approved program
22 found in any other place, or any other jurisdiction.
23 More detailed data collection and
24 analysis is required of the mine applicant of West
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1 Virginia.
2 Clearly, we have the most complex
3 determination process that exists anywhere in the
4 nation.
5 We have equally demanding requirements
6 with respect to flood control, post-mine land use,
7 valley fill construction, bond-release applications,
8 and many other areas and aspects of State law that
9 are too numerous to mention.
10 The state-issued SMRCA permit,
11 especially as administered in West Virginia, is so
12 detailed and full of environmental analysis, that it
13 clearly is the equivalent of an individual Section
14 404 permit.
15 In closing, I would just like to say --
16 AUDIENCE MEMBER: Your time is up.
17 MR. HAMILTON: Choose the third
18 alternative.
19 Thank you.
20 MR. CHAIRMAN: Mr. Scott Gollwitzer.
21 The next speaker will be Larry Emerson.
22 Larry Emerson.
23 MR. GOLLWITZER: Can you hear me?
24 It is a rhetorical question actually
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1 because you never listen.
2 My name is Scott Gollwitzer.
3 Where I am from is irrelevant. I am a
4 citizen of this country, and this is a public
5 meeting, and I am going to speak.
6 Looking at you, it is great to see five
7 agencies, four Federal and one State agency.
8 You are not separate, though, you are
9 the same. We have a term for that that is building
10 in the environmental community, it is called the
11 ammendustry.
12 This refers to the inexplicable ties
13 between the Bush Administration and his campaign
14 contributors.
15 I just wanted to thank you, and bring
16 that to your attention.
17 I am not here tonight to critique the
18 EIS. It is not my function here tonight. Nor am I
19 here to discuss the various human rights violations
20 and devastating environmental impacts of mountaintop
21 removal.
22 People who are going to speak after me,
23 will share those thoughts with you and I ask you to
24 listen to them.
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1 Tonight I am here to remind you each on
2 the panel of what your responsibilities are.
3 To do this, let me begin by reminding
4 you of what your responsibilities are not.
5 You are not here to do the bidding of
6 the ammendustries, nor are you West Virginia's
7 Economic Development Commission.
8 We heard lots of talk this afternoon
9 about the economic impacts of your polices; that is
10 not your function.
11 It is not to dismiss, on my part, the
12 economic problems in West Virginia. I am not here to
13 do that, I feel for the gentleman who spoke earlier
14 about EPA putting him out of work several times.
15 I would have to say that because of my
16 employment — and that is as an attorney for an
17 environment group — the EPA is keeping me employed
18 by the same token.
19 I wish they would stop.
20 So back to reminding you of what you are
21 supposed to be doing.
22 You are each charged under very unique
23 environmental laws with protecting human health, and
24 the environment, period.
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1 That is what you are charged to do.
2 As you listen to these folks articulate
3 their stories of devastation and human rights
4 violations, and injustices, I ask each of you to
5 reassess your current role in keeping these
6 injustices upon these people, and destroying the
7 environment upon which they depend, and the
8 environment in which they live.
9 Please do all that you can tonight, and
10 in the future to end this eco-terrorist act.
11 Thank you.
12 MR. CHAIRMAN: Larry Emerson.
13 E-M-E-R-S-0-N.
14 MR. EMERSON: That would be me.
15 MR. CHAIRMAN: The next speaker will be
16 Bill, I am going to spell it, G-O-R-Z.
17 MR. EMERSON: Thank you.
18 My name is Larry Emerson.
19 I live in the Charleston area.
20 I am the Director of Environmental
21 Performance for Arch Coal, Inc., the second largest
22 producer of steam coal in the country.
23 I have worked in the coal mining
24 industry for nearly 25 years, most of that time has
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1 been working directly on reclamation reforestation
2 and habitat restoration projects, primarily in the
3 southern part of the state.
4 I would like to make four specific
5 points related to the terrestrial components of the
6 EIS.
7 The EIS correctly points out what we, in
8 the regulated community, have understood for several
9 years, and that is that the existing SMRCA
10 revegetation rule, were developed primarily to
11 control erosion, and less so for successful tree
12 growth.
13 The emphasis on erosion control is now
14 changing and new methods are being developed to meet
15 the challenge of soil compaction, and composition,
16 competition with nervacious cover, and other issues,
17 that directly influenced successful tree growth.
18 The coal industry is committed to
19 effective and practical methods of improving
20 reforestation success.
21 As evidenced by many privately funded
22 research and demonstration projects currently
23 underway.
24 For example, the National Mine Land
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1 Reclamation Center in Morgantown, in cooperation with
2 Cantennary Coal, and Arch Coal, is currently
3 conducting field demonstrations to develop
4 cost-effective methods of utilizing various soil
5 horizons, and native-tree species, to establish
6 productive forests on reclaimed sites.
7 However, the agencies, and the public,
8 must understand that there are some landowners who
9 wish to have other land uses for their property after
10 the mining is complete.
11 Landowners wishes must be given some
12 difference.
13 To the extent that landowners desire
14 forest land on the reclaimed property, the industry
15 stands ready to help develop the rules and
16 techniques, that will achieve that objective.
17 Point two: One of the studies in the
18 EIS examine tree succession on reclaimed sites, by
19 counting the number of stems within measured sections
20 of reclaimed sites.
21 The results of the study concluded that
22 tree succession was limited to areas immediately
23 adjacent to undisturbed woodlands. However, there is
24 a significant short-coming in the study design as
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1 indicated in Appendix E, and I quote:
2 "The mine area studied was not designed,
3 engineered, reclaimed, or revegetated with the
4 post-mining land use of forestry, commercial or
5 otherwise."
6 Therefore, the conclusions drawn from
7 this study might be tempered with the fact of sites
8 examined were never intended to be forest land.
9 So my question is whether this really is
10 an objective study design.
11 Point number three: In September 1996,
12 the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service concluded formal
13 consultation with OSM, pursuant to Section 7 of the
14 Endangered Species Act, of mountaintop mining
15 operations in the studied area.
16 This programmatic consultation led to
17 the issuance by the Fish and Wildlife Service of a
18 biological opinion and conference report, that found
19 surface coal mining and reclamation operations,
20 inducted in accordance with properly implemented
21 State and Federal regulatory programs under SMRCA,
22 would not likely jeopardize the continued existence
23 of the listed, or proposed species, or result in the
24 adverse modification of designated, or proposed
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1 critical habitat.
2 We understand that the EPA is currently
3 in the process of writing a biological assessment,
4 relative to the preferred alternative in the EIS.
5 The industry encourages the EPA to
6 develop this biological assessment consistent with
7 the Service's opinion, and allow public comment on
8 this document before implementing it in their
9 enter-agency coordination efforts.
10 Point four: Ron Canterbury, a scientist
11 at the Southern West Virginia Bird Research
12 Institute, has done significant long-term research on
13 migratory neo-tropical birds in the studied area,
14 particularly in the southern West Virginia coal
15 fields.
16 In fact, $4 million in experts, have
17 indicated that his research represents the most
18 comprehensive information of this geographic area.
19 Dr. Canterbury's work has shown no
20 worthy increases in some, or more, species, in and
21 around older mine sites. In part, because of the
22 early successional nature of vegetation.
23 In short, the panel should take a broad
24 view of the migratory bird issues and consider that
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1 reclaimed sites play an important role in some
2 species.
3 In summary, the industry supports
4 Alternative 3, and I thank you.
5 MR. CHAIRMAN: First off, I want to
6 apologize beforehand before I butcher too many
7 people's names. I will do the best I can on them.
8 Bill Gorz?
9 MR. GORZ: Gorz.
10 MR. CHAIRMAN: Okay, thank you.
11 Then the next speaker will be
12 Nick Carter, or Carver?
13 MR. GORZ: Good afternoon.
14 My name is Bill Gorz.
15 I am from Asheville, North Carolina,
16 western North Carolina.
17 The reason that I am here today so far
18 away from my home, is that this is not a local
19 issue.
20 The fact is, mountaintop removal is not
21 limited to West Virginia, and it is spreading all
22 over the southern appalachians, particularly into
23 Kentucky, and Tennessee.
24 Where it affects people that live in my
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1 area.
2 Pollutions from the Tennessee Valley
3 Authority of East Tennessee Coal Plan, is killing the
4 Smokey Mountain National Park.
5 The American Lung Association has
6 determined that over 6,000 people a year, died from
7 pollution-related respiratory disorders in western
8 North Carolina alone.
9 I am very sure that sort of specific is
10 not limited to the western North Carolina area.
11 A large portion of those 6,000 deaths
12 can be directly attributed to obsolete coal plants.
13 Recently, the Tennessee Valley Authority
14 announced that because of their new anti-pollution
15 technology, which they had to put in because the EPA
16 sued them, and they were facing large fines, more
17 than any of you here make every year, every day,
18 because of the pollution.
19 They put in new anti-pollution
20 technology, we all thought that was going to be
21 great, but then they decided that they could use
22 cheap high-sulphur coal from the Cumberland Plateau
23 and that wouldn't overcome the pollution limits.
24 So instead of lowering pollution, and
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1 lowering those 6,000 deaths a year, they are opting
2 instead to increase their profits.
3 We have to wonder why Federal agencies
4 would be interested in their profits. They are not
5 in the profit-making industry.
6 Certainly, the coal industry is all
7 about profits.
8 They know about the American Lung
9 Association's statistics. They don't care about
10 people, they just care about profits.
11 Again, the reason why I am here, and
12 what this has to do right here and now, is that if we
13 allow this project to go forward, it will just
14 encourage the industry to expand to other areas.
15 I was rather surprised -- I guess I
16 shouldn't have been surprised — that on the EIS
17 there was no option for no mountaintop removal, which
18 there should be, in my opinion.
19 There has been lots of talk about jobs,
20 with little thought, or no thought given to what the
21 social costs of what those jobs are.
22 Pimps and crack dealers provide jobs
23 too, but we generally oppose those jobs because of
24 the social costs.
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1 Let's think about the social costs of
2 the jobs that are provided.
3 Thank you.
4 MR. CHAIRMAN: Nick Carter.
5 The next speaker will be John Snider.
6 MR. CARTER: My name is Nick Carter.
7 I am president and chief operating
8 officer of Natural Resource Partners.
9 I live and work in the Huntington,
10 Tri-State area. We are a publically mastered limited
11 corporation that owns and manages coal and timber
12 products.
13 I also serve as the president of the
14 National Council of Coal Resource, which is a trade
15 association for companies like mine.
16 The EIS seems to assume, without
17 detailed analysis, that coal companies that permit
18 and mine coal have the ability to control and utilize
19 the properties after mining is completed.
20 This assumption is incorrect.
21 In only a small percentage of cases do
22 coal companies that mine the minerals own the land
23 that it mines.
24 In nearly all cases, the coal company
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1 leases the mineral from a company like ours, or from
2 a family, or from heirs to the property.
3 These leases give the mining company the
4 right to occupy the land for the purpose of the
5 lease, which is the extraction of the mine.
6 Many of these leases expire
7 automatically when the mineral has been mined.
8 An additional problem, what does not
9 seem to have been considered by the EIS, is that most
10 of the land where the mineral is being mined, is not
11 controlled by only one owner.
12 For example, in many — maybe most
13 cases, the owner of the mineral does not own the
14 surface, may not own the oil and gas, and even if it
15 owned the surface, may not own the timber, or the
16 trees that are growing on the property.
17 Most mines today are not on a single
18 property owner, and the company has leases from
19 various owners. They may have as many as 30 to 50
20 leases to make up one mining block.
21 Additionally, the mining company must
22 reach agreement under the law, with all of the
23 surface owners above the mineral that they mine.
24 This may be many different -- many more different
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1 owners.
2 The actual mineral owners consist of
3 corporations, partnerships and individuals who have
4 amassed their mineral holdings of areas over a long
5 period of time, some dating back to the 19th century.
6 If the type of land-use planning and
7 post-mining land use, that the EIS recommends is to
8 be accomplished, then it will require the
9 participation of the mineral owners, and most
10 importantly, the surface owners, in addition to the
11 coal company.
12 The problem with the post-mining land
13 use planning that most people want, is that it
14 requires the landowner to be able to project,
15 sometimes two or more decades into the future what
16 the market potential will be for a particular
17 property.
18 Because we do not have a crystal ball,
19 these predictions are inherently risky and difficult.
20 In fact, they are so risky, that one
21 would question the business judgment of someone who
22 spent huge sums of money necessary to develop a piece
23 of property today, for a use many years in the
24 future, not knowing whether the demand will be there
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1 for that use.
2 Coal companies engaged in surface mining
3 can, with the consent of the surface owner, do a
4 variety of things on the surface in the course of
5 mining.
6 If a particular parcel is located on a
7 major highway, or near a large population center,
8 then the chances are high that there will be a
9 significant potential for commercial development.
10 This suggests that the land should be
11 mined with a variance to ALC.
12 In addition, if major infrastructure in
13 the form of electric utilities, substations, power
14 lines, roads, and septic systems are located on the
15 land to support the mining, we should think carefully
16 why this infrastructure should be removed, as the law
17 requires, in the course of reclamation.
18 On the other hand, if the mine site is
19 remote from commercial centers, as most mines are, it
20 makes more sense to adopt a reclamation plan that
21 minimizes future erosions, reduces the potential for
22 downstream flooding, and creates a diverse habitat
23 for animals and plants.
24 In conclusion, it is unwise, both
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1 economically and environmentally, to insist on a
2 one-size-fits-all approach to post-mining land use.
3 We should observe three principals,
4 respecting the preferences of the owners of the
5 surface in selecting post-mining uses, incorporating
6 into the permitting process, a flexibility to modify
7 post-mining land uses after mining has commenced, and
8 relying on the marketplace to guide these decisions
9 as opposed to a bureaucracy that has never built a
10 development, or created a job.
11 MR. CHAIRMAN: Sir, your time is up.
12 MR. CARTER: Thank you.
13 MR. CHAIRMAN: John Snider.
14 Again, the next speaker will be Kent
15 DesRosher.
16 MR. SNIDER: Good evening.
17 My name is John R. Snider.
18 For the past two years, I have been
19 employed as the Vice President of External Affairs,
20 Eastern Operations, Arch Coal.
21 Prior to that, I had worked for four
22 years in the West Virginia Development Office, the
23 last two serving as Executive Director.
24 I have over 25 years of experience in
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1 the field of economic development in the state of
2 West Virginia, and northern and central appalachian
3 coal fields.
4 During my time with the Development
5 Office, I assisted with developing the rules for the
6 West Virginia Coal Field Development Office, and
7 assisted in funding of several post-mine land-use
8 projects.
9 I am a certified economic developer.
10 Today I am speaking on behalf of the Coal
11 Association.
12 I would like to discuss for a few
13 minutes the Gannett Flemming document "Final Case
14 Studies Report on Demographic Changes Related to
15 Mountaintop Mining Operation," long name, but short
16 topic once you get to it.
17 It offers some interesting conclusions
18 which relate to a lot of economies in transition.
19 It is a report that really could have
20 been taken and located anyplace in the United States
21 during the same time frame.
22 West Virginia, as a whole, like many
23 other areas of the country, has been going through
24 transition. That transition has expired in many ways
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1 over that time frame, in showing us changing from
2 heavy manufacturing and mining, to service jobs, a
3 reduction in job pay, reduction in employment, a
4 reduction in population.
5 Gannett Fleming made several assumptions
6 based upon census tracks, not necessarily on areas of
7 employment, or other items. Long gone are the days
8 where the miner worked in the same town, or census
9 track, where the mine is.
10 Miners travel, miners are paid very well
11 today.
12 Stop and think: Do you live and work in
13 the same census track, or the same area?
14 Gannett Flemming's report was basically
15 on 50 and 100 houses in one census track, not a very
16 large community.
17 No matter how you look at it, it is not
18 a good example of what should be talked about. This
19 study only includes the economic impact of that small
20 area. Whether it be the mine itself, or what happens
21 post mining.
22 Several other issues must be looked at
23 in a different light when you review this report, and
24 what is happening in today's time frame.
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1 One: The population of West Virginia is
2 declining. It also is declining in the six
3 communities, or six census tracks shown in the
4 report; no surprise.
5 Two: The United States population has
6 for several years been changing from an
7 industrial-based economy, to a service-oriented
8 economy, no real surprise to anyone that understands
9 the economy of West Virginia.
10 During the time of this work, we saw
11 many of our high-paying industrial jobs go offshore.
12 We have seen, and continued to see, a
13 coal production shift in central Appalachia, to the
14 Tygart River Valley.
15 As we discuss coal production today, we
16 are seeing that shift go offshore. We are receiving
17 more coal every day from foreign sources, very
18 similar to what is happening in oil.
19 Three: As our country changes from
20 industrial service, we are seeing many of our fine
21 employees being left behind.
22 West Virginia has traditionally been a
23 heavy industrial state, which included at its heart,
24 the production of glass, steel, chemicals, timbering
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1 and mining.
2 West Virginia has been impacted
3 negatively more than any other area in the country,
4 because of its lack of diversity of its economy.
5 Many of our industries and mines have
6 closed over the past few years.
7 For the average, West Virginians have
8 aged these past few years. We are the oldest group
9 of people in the United States; we are the oldest
10 state.
11 Consequently, our school-age population
12 has fallen.
13 Very few areas in West Virginia are
14 gaining population, and the 14 counties in this area
15 are no different.
16 Did Gannett Fleming tell us anything
17 when he wrote this report, or did he take it off the
18 shelf? I think he took it off the shelf.
19 Overall, Gannett Fleming did a fair job
20 describing what was transpiring in those six
21 counties, as well as across West Virginia, but this
22 is something that could have been done anyplace.
23 What we really need is the capability to
24 transform flat properties into future diversified
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1 economy for southern West Virginia.
2 We have to be able to have legitimate
3 post-mine land-use properties available. This report
4 has to allow that, and we believe that Alternative 3
5 will allow that to happen.
6 Thank you, very much.
7 MR. CHAIRMAN: Kent DesRocher.
8 The next speaker is Randall Maggard.
9 MR. DesROSHER: My name is Kent
10 DesRocher, mine President and General Manager of Arch
11 of West Virginia, located near Yolyn, West Virginia.
12 I worked in the mining industry for 19
13 years, and then in the southern Appalachian area for
14 approximately 10 years. I reside in Chapmanville.
15 I would like to make some remarks
16 regarding post-mine land use.
17 Over the past several years, coal
18 companies have begun to help diversify the economy of
19 the 14 coal-field counties.
20 Through the development of post-mine
21 land sites, including such diverse projects as
22 industrial parks, golf courses, racetracks,
23 recreational areas, commercial fish facilities,
24 housing and public facilities, additional jobs are
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1 being provided for our neighbors until then.
2 With the assistance of the West Virginia
3 Coal Field Development Office, we are now even more
4 capable to plan for the diversification of the
5 economy in the coal fields.
6 All 14 counties have suffered in the
7 lack of transportation and developable acres for many
8 years.
9 The transportation routes are all
10 improving with the upgrading of US-119 and Interstate
11 77, coupled with Interstate 64 and 79.
12 Through the development of the King Coal
13 Highway, and the Coal Field Expressway, will further
14 increase development opportunities.
15 The mountainous terrain in 14 counties
16 is also slowed growth in the area. Industrial,
17 commercial, and housing sites have been at a premium.
18 The development of flats, and gently
19 rolling sites, will assist in the growth and
20 stability of the area.
21 Charles Yule, of West Virginia
22 University, lists six provisions for new land uses,
23 and land-use opportunities.
24 Mr. Yule indicates that most potential
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1 future mountaintop mining areas will be reclaimed to
2 various forest covering.
3 The current rules relating to commercial
4 forestry, must be reviewed to allow for a highest
5 fuel assessment.
6 The rules must also be reviewed with
7 respect to compaction, competition, and composition
8 of soils.
9 Recent studies would indicate that the
10 best method has not yet been proposed to provide the
11 best opportunities for commercial forrestries.
12 Much discussing has occurred over the
13 past several years, regarding post-mine management
14 for agriculture, such as vineyards, animal
15 production, greenhouse farming and agriculture.
16 Most of the sites where agriculture has
17 been proposed, has not occupied the entire site, and
18 approval of multiple uses will be required.
19 For example, let's say that the primary
20 post-mine land is used as a vineyard, which would
21 occupy 50 percent of the property.
22 But since this is an agricultural
23 project, this is a higher and better use, the
24 remaining portion of the property, must be allowed to
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1 be developed into support areas, pasture land, or
2 habitat, which would not compete with the primary
3 higher use.
4 The study projects a significant acreage
5 of land suitable for developing post-mining land
6 uses, will result from future mining under all of the
7 mining scenarios.
8 The only way that the 14 counties can
9 significantly change the economy of the area, is the
10 development of large sites capable of supporting
11 multiple uses.
12 Mine scenarios that produced many acres
13 of flat to gently rolling land areas, can provide the
14 opportunity to diversify and improve the economy of
15 southern West Virginia.
16 Mr. Yule is correct when he states that
17 development limitations, such as poor accessibility
18 and infrastructure proximates will continue in nearly
19 all of these areas.
20 These issues will require the
21 development agencies and the environmental agencies
22 to think out of the box.
23 Such issues of the use of mitigation
24 famous for water and sewer projects, should be
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1 considered if there is a desire by the involved
2 parties to redevelop and diversify the area.
3 Smaller sites, less than 50 acres, will
4 do little to diversify the economy of the 14
5 counties.
6 The environmental regulatory agencies,
7 must work closely with planning and development
8 agencies, when considering post-mine land use.
9 Here again, in order to allow for
10 diversity and stabilization of the economy,
11 regulatory agencies must think outside the box.
12 Higher and better use, must be site
13 specific, based on many items normally associated in
14 the planning documents.
15 If you want 14 counties discussed in the
16 study to diversify their economy, they must be
17 allowed to create land suitable for development.
18 The site must be of sufficient size to
19 make it worthwhile to provide the necessary
20 infrastructure required for development.
21 With the event of a responsible
22 Environmental Impact Statement, and a desire by the
23 Federal and State regulatory agencies, to provide for
24 affordable energy, while providing sites for future
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1 economic transformation in the 14 counties, we can
2 provide a positive outcome to the citizens of West
3 Virginia.
4 In summary, large-scale surface mining
5 can help support the development of infrastructure —
6 AUDIENCE MEMBER: Time.
7 MR. DesROCHER: — access, and sites
8 necessary for future development to allow for
9 diversification of the economy here in West
10 Virginia.
11 Thank you.
12 MR. CHAIRMAN: Randall Maggard.
13 Then the next speaker then will be
14 Michael Morrison.
15 I can keep time, thank you.
16 AUDIENCE MEMBER: How about hearing from
17 some citizens?
18 MR. CHAIRMAN: Go ahead, sir.
19 MR. MAGGARD: Hello. My name is Randall
20 Maggard, from Dunlow, West Virginia.
21 I am the manager of Environmental
22 Compliance for Argus Energy, a mining company located
23 in southern Wayne County, West Virginia.
24 We have operated on a reserve base of
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1 approximately 60,000 acres, or about 100-square miles
2 since 1987.
3 We have disturbed only approximately
4 3,000 acres, a mere five percent of our complex. But
5 since that time, we have mined over a billion dollars
6 worth of coal, and provided good-paying jobs for over
7 250 miners and contractors.
8 Now our jobs are at risk.
9 The permitting quagmire created by
10 frivolous lawsuits, and court judgments have created
11 indefinite delays, and such unpredictability to
12 sustain a viable mining operation.
13 We cannot get permits issued.
14 When the EIS was first considered, I
15 think the regulatory agencies first thought it would
16 be simple. The streams below valley fills and our
17 mining operations would totally be void of aquatic
18 life, but that wasn't the case.
19 In a nutshell, the most significant
20 findings in the EIS were that there is less mayflies,
21 and a detectible amount of selenium downstream of a
22 mining operation.
23 They blame this on mining, but these
24 same effects have been found downstream time and time
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1 again, below any man-made development, whether it be
2 road construction, housing, commercial areas, and in
3 particular, cities and urban areas.
4 Just a moment to put selenium issue in
5 perspective, I have in my pocket here, a bottle of
6 selenium that I purchased at Rite Aid drugstore that
7 is recommended as a nutritional supplement.
8 The detectible amount of selenium in
9 water is .001 parts per million. Each of these
10 tablets contain .200 parts per million of selenium,
11 over 200 times the detectible limit. The limits that
12 are discussed in the EIS.
13 The average value of selenium detected
14 would require a person to drink about five gallons of
15 water directly below a valley fill to get the same
16 concentration found in this single tablet that is
17 recommended for nutritional value.
18 I am confused.
19 But in closing, I would like to note
20 something that is not said in the EIS. The air in
21 West Virginia is cleaner than it has ever been in the
22 last 50 years. The water is cleaner than it has been
23 in the last 50 years, and yes, we even have more
24 forested acres than we did 50 years ago.
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1 So, please, let us mine coal and adopt
2 Alternative Number 3.
3 MR. CHAIRMAN: Mr. Morrison, and then
4 the next speaker will be Larry Emerson.
5 MR. MORRISON: My name is
6 Michael A. Morrison.
7 I am from Barboursville, West Virginia.
8 I have been a native of West Virginia
9 all my life. I love this state. And I have lived
10 here and care about my environment.
11 What I am seeing is devastation.
12 I am really sick of it. It turns my
13 stomach, but I am going to offer solution here. It
14 is called tourism. If you all know what that means.
15 If our streams were cleaned up, we can
16 have canoe rentals, canoeing, hiking, mountain
17 biking, we have the Appalachian Trails right now,
18 which is going to draw and invite tourism. And that
19 is a good example.
20 We can do more here, if our streams were
21 cleaned up. We have got nice streams in this state.
22 We are a unique state with streams.
23 I am telling you, you all just don't
24 care. You all don't care.
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1 You care as much about it as George
2 Bush, that King George, that Son of a Bush.
3 Thank you.
4 MR. CHAIRMAN: Our next speaker will be
5 Julia Bonds, Julia Bonds?
6 Then the speaker after that will be
7 Lawrence, B-E-C-K-E-R-L-E, maybe?
8 MR. GIBSON: What happened to Larry
9 Gibson, Buddy?
10 AUDIENCE MEMBER: Yeah, I thought Larry
11 was next.
12 MR. GIBSON: Yeah, what happened to
13 him?
14 MR. CHAIRMAN: I am going through the
15 cards in order by the numbers that were given to me.
16 MR. GIBSON: What?
17 MR. CHAIRMAN: I will be going through
18 the cards, as I said earlier, in order as the numbers
19 that were given to me. They are numbered and given
20 to me as those people signed in. That was the
21 numbers we are going through.
22 MR. GIBSON: I was the first one that
23 signed in.
24 MR. CHAIRMAN: I will check on it for
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1 you.
2 MS. BONDS: My name is Julia Bonds. I
3 live in the Coal River Valley in southern West
4 Virginia.
5 My family and I have been here many,
6 many, years, and many, many, generations.
7 I am the sister, daughter,
8 granddaughter, and great granddaughter of coal
9 miners.
10 My home is in the heart of your study
11 area, and in the belly of the beast.
12 The beast, is the greedy, irresponsible
13 coal barrens, and for us, regulatory agencies and
14 politicians, that serve as the meals of this beast.
15 I consider the draft EIS, the blueprint
16 for continued assault upon the people of Appalachia.
17 A declaration of war upon children, their children,
18 and God's creation.
19 Ban mountaintop removal now.
20 This EIS encourages the coal industry to
21 continue to use Appalachia, and her children, as a
22 national sacrifice zone.
23 This EIS did not study the cumulative
24 effects of communities in the coal fields' health and
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1 socio-economic impacts of post, present, and future
2 valley-fill mining.
3 How did you study environmental justice
4 impacts?
5 The truth is, you didn't.
6 You merely dismissed the cultural
7 communities, the people, and the property being
8 destroyed by this mining method.
9 You just dismissed it.
10 I demand a revised Environmental Impact
11 Statement, that includes cumulative impacts;
12 cultural, social, emotional, spiritual, and health
13 problems of the communities of people affected by
14 mountaintop removal.
15 A total cultural study already exists.
16 This study by our Dr. Mary Hufford is available at
17 the Library of Congress.
18 Dr. Hufford, Doctor of Nephography, is
19 doing research at the University of Pennsylvania.
20 Our mountain culture has been here long before white
21 settlers came, and long before commercial coal mining
22 began. And our culture will be here long after the
23 coal is gone.
24 We believe that many people in
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1 mountaintop removal effect people who suffer from
2 Posttraumatic Stress Disorder, from blasting, and
3 flooding, and the ill effects of mountaintop mining.
4 How dare you dismiss the suffering of
5 low income and the minority people of Appalachia.
6 How dare you dismiss and defy the
7 Executive Order dealing with the environmental
8 injustices on the low income and minority people.
9 How dare you do that.
10 Your own study says that this area is
11 well above the average in poverty, and unemployment.
12 Where is the study on the socio-economic
13 problems of this area?
14 Why are the people in the coal-rich
15 counties the poorest people?
16 What are the actual costs to the
17 communities and the people that suffer the effects of
18 mountaintop removal?
19 This mining method affects the very
20 poor, and the powerless, and the oppressed people of
21 central Appalachia.
22 Economic development on these artifical
23 sites is nonexistent.
24 Only 94 percent of these destroyed
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1 mountaintops are ever given any economic development
2 for the affected — the affected — communities.
3 Show me economic development, in Boomer
4 Hollow, in Bob White, in Montcoal, in Prince. Show
5 me, show me something.
6 In the last six months, two schools in
7 the Coal River Valley, both surrounded by money
8 Massey mining permit, was closed, sending our
9 children on very, very, long bus rides, and one of
10 those schools is at Montcoal.
11 Where is the money, and where is the
12 support of the coal industry then?
13 The Raleigh County, Board of Education
14 said it does not receive one red cent that coal has
15 for education. But coal says it gives.
16 So who is lying? I would like to see a
17 report on that.
18 The scientific evidence of this study
19 shows that mountaintop removal is environmentally
20 insane, but the recommendations by the administration
21 is to make it easier for greedy coal companies to
22 destroy everything.
23 Your report makes an airtight case
24 against your conclusions.
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1 Your report, and your conclusion,
2 strongly contradict.
3 Did a complete idiot write the
4 conclusion?
5 As a fellow Christian, I challenge
6 President Bush, to come to the coal-field hollows of
7 central Appalachia, and talk with the blasted, and
8 flooded, and the poor, and the oppressed people
9 impacted by mountaintop removal.
10 I ask President Bush to investigate his
11 agencies.
12 No true Christian would allow these evil
13 abuses to continue.
14 I am sure once the President discovers
15 these crimes against the citizens of Appalachia, he
16 would stop mountaintop removal.
17 No true God-fearing man would allow
18 these crimes to continue.
19 MR. BECKERLE: I am Lawrence Beckerle.
20 MR. CHAIRMAN: After Mr. Beckerle, the
21 next speaker will be Nanette Nelson.
22 MR. BECKERLE: Good evening. My name is
23 Lawrence Beckerle, I live in Nicholas County.
24 I have a number of diverse interests and
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1 I am involved with a number of different
2 organizations, which I will not necessarily get into
3 tonight.
4 I would mention that my first
5 surface-mine reclamation project that I got involved
6 in was in 1972, and I have been looking at issues
7 involved with surface-mining reclamation over a
8 number of years, and a number of capacities, before
9 SMRCA was invented and thought of, and I have worked
10 in a number of different states.
11 Two concerns I have: One, is that when
12 you make your decision that you realize that there
13 are a number of variables that are upon what can
14 happen with a valley fill, or mountaintop mining.
15 That you consider all those variables,
16 which I will try to include in my written comments,
17 because sometimes we confuse issues, then it becomes
18 conclusions when we are muddling, and at war with --
19 involving so many variables.
20 The other thing that I have experience
21 in seeing is that the type of regulations that we
22 pass, and sometimes they have unintended
23 consequences, and can have a large part to do with
24 what we end up with.
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1 To give you a couple of examples, I can
2 well remember when OSM had interim regulations
3 prohibiting any depressions larger than a square
4 meter in size.
5 It was there for a few years, then it
6 disappeared, thank goodness. But it was there for a
7 time period.
8 West Virginia has a drainage handbook
9 that is designed for how water should be controlled
10 off of the surface mines, and so on.
11 That originated for urban construction,
12 highway construction, and so on. So the primary
13 emphasis of that drainage handbook is how to control
14 water to take it off the site.
15 In fact, there is a rule in this
16 drainage handbook yet to this day, that prohibits any
17 depressions be any deeper than two-tenths of a foot.
18 That is a very small distance, two-tenths of a foot.
19 So you deliberately create a site that is dry. In an
20 urban situation, it makes sense because you don't
21 want to have the mosquitos.
22 In a surface mine, you want the
23 mosquitos as the base for the food source.
24 There was also some question about what
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1 is an impoundment.
2 So with every little structure being
3 considered an impoundment, even sediment ditches are
4 removed after mining. And so on the operational
5 side, the coal operators, when you try to talk to
6 them about building this type of structure, or that
7 type of structure, say why build it, if we are going
8 to have to destroy it to get our bond released?
9 So we need to look at those kinds of
10 issues. As a result of those types of things, there
11 are burn-up pools, and ephemeral pools are very rare
12 on surface mine areas.
13 Wet metals are rare, wet forests are
14 rare, absorption terraces are basically unheard of in
15 this state, a zero run-off bench and berm systems are
16 unheard of.
17 To illustrate my point, I know of no
18 crayfish farms in any surface mine in West Virginia.
19 Now that might seem strange to some
20 people that I would even mention that. But If
21 someone wanted to put a crayfish farm on, the only
22 thing that the DEP and the regulatory people would
23 look at is what the economics are behind crayfish.
24 They would not consider that crayfish pools would
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1 help reduce flooding, would help provide a food
2 source for wildlife, and so on.
3 So, there needs to be other things
4 considered into these projects when you look at
5 crayfish farming, and look at the other benefits that
6 can result from those.
7 There has been an overemphasis on
8 perennial grasses, including nonnutritive, and other
9 grasses that are not productive for wildlife.
10 And one of those disadvantages of that
11 is that by contrast, if they would emphasize a
12 nitrogen-fixing plan, it would increase the earthworm
13 population, which would help make the soil more
14 productive, and help increase infiltration, help grow
15 better trees and so on.
16 By the overemphasis on nonnutritive-type
17 grasses, instead of nitrogen-fixing plants.
18 We have deliberately made these lands
19 nonproductive, and that is very unfortunate. We need
20 to change that.
21 My minutes are almost up. Good grief.
22 But to give an example, if we had —
23 another thing that would help us to decide these
24 issues --
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1 AUDIENCE MEMBER: Time.
2 MR. BECKERLE: — would be grade
3 limitations, it would have described those, and we
4 could make better decisions.
5 Thank you.
6 MR. CHAIRMAN: Our next speaker is
7 Nanette Nelson.
8 After that, we will be taking a
9 five-minute break.
10 MS. NELSON: My name is Nanette Nelson,
11 and I live on Big Coal River in Boone County.
12 When I sat down last night and thought
13 about this meeting, I became both sad, and angry.
14 The very subject of MTR, causes such
15 extreme emotions for true coal-field residents.
16 Those of us who have lived in our
17 communities for many generations, are at one with the
18 land.
19 My family has been in Boone County since
20 the 1700's.
21 Not many people can understand this
22 concept; you just have to know our hearts.
23 I want to impress on you the true cost
24 of MTR.
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1 We hear that the DEP, EPA, and other
2 agencies, plus the industry, want to rely on
3 so-called scientific data.
4 But the data always seems to suit their
5 wants and their needs. Certainly not the coal-field
6 residents.
7 How do you gather scientific data on
8 people; their feelings, their hopes, their dreams?
9 You cannot.
10 This EIS statement is a sham, and it is
11 a disgrace to even present it to the people of this
12 state.
13 You want to talk about economic
14 development; where is it?
15 According to the DEP website, there are
16 363 active mining permits in Boone County.
17 They say that MTR sites are made into
18 economic development sites; where are they?
19 There are 79 active MTR sites now, and
20 I doubt that there will ever be any kind of economic
21 development on Big Coal River.
22 Our county has terrible conditions
23 around the MTR site. Property values have gone down.
24 People could never get enough out of their homes to
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1 buy an equivalent home elsewhere.
2 People have worked all of their lives to
3 have a home, only to see its value go to almost
4 nothing.
5 Whitesville and Madison are only ghosts
6 of what they once were. Everywhere there is MTR,
7 community death soon follows.
8 People have left because they can't
9 stand living in the conditions caused by MTR.
10 Our schools are closing. We have lost
11 many schools in our county in the past few years;
12 need I say more?
13 They say MTR is wonderful for wildlife.
14 If it is so wonderful for wildlife, why are they
15 coming down into our yards looking for food? They
16 never did that before.
17 You never hear a whippoorwill anymore.
18 Big Coal River used to be full of
19 freshwater muscles; they were huge. They were
20 everywhere in the river. They are all gone now.
21 You have poisoned, and polluted, and
22 blasted, and dusted the environment to death.
23 Not to mention the unprecedented
24 flooding that is occurring somewhere every time we
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1 have a rain event.
2 This used to be rare. Now it is
3 becoming common place. And who is paying?
4 As usual, FEMA is called in and the
5 Federal tax dollars are used to try to help these
6 families recover, but even this is a sham.
7 FEMA doesn't even come close to paying
8 enough to putting these poor people on the road to
9 recovery.
10 Some of these families will never have
11 normal lives again.
12 And again, the coal and the timber
13 companies get off scot-free.
14 Where is the justice in this?
15 When is this ever going to end?
16 When you have destroyed the lives of
17 everyone, or have run the rest us off so that you can
18 run free of rein to do whatever you want, with no one
19 to sue.
20 I truly believe that this is your goal.
21 You wish that we would all just go
22 away. But Bill Rainey, we are not going anywhere, so
23 don't get your hopes up.
24 You say that MTR is a safer mining
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1 method; for whom?
2 I imagine that it is for the person
3 sitting in the big air-conditioned pieces of
4 equipment. But what about the people who have to
5 live around these sites?
6 Remember, these folks didn' t move in on
7 you, you moved in on top of them.
8 Is MTR safer for these residents?
9 I think not.
10 I want you to know something, I am not
11 against coal mining. I am against irresponsible
12 mining methods.
13 My husband worked underground for many,
14 many, years. The true miners knew the dangers and so
15 did their families. They accepted that danger.
16 These men exposed themselves to dangers every day.
17 They exposed themselves, no one else.
18 They are true, brave men.
19 The people who work the MTR sites, may
20 have a safer job for themselves; however, they are
21 putting innocent people in harm's way.
22 The little children, the elderly, common
23 people, and even babies yet unborn, are in danger
24 around these sites. And you call this a safer mining
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1 method? I think not.
2 When you put people in harm's way that
3 are not even connected to the mining industry, to
4 save your own behind, I call that cowardly.
5 Thank you.
6 MR. CHAIRMAN: We are going to take a
7 five-minute break. The two speakers after the break
8 will be Larry Maynard and Vivian Stockman.
9 One thing when you return from the
10 break, if the speaker is already speaking, let's be
11 courteous and be really quiet when you come in and
12 sit down.
13 In about five minutes, we will be
14 starting again.
15 Thank you.
16 (Break.)
17 MR. CHAIRMAN: Let's get started.
18 As I said before, our first speaker will
19 be Larry Maynard.
20 Our second speaker will be
21 Vivian Stockman.
22 As we are all sitting down, let's
23 remember to be real quiet for them.
24 Thank you.
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1 MR. MAYNARD: Thank you.
2 My name is Larry Maynard. I am from
3 Delbarton, West Virginia, and the founder of DECAF,
4 Delbarton Environmental Community Awareness
5 Foundation.
6 I would like to talk a little bit today
7 about jobs. Now having jobs, does not justify the
8 outright destruction caused by mountaintop removal
9 mining.
10 If MTR is banned, then the companies
11 will have to find alternative and less destructive
12 ways to extract their coal; right?
13 Jobs will be there, and plentiful,
14 possibly more jobs than before.
15 If this form of mining continues, then
16 our environment, and this area, will continue to
17 suffer while the CEO's become rich and the West
18 Virginians, they just stay poor.
19 West Virginia is becoming the coal
20 industry's toxic waste dump. Coal waste impoundments
21 that hold slurry, should really be classified as
22 such.
23 Selenium compounds, arsonic, and other
24 hazardous chemicals, make up this sludge.
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1 There are good forms of chemicals, and
2 bad forms of chemicals. Like selenium, for instance,
3 and chromium compounds. Like some forms of chromium,
4 body builders use it, while others cause cancer.
5 And this stuff gets in our watersheds.
6 Some of the things that I want to talk
7 about — some of the primary effects from mountaintop
8 removal is destruction of vegetation, our natural
9 water streams, the animal habitats, the beauty of our
10 environment that surrounds us all. And the future of
11 timber, or any wood-producing jobs, just to mention a
12 few.
13 Also, water-well depletion, homes being
14 flooded throughout the valleys, dust that comes from
15 the large coal trucks that barrel down our roads, the
16 increased weight limits to destroy our roads. And
17 who picks up the tab for that, the coal industry, or
18 the citizens?
19 They cannot constitute their actions
20 toward our environment just by making level land, and
21 a few jobs, even if they do pay their fair share of
22 taxes.
23 Thank you.
24 MR. CHAIRMAN: Vivian Stockman.
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1 Then the next person will be Larry
2 Gibson.
3 MS. STOCKMAN: I just want to triple
4 check that it is okay that I talk, because I heard
5 there was grumbling because I spoke already this
6 morning, or this afternoon?
7 MR. CHAIRMAN: There is nothing in the
8 rules that says you couldn't speak at the different
9 sessions, so go ahead.
10 MS. STOCKMAN: All right.
11 My name is Vivian Stockman. I am with
12 the Ohio Valley Environmental Coalition. The
13 original intent of the environmental impact
14 statement, as published in the Federal register,
15 was:
16 "... to consider developing agency
17 policies, guidance, and coordinated agency
18 decision-making processes to minimize, to the maximum
19 extent practicable, the adverse environmental effects
20 to waters of the United States, and to fish and
21 wildlife resources, affected by mountaintop mining
22 operations, and to environmental resources that could
23 be affected by the size and locations of excess spoil
24 disposal sites in valley fills."
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1 The draft EIS — the recommendations in
2 that draft, fail, they utterly fail, to fulfill the
3 original intent of the EIS.
4 And I wonder if that is because of the
5 people like J. Steven Guiles, and Michael Castle, who
6 possibly were allowed to even write these
7 recommendations.
8 This afternoon, I heard people say that
9 they don't believe the MTR is involved in the
10 flooding in southern West Virginia.
11 I guess they haven't read the DEP, and
12 OSM studies that say otherwise. I guess they don't
13 believe the people who live in the flooded areas,
14 downstream from mountaintop removal. I guess, they
15 just don't believe what those folks are saying.
16 No, MTR is not responsible for all of
17 the flooding. But the studies say, and reality
18 shows, that it does indeed make flooding much worse.
19 We have heard a lot of comments about
20 how great mountaintop removal is for the state
21 because it provides flat land for economic
22 development.
23 How can that possibly be true? Right
24 now, we have probably over 300,000 acres of blown-up,
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1 treeless, soilless, rubble-strewn former
2 mountaintops, just waiting for the long touted
3 economic development.
4 These wastelands have some ponds with
5 stagnant water, not to mention the coal-waste flood
6 lakes, but a good supply of fresh water, one
7 essential for economic development just isn't
8 available, because the blasting has reeked havoc on
9 the ground water, and of course, the streams are
10 buried.
11 Remember, too, that most of these
12 flatlands that the industry touts are hundreds of
13 feet above any existing infrastructure, are municipal
14 roads and former DEP head, Michael Callahan admitted
15 that less than two percent of the sites that have
16 already been obliterated by mountaintop removal, have
17 had any sort of economic development.
18 Yes, there are some projects on some
19 mountaintop removal sites, but why in heaven's name
20 do we need anymore, if we already have over 300,000
21 acres sitting around, flat acres.
22 We do have a couple of golf courses, a
23 high school, whose gym sank, and they had to get the
24 Jaws of Life out to open the doors. Some built that
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1 have been having stability problems, too.
2 For instance, in Kentucky, there is what
3 they are calling now a "sink-sink". It is a prison
4 that over $40 million of taxpayer money has gone into
5 stabilizing the site, and the towers are leaning.
6 It is turning out to be the most
7 expensive jail ever built in the United States. And
8 that is the showcase of mountaintop economic
9 development site.
10 At last year's Coal Summit in this very
11 building, a hydrogeologist noted that in the Coal
12 River basin alone, there are about 95,000 acres of
13 obliterated mountaintops and buried valleys.
14 That is enough flat land to provide all
15 of the following: Five, 5,000-acre recreational
16 parks; Ten, 1,000-acre prison sites — since that is
17 going to be our great economic development — five,
18 500-acre shopping malls -- I don't know where all the
19 shoppers will come from. 100, 100-acre trailer
20 parks — and I guess that will relocate all the MTR
21 flood victims. There would still be 400, 50-acre
22 school sites — not that there are any students left.
23 So that still leaves about 5,000 acres,
24 which we could make the monument park for the West
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1 Virginia Coal Association, so they can show people
2 how great mountaintop removal is for West Virginia,
3 one of the poorest states in the nation.
4 The EIS needs to address the fact that
5 West Virginia already has enough barren, waterless,
6 soilless, flat land.
7 We got enough.
8 Thanks.
9 MR. CHAIRMAN: Larry Gibson. Then the
10 next speaker will be Julian Martin.
11 MR. GIBSON: Here I see — on this
12 stage, I see OSM, FWS, WVDEP, the EPA, COA; we don't
13 have no CFO. That is what is called CFC, actually,
14 for -- Concern for Citizens.
15 We have these here -- a lustrous group
16 up here of people who are supposed to be representing
17 the State of West Virginia, and the group of people
18 here -- I don't see them doing anything that is worth
19 their while here.
20 Also, we was talking about --
21 I heard — while we was sitting there talking —
22 I had other things to say, but I want to talk about
23 this one.
24 We have heard about the decrease in the
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1 population of the coal fields, the number of people
2 or citizens in the coal fields.
3 The only thing that I don't understand
4 is, if coal is so good, how come we're losing our
5 citizens in the coal fields? How come people are
6 leaving?
7 Also, how come we have such low income?
8 How come we have such low education in the southern
9 coal fields? How come we don't have any
10 infrastructure? How come we don't have city services
11 for everybody in Logan? Things like that, we don't
12 have it.
13 Another thing I want you all to
14 understand about mountaintop removal, it is not only
15 destroying our mountains, it is interfering with our
16 mountain way of life.
17 Now I mean, we have, around my area, in
18 our mining area, or the mining around my mountain, we
19 have mountaintop at about 2,000 feet. My land stands
20 about 6- or 700 feet above the sites.
21 But we have — because of the
22 mountaintop removals, and the underground mining, we
23 have mine cracks that just happen to be up there the
24 other day, too. And this is several times now
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1 they've filled these mountain cracks up.
2 But I called the Surgeon General's
3 office the other day, and I left her a message, We
4 have people in harm's way over here in Clearfork.
5 And I called her, and I made a reference to her to
6 find a way to put these people out of harm's way, so
7 that she could ensure their safety, to make sure
8 their life won't be in danger.
9 We have nobody here on this panel just
10 concerned about the citizens. If you did, you would
11 be going over renting these homes over there in
12 Clearfork that' s empty, and living down below those
13 mountains, where the floods did not happen.
14 Of course, it is obvious that floods do
15 not happen in the coal fields.
16 Another thing that I mentioned about the
17 jobs here; Gosh, now I've got to help Chris Hamilton
18 out here, because the jobs, here in the coal fields,
19 I think we have lost about 150,000 miners in
20 West Virginia. And I heard Chris up here say, We are
21 providing jobs for the people in the coal fields.
22 Well, I think if we keep providing jobs
23 at that rate, we won't have to worry about the coal
24 company, they will put themselves out of business.
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1 And another thing, if Chris Hamilton
2 endorses this thing that you all put together, it
3 can't be good for the citizens.
4 It can't be good for the citizens.
5 I am going to the office and I am voting
6 against this. Because if Chris is for it, I got to
7 be against it.
8 MR. MARTIN: My name is Julian Martin.
9 MR. CHAIRMAN: Just a minute, sir. I'm
10 sorry.
11 After Mr. Martin, Janet Fout.
12 Okay, Mr. Martin.
13 MR. MARTIN: My name is Julian Martin.
14 I am the 8th generation that has lived on Coal
15 River. We live in Charleston now.
16 My people came here around 1800. We got
17 here before coal did.
18 I would like to see the people that want
19 to destroy our mountains, are moving in on our
20 homeplace.
21 I would like to lodge a complaint with
22 this panel: I was the second person to sign in
23 tonight. Larry Gibson was the first. He was the
24 first person to walk through that door; I was the
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1 second.
2 Chris Hamilton was not in that room out
3 there. He walked in here about two or three minutes
4 before the thing started and he spoke second.
5 Now that shows you how low the coal
6 industry will stoop. If they will cheat on stuff
7 like that, for God's sake. Now that is really tacky;
8 isn't it? I mean, that is character, isn't it? That
9 is who you are dealing with. These are the kinds of
10 people that you are dealing with.
11 They would steal from their little
12 sisters.
13 They would push their mother down the
14 stairs in a wheelchair.
15 I want to complain about the fact that
16 your economic study was not a broad — did not cover
17 enough years. I want you to go back and do this
18 again. I bet you love to hear that, don't you?
19 You will get some information from me
20 about Bill Mackey, who used to be the head of the
21 Board Service, in West Virginia. And he resigned in
22 protest against mountaintop removal.
23 He said it was akin to a disease like
24 AIDS. That is what he said.
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1 This is not a tree-hugging radical,
2 out-of-state environmentalist, okay? This is a man
3 who believed in clear-cutting, for God's sake.
4 He says that mountaintop removal is akin
5 to a disease like AIDS. Why was he not interviewed
6 for this? Why was the information that he has not
7 included in this study?
8 This man was a was a prominent figure in
9 this state, and in this business. He knows what he
10 is talking about. He said that 300,000 acres had
11 been destroyed already. And he said that for every
12 acre, you can get 200-board feet of timber that is
13 new growth. That is the new growth per acre.
14 I am sure it is an average, okay?
15 Multiply those two numbers together,
16 300,000 times 200, comes out to 60-million-board
17 feet. That was in 1997, this estimate he made.
18 That 60-million-board feet of timber
19 could have been cut on what has already been
20 destroyed every year, forever.
21 Not just one, every year. That is just
22 the new growth. You could have cut that and not miss
23 it.
24 Now, if this whole mess doubles, as this
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1 report claims, it's going to — if mountaintop
2 removal doubles — then by the year 2013, I think it
3 was, in 10 years, or something, it is going to be
4 around 200-billion-board feet of timber lost every
5 year, forever.
6 Every year. Not one, but every damn
7 year, and that is if they quit mining right then.
8 They are destroying the hardwood timber
9 in West Virginia. Fall is going to disappear. All
10 the trees are going to be the same. They are going
11 to go with the cheap trees, where they can grow real
12 fast, and don't change colors. They don't want to
13 mess with that. We're all going to look like Oregon,
14 you know, you're going to have green and yellow, that
15 is it.
16 So I beg you, I plead with you — I know
17 I am pissing in the ocean — I beg and plead with you
18 to reconsider the economic study.
19 Do a long-term economic study. Not just
20 about the coal industry, about everything this is
21 costing us.
22 For God's sakes, they are destroying the
23 future use of these places.
24 These are wastelands. Get a grip.
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1 These are horrible looking places; these are not
2 close calls.
3 This is the worst environmental crisis
4 in the whole world.
5 There is not another mountain range in
6 the United States that has had 300,000 acres
7 destroyed. Nowhere. It is an outrage.
8 And I wish I had another hour.
9 I want you to offer other options.
10 Enforce the law as it is. If you did that, it would
11 stop them in their tracks.
12 Do away with those damn national
13 permits that say that a valley fill has a minimal
14 environmental damage.
15 Good God, don't let them dump anything
16 in any stream. It is craziness.
17 There are 147 years of underground coal,
18 according to this report. Let's do it underground,
19 with the pillars left behind so that the top doesn't
20 cave-in, too.
21 Now, I talked today to a DEP person, and
22 he said that it looks like they did all that research
23 and then just ignored the damn thing in their
24 recommendations.
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1 I know that there are people in your
2 departments. We know them. We know who they are
3 there. You know, there are moles. Deep Throat isn't
4 anything. You can't trust anybody over there.
5 They are on our side.
6 They tell us that this is a bunch of
7 bullshit.
8 Thank you.
9 MR. CHAIRMAN: Janet Fout.
10 James — I believe it is Maynard.
11 I am Janet Fout. I work for the Ohio
12 Valley Environmental Coalition.
13 I am a life-long resident of West
14 Virginia. My daughter is seventh generation.
15 I just wanted to remind folks here on
16 the panel a little bit about the National Environment
17 Policy Act of 1969.
18 The purpose of the Act basically says to
19 encourage, productive and enjoyable harmony between
20 man and his environment. Promote efforts which will
21 prevent or eliminate damage to the environment and
22 biosphere, and stimulate the health and welfare of
23 man.
24 This is the foundation for this EIS
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1 process, and there are three parts of this that I
2 think are very much being neglected by the EIS.
3 It says that you should ensure for all
4 Americans safe, helpful, productive and aesthetically
5 and culturally pleasing surroundings.
6 I don't think that there is anyone who
7 has ever been to a mountaintop removal site, who
8 would say that mountaintop removal, as it is
9 practiced in West Virginia, does that.
10 That you should attain the widest range
11 of beneficial uses of the environment without
12 degradation, risk to health, or safety, or other
13 undesirable, or unintended consequences.
14 What I read of the EIS, says that there
15 are many consequences, and they are very negative
16 consequences to water quality, to habitat for
17 wildlife, for communities, for people who live near
18 blasting.
19 There are numerous, numerous, impacts.
20 That you are to preserve important
21 historic, cultural, and natural aspects of our
22 national heritage, and maintain wherever possible, an
23 environment which supports diversity and variety of
24 individual choice.
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1 There is very little in the EIS, as it
2 is currently stated, that covers the cultural, or
3 historic losses.
4 I would suggest to you that since your
5 EIS contains — at least two symposiums — put
6 together by Federal agencies, and the coal industry,
7 that you also include the proceedings from the
8 Citizens Coal Summit that was in 2002, held here in
9 Charleston.
10 You will learn a lot about the cultural
11 impacts, and the impacts on people's lives.
12 Also, just some something — the reason
13 why I think mountains need to be preserved in West
14 Virginia.
15 These are the words of Wendell Berry:
16 "The peace of wild things.
17 When despair for the world grows in me
18 and I wake in the night at the least
19 sound, in fear of what my life and my
20 children's lives may be,
21 I go and lie down where the wood drake
22 rests in his beauty on the water,
23 and the great heron feeds.
24 I come into the peace of wild things
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1 who do not tax their lives with
2 forethought of grief.
3 I come into the presence of still water
4 And I feel above me the day-blind stars
5 waiting with their light.
6 For a time I rest
7 in the grace of the world,
8 and am free."
9 There is very little in your Draft EIS
10 that talks about those kinds of impacts. When all of
11 our mountains are gone, when all of our streams are
12 filled, where will we restore our souls?
13 And also, as long as I've got time, I am
14 going to mention a few other things.
15 I think there is not nearly enough in
16 the draft EIS to address the concerns about
17 coal-slurry impoundments. I actually have three
18 photographs that I will leave with you.
19 These are so close to many communities
20 and in these particular photographs show how close
21 they are.
22 Here is a little known economic fact of
23 coal. In 2002, for every $100 a miner which makes
24 $50,000 a year — a CEO of Massey Energy rakes in
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1 approximately $13,600.
2 So somebody certainly is benefiting from
3 mountaintop removal.
4 I wanted to mention something about the
5 Alternatives. The reason Alternative Number 3, is so
6 attractive for the coal industry and which I think
7 that is definitely the wrong way to go. That is a
8 fast track.
9 That means that everything is given a
10 rubber stamp, nationwide permit. I think what Julian
11 mentioned before, this is for minimal adverse
12 environmental impact.
13 The coal industry likes this because it
14 is the quickest -- is a strategy which enriches their
15 bottom line, and so that is why they prefer that.
16 We don't prefer that.
17 In fact, we believe that mountaintop
18 removal should be banned. There might be lots, and
19 lots of laws, like Chris Hamilton mentioned before.
20 But unfortunately there doesn't seem to be anybody
21 who has political will to enforce the laws. Whether
22 it is AFC laws, flood control, bond release, or you
23 name it.
24 Finally, there was some mention about
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1 Mark Canterbury's study, and what is a frequent
2 decline in this nation wherein we have a prime
3 habitat.
4 Mountaintop removal will destroy and
5 fragment —
6 MR. CHAIRMAN: You are out of time.
7 MS. FOUT: Well, thank you.
8 MR. CHAIRMAN: Thank you.
9 MS. FOUT: I will submit written
10 comments.
11 Thank you very much.
12 MR. CHAIRMAN: James Maynard.
13 And the next speaker will be Donna
14 Price.
15 MR. MAYNARD: My name is James Maynard,
16 I am in Delbarton, West Virginia. I just don't like
17 the way they are tearing our mountains up, filling up
18 the hollows, and stuff like that.
19 It is not real good, or you know.
20 The environmental -- and stuff like
21 that, and the trees, and stuff, tearing it up.
22 I have seen it all. I have seen trees
23 tore all to pieces and just thrown over the hill and
24 covered up and everything else.
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1 What do you call them dams, and stuff
2 like that? I have seen them, too, and they ain't no
3 good.
4 That is all I got to say.
5 MR. CHAIRMAN: The next speaker is
6 Donna Price, and then the following speaker is Frieda
7 Williams.
8 MS. PRICE: My name is Donna Price, and
9 I am from Dorothy, West Virginia, in the Coal River
10 Valley.
11 First, let me say that I am absolutely
12 against the mountaintop removal method of coal
13 mining.
14 This massively destructive mining
15 method, has eradicated hundred of thousands of
16 Appalachian hardwood forests, and replaced them with
17 worthless grassland.
18 It eliminates miles of precious
19 headwater streams, and then there are these massive
20 valley fills. Composed of waste rock and dirt that
21 is blasted from mountaintops, and dumped into the
22 nearest valley.
23 And by the way, for everyone who calls
24 valley fills usable flatland; West Virginia is the
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1 Mountain State.
2 These monstrosities are contemptuous
3 insult to our heritage.
4 Runoff from these fills degrades our
5 tributary streams and clogs them with silt.
6 Recent studies tell us that all of these
7 things contribute to the dangerous flash floods, that
8 have become a plague across this region over the past
9 several years.
10 Now none of this is news to you people
11 who live near mountaintop removal; we are seeing
12 these things happen. We live with them every day.
13 We know what is happening, to our land, and our
14 homes, our communities, our schools.
15 We know exactly why our highest
16 coal-producing counties have the highest unemployment
17 rate, and the highest poverty level in the state.
18 We all know these things. And you know
19 about these things, too. You may not be comfortable
20 with that knowledge, and you may choose to ignore it,
21 in order to make your study accomplish what it has
22 been designed to accomplish, which seems to be to
23 keep the coal industry profitable.
24 But you could never say that you don't
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1 know about these things. It has all been explained
2 to you numerous times during these public hearings,
3 and I think that this EIS is a shame and a sham.
4 And I see people all over this region
5 becoming more and more frustrated and angry at this
6 administration, and these agencies, have failed in
7 their duty to prevent this irresponsible destruction
8 of our land and our water.
9 One more thing: This dirty little
10 secret is no longer confined to the hills and
11 hollows of central Appalachia.
12 The ravages of mountaintop removal
13 mining, and the devastation it is causing to our
14 land, and water, and our people. All of these things
15 are being made known to citizens all over this
16 country, and the outrage is growing.
17 Blowing up mountains is becoming a
18 decidedly unpopular method of mining coal. It is too
19 destructive. It violates the principles of the Clean
20 Water Act.
21 It is becoming unacceptable to the
22 people of this country, and it will be stopped.
23 Thank you.
24 MR. CHAIRMAN: Frieda Williams. And
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1 then the next speaker will be Bill Price.
2 When you come up, remember to speak into
3 the microphone.
4 Thank you.
5 MS. WILLIAMS: I am glad to have this
6 opportunity again.
7 I say, no to mountaintop removal.
8 Even those who work in the mines are
9 affected by the damage that illegal and irresponsible
10 coal mining has on the citizens of the coal fields.
11 Over just the past two years, many homes
12 have been destroyed by flooding that has come from
13 mountaintop removal sites and by valley fills that
14 overflow.
15 No one knows how much water is stored in
16 our mountains. I wish we did.
17 Throughout the coal fields, abandoned
18 deep mines have been filling with water for more than
19 50 years. Research from the University of Kentucky,
20 established that water contains more than 60
21 different chemicals, all of which are polluting our
22 drinking water.
23 We know only too well what the problem
24 is. We know what it will take to solve the problem.
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1 We have the proof through the Governor's Flood
2 Committee Report, and the national report on coal
3 slurry damage.
4 These reports have taken more than two
5 years to complete. So why the delay on putting the
6 solution into place?
7 The people of the coal fields need the
8 answer yesterday. Profits for a few, is not good
9 enough reason to let this destruction continue.
10 If you really want to make a decision,
11 don't take anyone else's word, come to the coal
12 fields yourself.
13 More than 80 years ago, Mother Jones
14 said, "There is never peace in West Virginia because
15 there is never justice."
16 Unfortunately, that is still true
17 today.
18 Thank you.
19 MR. CHAIRMAN: Bill Price, and then next
20 one will be James Chajmacki. I will apologize for
21 that name, now.
22 MR. PRICE: Can you hear me? Because I
23 want to shout it to the rafters, it is time to stop
24 mountaintop removal mining.
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1 My name is Bill Price, and I am the
2 environmental justice resource coordinator for the
3 Sierra Club in central Appalachia.
4 I am a proud member of the Coal River
5 Mountain Watch, and I am a resident of Dorothy, West
6 Virginia, living smack down in the middle of the
7 southern coal fields of West Virginia.
8 I must tell you that I came here
9 reluctantly. Not because of any threats, or
10 intimidation — because we weren't going to listen to
11 that — but because I know that the Bush
12 Administration, and the Environmental Protection
13 Agency want us to come here, say our peace, and go
14 back and live under the valley fills again.
15 And I know that this EIS is a shame and
16 it is a sham, and the Bush Administration just don't
17 give a damn.
18 But in the end, I decided to come here
19 and tell the EPA, and others, that there is this
20 great frustration in the coal fields of West
21 Virginia, Kentucky, and Tennessee.
22 People who have for so long battled for
23 justice, are fed up with not being listened to, fed
24 up with laws not being enforced, fed up with crooked
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1 politicians, fed up with the coal industry that puts
2 profit above people, fed up with having our homes and
3 lives destroyed in the name of corporate greed.
4 From that frustration is coming power.
5 Power that doesn' t come from money, and it doesn't
6 come from status, it comes from within. And it comes
7 with being united with people from around this
8 region, around this country, and around the world.
9 I am here tonight to tell you about the
10 people. I will tell you about a mother who used to
11 go out on her back porch with a cup of coffee in her
12 hand, and look up into the beautiful mountains and
13 valleys, behind her home, and now she goes up there,
14 and looks up at a pile of rock that they call a
15 valley fill, and she cries.
16 Mothers shouldn't be crying in the
17 States of West Virginia, Kentucky and Tennessee.
18 This EIS is a sham. And we can do
19 better.
20 And I want to tell you about a father
21 who once took his son fishing in the mountain streams
22 surrounding his home to teach him how to fish, like
23 his father had before him. Now he would have to
24 explain to his little boy how that mountain stream is
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1 no longer there. How it is part of over 700 miles of
2 streams that have been buried by mountaintop removal
3 mining.
4 Daddy should not have to explain that to
5 the little boy, and the EIS does not solve that
6 problem, and we can do better.
7 I want to tell you about a grandfather
8 and grandmother, who worked their entire lives to get
9 a little place up in the mountains so that they could
10 retire in peace and quiet. And now, every day that
11 peace and quiet, is blasted, because of blasting on
12 the mountains above them, and they are afraid, pissed
13 off, and stressed out.
14 And grandparents should not have to live
15 that way. This EIS does not solve that problem, and
16 we can do better.
17 And you need to hear about the
18 children. The children who are going to bed every
19 night that it rains fully clothed because they don't
20 know that at 3 o'clock in the morning they may have
21 to get up and run for their lives. Not from the
22 water coming from the streams, but the water that is
23 coming from the sediment ponds above them.
24 Children should not have to be going to
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1 sleep fully clothed at night. This EIS does not
2 solve that. And it is a sham, and we can do better.
3 Frieda, thank you for mentioning Mother
4 Jones. Because people today are still fighting for
5 justice in the coal fields, and we will have that.
6 Our battle is not with the ones of those
7 that are feeding their families, but it is with the
8 greedy coal operators, and the West Virginia Coal
9 Association who put profit above people.
10 And our battle with the Bush
11 Administration, that totally ignores the laws and
12 lets this illegal practice continue.
13 We will win.
14 We will have coal field justice, in
15 spite of the fact that this EIS is shame, and a sham,
16 and the Bush Administration just don't give a damn!
17 MR. CHAIRMAN: James Chajmacki?
18 AUDIENCE MEMBER: He left.
19 MR. CHAIRMAN: Okay. Pam Medlin.
20 After Pam we will be taking another
21 small break again.
22 MS. MEDLIN: I am Pam Medlin. I am from
23 Charlotte, North Carolina.
24 I am here tonight representing a family
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1 from McDowell County, West Virginia.
2 My eighth-year-old son came to me
3 recently with tears in his eyes asking, Mommy, why
4 don't they realize that cutting down the mountains
5 and trees causes flooding and hurts the earth. Even
6 I know that, and I am just a kid.
7 That single statement stunned me. My
8 immediate family no longer lived in West Virginia.
9 My kids don't have to live in fear of another flood
10 or slurry dam breaking. Yet they feel the pain of
11 their friends and family still living in the coal
12 fields of West Virginia.
13 My son heard me planning my trip here
14 today and begged to come along. Why do you want to
15 go? I asked him. His reply, So that I can ask the
16 coal company, and the coal miners myself, why they
17 hate little kids so much. They put them in danger.
18 Why can't we find better ways to make
19 electricity, and why they can't be nice to the earth?
20 Again, I was stunned by the intelligence
21 of an eight-year-old child. If he could understand,
22 then surely the coal companies, and the government
23 could understand, as well.
24 This earth is a gift given to all of us
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1 for the short amount of time we are here. Not just
2 big business and people with money.
3 For someone to have the audacity to
4 think that they can improve the gift that has been
5 given, leaves me at a loss for words.
6 What is going to be left for future
7 generations? When the last hardwood forest is being
8 trucked out of here, and seeing flat scarred land
9 where a majestic mountain once stood?
10 Can you, the coal companies, or you the
11 government, look into the innocent eyes of a child
12 and honestly say that you tried to do something good
13 for the earth and their future? That you didn't
14 think mountaintop removal was bad for the earth?
15 We ask that you take an honest and
16 unbiased look at the government's own research. They
17 have proven, without a shadow of a doubt, that
18 mountaintop removal and valley fills destroy our
19 environment and our future.
20 We ask that you extend the deadline for
21 comments on the Environmental Impact Statement, so
22 that all people can read, and fully understand the
23 devastation our own government, our own government,
24 is permitting to continue.
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1 Perhaps it is time that we all realize
2 that we are in this together. There are
3 alternatives, and together we ought to succeed in
4 making a difference.
5 Remember the words of a child, "I know
6 that, and I am just a kid."
7 MR. CHAIRMAN: It is time that we all
8 take a five-minute break here. The two speakers
9 after the break will be Winnie Fox. Carolyn
10 Chajmacki, if she happens to still be here, and Patty
11 Sebok.
12 Let's take five minutes, and come back
13 in, and if the speaker is speaking, again, be very
14 quiet.
15 Thank you.
16 (Break.)
17 MS. FOX: My name is Winnie Fox. I am
18 from Huntington, West Virginia, and I was born on the
19 Big Sandy River.
20 I have seen a lot of hideous things in
21 my time, but I have never, never seen anything as
22 hideous as mountaintop removal.
23 This state has the richest resources and
24 the poorest people. We talk about we have no jobs,
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1 our children have to leave this state because there
2 is nothing here for them. We educate them and then
3 bid them good-bye. They are like refugees.
4 I am going to calm on down now. But I
5 want to read a poem that I wrote about Massey because
6 I am supposed to restrain myself. Because I might
7 incinerate.
8 "Ode to Massey Coal"
9 "How you use energy all wrong
10 You have been among us too long.
11 Everything you have been doing is wrong.
12 You have messed up our rivers,
13 You have messed up our streams,
14 You have messed up our hopes,
15 and you have messed up our dreams.
16 You have blown up our mountains,
17 You have taken our wells,
18 and instead of respecting,
19 You've given us hell.
20 You've been a rotten corporate neighbor,
21 You've no respect for labor.
22 Now we have a monumental job of cleaning
23 up the mess you made,
24 And I've covered for the taxes you have
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1 not paid.
2 The ads that you running on TV to make
3 you look good,
4 but they are not working,
5 you are still a corporate hood.
6 The toxic sludge is so yucky,
7 that you don't want Kentucky.
8 Can we recover our losses,
9 at the EPA office?
10 Stop this deadly World War,
11 We can't stand it anymore.
12 When we bid you goodbye,
13 there will be no tears in our eyes.
14 Here's to you, Dear Old Massey,
15 you have been a pain in the . . .
16 neck."
17 These are sacred land, and these are
18 sacred people, and you are the regulatory agency for
19 this site, and it is your sacred duty to protect
20 these mountains and protect these people.
21 Because if you don't, you will have to
22 answer to somebody for that. I promise. And I keep
23 my promises.
24 Thank you so much.
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1 MR. CHAIRMAN: Carolyn Chajmacki?
2 AUDIENCE MEMBER: They left.
3 MR. CHAIRMAN: I knew he did, but I
4 wasn't sure if she did or not.
5 Patty Sebok. And then after Patty, it
6 will be Janice Neese.
7 MS. SEBOK: Hello. My name is Patty
8 Sebok. I am a lifelong resident of Boone County,
9 West Virginia.
10 My ancestors also have been here since
11 the 1700's. My father was a coal miner, and my
12 husband is a coal miner. So I am not against all
13 coal mining. But I am against mountaintop removal
14 mining.
15 I keep hearing that mountaintop removal
16 mining provides the only good paying jobs in a
17 depressed region, and levels out rough terrain for
18 future development. Well MTR mining provides so many
19 jobs, then why are the coal mining counties the
20 poorest of the state?
21 Name me one mountaintop removal site
22 that has been developed on the Big Coal River area.
23 We hear that there is no economic development because
24 of a lack of potential development sites.
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1 Big Coal River area has over 95,000
2 acres of flattened land. Is this not enough land for
3 development? Where are the development plans for the
4 land? What is the percentage of mountaintop removal
5 sites that are developed from destroyed mountains?
6 Boone County has an economic development
7 plan, but it plainly states that if an MTR site is
8 not within a half of a mile of a four-lane road,
9 there will be no development.
10 So on our side, the Big Coal River side
11 of Boone County, there will not be any development.
12 If mountaintop removal mining is so good
13 for communities, why isn't there any mountaintop
14 removal going on in Charleston or South Charleston.
15 Is it because mountaintop removal impacts the poor,
16 those without power? You won't see it in the rich
17 communities.
18 Lives are lost, homes destroyed, and
19 communities devastated. Plus the loss of our culture
20 when we lose our mountains, and the freedoms that go
21 into our mountains.
22 Deer and bear are being seen in people's
23 yards in the daytime to eat because they are being
24 run out by mountaintop removal. They have no food.
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1 In the past four years, I have seen more
2 deer coming in my yard to eat grass than I have in my
3 entire lifetime.
4 If you think that enforcement of
5 existing regulations will not be economically
6 beneficial to continue mining, then go back to deep
7 mining.
8 Deep mining does not cause the problems
9 that mountaintop removal mining does. Plus, it
10 provides more jobs, with much less environmental
11 impact on communities, and private property owners.
12 Last year, my husband was laid off twice
13 from the deep mines, while the mountaintop removal
14 sites were working night and day.
15 Mountaintop removal mines does not
16 provide half as many jobs as deep mines, but deep
17 mines cannot compete with the cheap prices of
18 mountaintop removal coal.
19 This EIS study costs the American
20 taxpayers -- yes, the American taxpayers, not just
21 West Virginia taxpayers — $8 million.
22 And it started out to minimize the
23 potential for adverse effects of mining operations.
24 So I would like to know how did it come
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1 to be a streamline permitting process?
2 Thank you.
3 MR. CHAIRMAN: Janice Neese. The next
4 speaker will be Chuck Wrostok.
5 MS. NEESE: Hi. My name is Janice Neese
6 and I am currently the executive director of
7 Coal River Mountain Watch.
8 I, too, am a lifelong West Virginian. I
9 have come from two generations of coal miners.
10 For over five years — the last five
11 years — I have been working very closely with the
12 residents of the southern coal fields, fighting the
13 environmental, social, and economic impacts of
14 mountaintop removal mining.
15 It is the hardest job that I have ever
16 done in my job, and I was a teacher for 31 years. So
17 that is saying quite a bit.
18 It seems, four long years, we have been
19 waiting the results of the study, hoping that someone
20 would finally listen. Unfortunately, you chose not
21 to.
22 While we were waiting, we were
23 suffering. While you were studying, we were
24 suffering. It seems that every study is the same
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1 result. We expect something good, and it is always
2 something bad.
3 In the four years that you were working
4 on this study, we have suffered from -- we have
5 suffered the decapitation of our mountains, and the
6 dumping of valley fills into our streams. We have
7 suffered air pollution, dust pollution, three
8 devastating floods.
9 We have had sludge dumps, sludge dam
10 spills, valley-fill failures, et cetera, et cetera,
11 et cetera.
12 And I could take my five minutes telling
13 you of what we studied, but that's not what I'm going
14 to do.
15 I'm going to tell you that the study
16 that you released, shames every member of the
17 community. And it deals a death blow to both the
18 physical environment and human environment in the
19 southern coal fields.
20 I am not sure -- I am not sure why you
21 chose to side with the coal industry, and with their
22 false economics. Maybe, perhaps, you were swayed by
23 the threat of lost jobs.
24 I am 67 years old, and I have heard that
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1 threat since I was six years old. I lived through
2 it.
3 Why does the coal industry think that
4 they are entitled to a job, when the rest of the
5 nation, schoolteachers, all types of people, have
6 lost their jobs?
7 Are we out trying to protect their
8 jobs? Have I seen anyone on this committee try to
9 protect their jobs? No. It is only the coal
10 industry.
11 They think that they should take a few
12 jobs that they give to a community, and we should be
13 grateful.
14 They also tell us that we are,
15 obligated, to provide cheap energy for the nation.
16 Well, we don't think so.
17 We have no intentions of allowing this
18 to continue. We have no intentions of seeing our
19 communities destroyed, our mountains destroyed, our
20 heritage destroyed; everything that we hold dear is
21 destroyed.
22 How many people did you talk to from the
23 southern coal fields when you did this study? Did
24 you interview anyone in the Boone County area? Did
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1 you interview anybody from the impoverished counties
2 of Mingo, McDowell, Boone, parts of Raleigh?
3 We didn't see you. We didn't hear from
4 you. You know, when we send in our comments, we
5 seriously think that they are probably not even read.
6 I would like to talk a little bit, too,
7 about — well, I wanted to say, something else about
8 what, perhaps, changed your mind about what you were
9 supposed to do? Perhaps you fell prey to the coal
10 industry's economists' point of view.
11 Let me tell you about the economy of
12 coal. Coal is a false prosperity. It enriches the
13 few, to the detriment of many.
14 The motto of coal is get as much coal as
15 you can with the fewest number of men, and the
16 greatest amount of profit, and get out, with — the
17 profit — as fast as you can.
18 I have seen that three times in my
19 lifetime. I have seen that happen, and nothing is
20 left behind for West Virginia, and nothing is left
21 behind for Kentucky.
22 Finally, I would like to say something
23 about reclamation. You know, one of the gentlemen on
24 that site said that they shouldn't have to reclaim
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1 these places because it is difficult, you know, it is
2 difficult to do.
3 They are required by law to reclaim
4 these land sites. Nothing has been done in Boone
5 County, for Boone County. Four percent have been
6 reclaimed, if at all.
7 What I am here to tell you tonight, is
8 that we are angry, and we wanted to tell you: Hell,
9 no, to your study, and hell, no, to mountaintop
10 removal mining.
11 Thank you.
12 MR. CHAIRMAN: Chuck Wrostok.
13 And then after Chuck, we will have
14 Marian Miller.
15 MR. WROSTOK: My name is Chuck Wrostok.
16 After Chris Hamilton gave his qualifications, I guess
17 I have to say that I am not a native West Virginian.
18 But I have been here for 27 years, and I am here to
19 stay. I am not going anywhere.
20 For the federalities they are here
21 tonight, I also want to say that I have 40 years
22 experience as a U.S. taxpayer.
23 This EIS report is an unhealthy example
24 of the type of double speak emanating from
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1 Washington, B.C., these days.
2 I can understand the delay in the
3 release of such a document. It has to be
4 embarrassing to some of the authors.
5 Who would be proud of a document that
6 makes such a strong case for protecting the
7 environment, while recommending a speedier way to
8 destroy it?
9 So as a taxpayer, I am formally
10 demanding a refund of the $8 million that you spent
11 on this.
12 Now if our government was controlled by
13 the people, and for the people, we wouldn't be here
14 today defending our mountains from mutilation?
15 We would not have to deal with the
16 perverse logic of an EIS report that tells us of vast
17 environmental damage from mountaintop mining, and
18 then makes it easier to get permits to do this very
19 same damage.
20 Am I missing something here? I mean, I
21 don't get it, or what?
22 We also wouldn't have to deal with the
23 dark minds that control the mining industry who would
24 destroy one of the world's most diverse ecosystems
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1 for the sake of profit.
2 If we had a government that was
3 controlled by the people -- there is already a
4 healthy mistrust of the Federal government in this
5 neck of the woods, and this EIS report doesn't help.
6 Today, miners, drivers and their
7 families, are faced with terrible choices. They are
8 being asked to transform their woods through hunting
9 grounds, their fishing streams into barren wasteland,
10 or lose their jobs. It is an awful choice. One that
11 they should not have to make.
12 Many of them were here today. If you
13 look into the hearts of many of the people here, you
14 will see many of the neighbors, everyday folks like
15 yourselves, thinking about their choice to have a
16 home, and a decent life in these hills and hollows of
17 this beautiful land; these mountains that God made.
18 Some people will say that there will
19 eventually be jobs at Walmarts, and fast-food places
20 on this reclaimed land, but who could live on minimum
21 wage and no benefits?
22 By the way, this "reclaimed land"
23 phrase, I have a little trouble with. Where I come
24 from, we call it a landfill. It is usually filled
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1 with junk.
2 We all have to work together to find a
3 way to keep our mountain heritage and have good jobs,
4 too.
5 If federal agencies can bail out savings
6 and loans associations, if they can bail out airlines
7 with billions of dollars of money that come out of
8 our pockets, then it could help coal-field people
9 create good-paying jobs here in West Virginia.
10 It is like we are invisible here,
11 sometimes.
12 Federal subsidies could create jobs in
13 alternative-energy research, development and
14 construction, jobs with a future.
15 Are we to become an energy-sacrifice
16 zone, because we can't pull together for a more
17 diverse economic future? Surely we can do better.
18 Now maybe the Government agencies who
19 are so anxious to now communicate with one another,
20 could communicate with agencies and see what they
21 could do about this.
22 There are plenty of people down here
23 willing to work. They need the jobs, they have the
24 resilience, they have the intelligence, and they have
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1 the work ethic.
2 We are not about to have this
3 government, which is controlled by industry, destroy
4 our way of life. These mountains are not an
5 impediment to progress; they are our soul.
6 We reject the premise of having jobs,
7 while devastating our land forever is a good thing.
8 It is a dead-end path.
9 As Woody Guthrie put it, This land is
10 our land. The water, the air, the soil that sustains
11 us. These are our rights and vital ingredients for
12 the common good of everyone.
13 A good Government report would not only
14 reflect that, but would find ways to sustain the
15 common good.
16 MR. CHAIRMAN: Sir, you are out of time.
17 MR. WYROSTOK: Thank you.
18 MR. CHAIRMAN: The next speaker is
19 Marian Miller, and then after that is
20 Pauline Cantebury.
21 May I remind you again, to please adjust
22 the mic so that all the people can hear everyone.
23 Thank you.
24 MS. MILLER: My name is Marian Miller.
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1 I live in Sylvester, in a coal-dust town that has
2 surrounded us.
3 I am against mountaintop removal. We
4 need to protect our water streams, and our rivers --
5 God gave us these beautiful mountains, not to be
6 destroyed.
7 I moved to Boone County in 1951. There
8 were coal mines and coal camps along Coal River.
9 They did not remove the mountain tops years ago, and
10 it was a bigger demand for the coal in 1951 when I
11 moved to Coal River.
12 Why do they have to remove the mountain
13 tops now?
14 This is where our State, our Federal
15 government needs to make laws, enforce them. Don't
16 force people out. Don't wait until it is too late
17 and we are washed off. Act now on the law.
18 When I go to bed at night, I do not know
19 if we are going to be flooded after a heavy rain, or
20 if an impoundment will break loose. We do not have
21 any kind of a warning signal.
22 I am between two most endangered
23 impoundments. One is across the river from me, and
24 one is five miles up the road.
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1 Now we think, Are we going to be washed
2 down Coal River? Does anybody here really know? No.
3 I am not against coal mining, because we
4 need coal, and we need jobs, but don't destroy our
5 mountains and communities.
6 There should be a law of how close the
7 mines are built to a town. Before the mountaintop's
8 removal, and pollution in Coal River, we could swim
9 in the river, we could fish in the river. We could
10 take a little canoe ride down Coal River, but they
11 are dammed up the river now, and we can't go
12 nowhere — can't fish.
13 In the wintertime, we used to go ice
14 skating. The Coal River would freeze over. Now what
15 is in our river? What kind of chemical is in our
16 river that they do not freeze now?
17 Now I have got a little picture here I
18 want to show you, that the people in Sylvester have
19 suffered over a mountaintop removal. Right there,
20 (indicating) is where a stoker plant is put about 300
21 yards from my home.
22 Now on the count of all of the coal dust
23 that we are getting from the stoker plant, it has
24 ruined our little town.
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1 Now my time is almost up, but I just
2 want to tell one more thing: We have lost our
3 schools, and I feel now that I have lost my home.
4 My home is appraised at $144,000. And
5 on the count of the coal dust, it is wort $12,000.
6 It has depreciated. This is what I have worked so
7 hard on all my life, and it is only worth $10,000,
8 not enough to bury me.
9 My husband was in the War. He fought
10 for our country; now I am fighting for my home.
11 I am damn mad. Now they say we have no
12 pollution; they are crazy.
13 This is what we put up with,
14 (indicating), coal dust.
15 MR. CHAIRMAN: Thank you, ma'am.
16 Next speaker is Pauline Cantebury.
17 Then the next speaker is Melvin Tyrce.
18 MS. CANTEBURY: My name is Pauline
19 Cantebury, and I am also from the town of Sylvester,
20 West Virginia.
21 Whoever said that we don't have any coal
22 dust anymore? Up there in the part of West Virginia
23 where they say that we don't have any coal dust
24 anymore -- well whoever said that here tonight, sure
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1 has not been in Sylvester in the last five years.
2 Because the last five years, the town of Sylvester
3 has been totally polluted, demolished, destroyed with
4 coal dust.
5 This Environmental Impact Statement you
6 have made does nothing for the communities.
7 You did not even come into the
8 communities, you didn't ask us anything. You didn't
9 ask us why we were complaining like we were
10 complaining.
11 I want to tell you what it is like to
12 live in the coal field today. Mountaintop removal
13 mining of coal fields today is massive ruination, not
14 only to the beautiful Appalachian mountains of West
15 Virginia, but to every creature whose existence
16 depends on these mountains for survival, and to the
17 citizens who live in the valley below them.
18 Much danger and destruction lurch behind
19 a guard shack, at the mouth of those operations.
20 Explosions that resemble the Atom Bomb,
21 fill the airway with rock dust for miles away,
22 covering the valley below, and all those who dwell
23 within, with this deadly stuff, which causes
24 silicosis.
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1 Inadequate runoff ponds are built in the
2 hollows that break during heavy rains, hitting walls
3 of water gushing down the mountains destroying
4 everything and everyone in its path.
5 Dams are built up over hollows, holding
6 millions of gallons of black slurry, loaded with over
7 60 chemicals and varying degrees of age and erosion.
8 And seeping into underground mines that are in the
9 entire past history, threatening valleys and people
10 below them who have no route to safety. Buffalo
11 Creek and Martin County, Kentucky, are two good
12 examples of what will happen.
13 The first of these impoundments is
14 released constantly into our streams and rivers.
15 The Big Coal River, in Boone County, was
16 a free-flowing river. It is now a trickling stream
17 blocked at intervals with illegal dams and it is one
18 of the most contaminated rivers in the United States
19 of America, and it is the drinking water supply for
20 that area.
21 Illegal substances, such as rock dust
22 are disposed of in these impoundments. Unmarked
23 tankers and drums travel constantly into these areas
24 across our highways.
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1 The dark of night hides many things.
2 Powdery, black coal dust pours from uncovered
3 structures, placed near residential areas, polluting
4 the air for miles, destroying citizens' properties,
5 homes, and exposing everyone to black lung.
6 The entry in the year 2000, had a 100
7 percent higher cancer risk than the Clean Water Act
8 allows. It is no different today.
9 The allotted time period speak here does
10 not allow enough to tell all of the vicious acts that
11 are being imposed by the citizens of West Virginia in
12 the southern coal fields caused by mountaintop
13 removal.
14 As a fellow Republican, and with due
15 respect, I challenge President Bush, and you, the
16 impact committee, to come into the hollows and
17 valleys of southern West Virginia, and feel the
18 explosions shake the house that you are standing in,
19 while the walls crumble, and pictures fall to the
20 floor.
21 And the continuing fear of rock dust
22 falling through the air on your body and breathe it
23 into your lungs.
24 To watch the sun disappear behind the
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1 clouds. To see the stress, the streams and rivers
2 turn black with a chemical-layden slurry, or catch a
3 fish with holes eaten into its body from those
4 chemicals, and see the animals killed along the
5 highway after being driven from their habitat. Then
6 show from the odor of the acid runoff from watching
7 the toxic slide seep from the valley fills where they
8 have filled the valleys.
9 Then witness a person dying from
10 hemorrhaging lungs, eaten up with coal dust, or a
11 black-lung victim, gasping for air into his mouth
12 clogged with coal dust.
13 And see a child panic, when it rains,
14 fearing his home will be destroyed again. Then leave
15 our valley of narrow bridges and unkept highways,
16 dodging their car between the mountains, and
17 overloaded coal truck swerving in your lane. That is
18 mountaintop removal mining living.
19 I am a coal miner's daughter, and a coal
20 miner's wife. I am now a 73-year-old widow, who
21 worked 45 years to acquire the home that I have, but
22 now my home is worthless. My home is full of black
23 coal dust.
24 MR. CHAIRMAN: You are out of time.
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1 MS. CANTEBURY: My home is —
2 Sir, I think I have lost enough, if you
3 can bear with me this time.
4 MR. CHAIRMAN: I'm sorry, ma'am. We
5 have several people, but when you get through, you
6 can put your comments in the comment box.
7 MS. CANTEBURY: Okay. Let me say one
8 more thing: On my worthless home, on the wall, is a
9 plaque with metals on it. The same metals that
10 Jessica Lynch has on her chest.
11 My husband fought in three major battles
12 in World War II, spending 116 days as a Prisoner of
13 War, in Germany.
14 I am so glad that he is not here today
15 to see the things that he had, for the sacrifices
16 that he paid, and see his home like it is today.
17 Thank you.
18 MR. CHAIRMAN: Melvin Tyrce. Then the
19 next speaker will be Bill McCabe.
20 MR. TYRCE: My name is Mel Tyrce and I
21 am a resident of Hurricane, West Virginia. As long
22 as we are keeping count, I am a fifth generation
23 West Virginian.
24 I have a general comment to make at
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1 first, and then I have some specific things about the
2 EIS.
3 Let's be honest here, okay? Mountaintop
4 removal is about a cheap and easy access to a
5 nonsustainable energy source.
6 It is not about redevelopment. It is
7 not about future sustainable energy. It is about
8 cheap and quick access to a nonrenewable energy
9 source. And that is what it is about.
10 Anyway, I think it is going to take a
11 long time, but I think we are going to have to adopt
12 a society of permanence. A sustainable energy,
13 sustainable economic development.
14 From my perspective, that is the
15 ultimate answer here.
16 Anyway, that is my first thing.
17 The second comment I got is: What would
18 be the Corps of Engineer's criteria from deciding
19 between nationwide permit, verses individual permit?
20 To me, that is the best concern. The
21 process would go a lot quicker with a nationwide
22 permit. I think this is a critical issue that I am
23 not sure is fully defined yet. I think it is
24 something I think we need to look at.
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1 The third thing I had is: Will
2 mitigated or replace wetlands, or waters of the
3 United States be equal, in terms of the same quality
4 and functionality, and species of diversity of the
5 wetlands that were replaced?
6 In other words, are we talking quality
7 here, or quantity? That is an important thing.
8 I am not familiar with the 404 process
9 of mountaintop removal, but I have delineated
10 wetlands for 404 permit process for other industries,
11 and there is a certain amount of accountability there
12 in terms of quality in mitigated wetlands, verses
13 quality of a destroyed wetland.
14 I think that is an important
15 consideration, particularly some of these headwaters,
16 is really vitally important for downstream energy
17 budgets.
18 I think that needs to be looked at.
19 The fourth thing I got, I am not sure
20 from looking through the EIS if this was covered:
21 What are the long-term impacts to downstream energy
22 budgets from the loss of ephemeral or upper streams?
23 There is a lot of ephemeral aquatic
24 energy sources, the nutrients that are presented from
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1 flowing downstream, when these ephemeral streams are
2 buried. I am just wondering about long-term. 20,
3 30, 50 years down the road. I am not sure that was
4 addressed.
5 The other comment I had: How will
6 Alternative 3 be financed? I have heard some people
7 talk about streamlining, and how we will put this
8 under one state agency.
9 I used to work for the DEP, and funding
10 is something they had very little of. And I don't
11 understand how this increased responsibility for the
12 State DEP, will be funded, in terms of enforcement,
13 permit, review, and that kind of thing.
14 The State is now strapped for cash.
15 I mean, how are the budgets of the DEP going to
16 withstand this nationwide permit process if it is
17 passed?
18 It is confusing.
19 I believe that is it.
20 The last thing — God forbid —
21 mountaintop removal continues, I think that we really
22 have to seriously look at sustainable replacement in
23 terms of economically sustainable development, as
24 well as environmentally sustainable environment.
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1 I have heard people talk about that the
2 industry representatives say that they don't have a
3 crystal ball, but they seem to.
4 I mean, if they are coming out here and
5 destroying hundreds of thousands of acres of land,
6 and burying streams, they must know something that
7 the environmentalists don't know in terms of their
8 impact.
9 So I don't buy that as an excuse for
10 not having the proper language in place before these
11 permits are issued, guarantees about the development
12 of this property. That has been a shortfall in the
13 past, and it seems now is the time to correct that.
14 If mountaintop removal is allowed to continue.
15 Thank you.
16 MR. CHAIRMAN: Bill McCabe.
17 MR. McCABE: Can I ask the panel a quick
18 procedural question?
19 MR. CHAIRMAN: What would that be, sir?
20 MR. McCABE: I was wondering if there
21 are any other citizens of the coal fields that are
22 effected by this horrible tragedy that want to
23 speak?
24 Can I see hands?
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1 Okay. Would it be possible, sir, that I
2 yield my time until you hear from — I am worried
3 about your attention span, is what I am worried
4 about. And it would be more important for you to
5 hear from them, because they are actually taking it.
6 Can I swap places with the last of the
7 two speakers that would be anti-mountaintop removal
8 from the coal fields?
9 Sure I can.
10 MR. CHAIRMAN: I would have to move you
11 to the bottom of the list, sir. That is the only way
12 I can conceivably do that.
13 MR. McCABE: If moving me at the bottom
14 of the list is after the last person who speaks
15 against mountaintop removal.
16 MR. CHAIRMAN: I don't know who speaks
17 for what. That would be the only way to do that.
18 Either speak now or move to the bottom.
19 MR. McCABE: I am going to yield to the
20 expertise of the coal fields.
21 MR. CHAIRMAN: The next speaker will be
22 Florence — I am going to guess — Twu. I may be
23 wrong.
24 Then the speaker after that will be
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1 Abraham, M-W-A-U-R-A. I won't even try that one.
2 Florence Twu. Then the next speaker
3 will be Abraham, M-W-A-U-R-A, after Florence.
4 Is Florence here?
5 MS. TWU: My name is Florence Twu. I
6 grew up in West Virginia, and my family moved to
7 Illinois. This is the first time that I have been
8 back to the state for 13 years.
9 I didn't come back to see flat grassy
10 land, there is enough of that in Illinois. I came
11 back because all of my childhood memories are
12 universally tied up with the mountains in this
13 state.
14 And I am pissed off, enough to be back
15 here working at the Ohio Valley Environmental
16 Coalition.
17 I am a student at Harvard, and I can
18 speak to you about the economics and the terms of
19 multi-variable calculus, or parts of derivatives in
20 count theory, or cost-benefit analyzes.
21 But the first thing you learn in a
22 Harvard economics class is that economics gets shut
23 out by politics, and that is exactly what has
24 happened in this EIS statement.
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1 An economic study that was prepared to
2 be part of the EIS said that even under the
3 restrictive scenarios studied by the DEP, the
4 economic cost of dramatically limiting valley fills
5 would be minimal.
6 There's a study found in the draft EIS,
7 or was it discarded because the Bush Administration
8 didn't like the results? This is called
9 appeasement.
10 It is a shame if you cannot come up with
11 an answer that is more humane. And I can't even
12 believe how much I have learned from these people
13 here. But I don't need my degree to tell you that
14 this is wrong.
15 But of my time here, it is just -- I am
16 going to use my education to stop this. And I think
17 you are smart enough to know that this is not the
18 right thing to do.
19 MR. CHAIRMAN: Abraham — I am not sure
20 how to pronounce the last name, M-W-A-U-B-A. (sic)
21 And then after Abraham, we'll have Jason
22 Sneed.
23 MR. MWAURA: Thank you gentlemen, and
24 ladies. My name is Abraham Mwaura. I am from
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1 Huntington, West Virginia. I work with OVEC.
2 MR. CHAIRMAN: Can you speak up?
3 MR. MWAURA: Okay. Abraham Mwaura,
4 Huntington, West Virginia. I work with OVEC.
5 I guess I am just going to continue
6 participating in this frustrating stating of the
7 obvious. I have Tylenol with me. I didn't have
8 selenium with me.
9 I am going to put a nontoxic dose of
10 Tylenol in my nonrenewable resource.
11 Then now I am going to talk to you about
12 stuff you already know. I mean you wrote a whole
13 report on this stuff. You guys better know this
14 stuff, you know the impact of mountaintop removal,
15 but I am going to say it anyway to you, so bear with
16 me.
17 There has been a grave error, first of
18 all, in your statement. The one I received was on
19 the environmental impacts of mountaintop removal, and
20 you sent one on the economic impact of mountaintop
21 removal to the coal guys, because they came up here
22 and talked about coal, and economic development, and
23 all sorts of good things moneywise, that is going to
24 come from coal, different statements.
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1 The coal industry loves, and often says
2 that mountaintop removal only affects one percent of
3 the state.
4 In fact, they recently revised that
5 figure to two percent. Remember, mountaintop removal
6 happens in southern West Virginia, not in the north,
7 so it is not the whole state.
8 Several years ago, CNN reported that
9 over 20 percent of the land mass in some county has
10 been subject to mountaintop removal.
11 It is probably more now. We're talking
12 about counties like Boone, Logan, and Mingo. This
13 huge land disturbance obviously creates massive
14 problems.
15 Take the last few years, flooding, as an
16 example. But you guys know this, remember?
17 Remember that when the coal industry
18 tells you how much it puts into the state in terms of
19 taxes, remember what we pay, and pay, and pay, to
20 clean it up.
21 The EIS needs to include a full
22 accounting of all tax subsidies that coal industry
23 gets. Remember the billion dollar super tax credit
24 that was supposed to create jobs, and instead was
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1 used to buy giant machines that replaced loads of
2 miners; remember?
3 The EIS should have a full accounting of
4 all of the externalized costs associated with
5 mountaintop removal.
6 This industry continues to pit
7 working-class people against working class people,
8 while whisking profits out of state and leaving us,
9 our children, and our children's children a fiscal,
10 social, and environmental bill that will be
11 impossible to pay.
12 The draft EIS fails to note the act of
13 environmental terrorism that are being committed
14 right here in Appalachia.
15 Some have been saying that we need to
16 sacrifice West Virginia's mountains, so that the
17 nation can have cheap energy without relying on
18 foreign sources of energy.
19 Arthur Dennis Burke, using government
20 statistics -- Government statistics -- calculated
21 that 2,500 tons of explosives are used against the
22 Appalachian mountains each day.
23 That is every four days more explosives
24 are used in mountaintop removal coal mining that were
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1 used in the post 911 bombing of Afghanistan in the
2 hunt for Bin Laden.
3 In the long run, no amount of bombing of
4 own our coal fields, will ever give us homeland
5 security.
6 In fact, the ironic thing is that this
7 bombing is destroying our homeland. But again, you
8 guys know this, you wrote a report on it.
9 Our nation's energy appetite shouldn't
10 and needn't drive us to justify such massive
11 cruelties to people and the land that supports us.
12 There are alternatives. The World Watch
13 Institute says that renewable cleaner energy
14 technology are advanced enough to satisfy the world's
15 energy needs now. That is without whole-hearted
16 government support for research and development in
17 these technologies.
18 Just think what we could do if we had
19 Manhattan Project Org. alternative energies. World
20 watch says the main thing lacking in getting
21 alternative energy in place, is the political Bush.
22 The EIS needs to expose Bush
23 Administration ties to fossil fuel energy industry
24 and it needs to recommend that we begin a full-scale
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1 switch to alternative energy.
2 Bring that industry to the coal fields.
3 That way, we can have jobs, as well as a future.
4 MR. CHAIRMAN: You are out of time.
5 MR. MWAURA: Now I dare one of you to
6 drink the water that I just put a safe amount of
7 Tylenol in over a period of 20, or 30 years, in a
8 nonrenewable resource, our water. But the dose of
9 selenium that I put in is safe.
10 MR. CHAIRMAN: Is Jason Sneed here?
11 (No response.)
12 MR. CHAIRMAN: Okay, the next person the
13 Connie Lewis.
14 Is Connie here?
15 Okay. Connie will be speaking next and
16 after Connie it will be Paul Nelson.
17 MS. LEWIS: Before I begin my formal
18 remarks, I have only lived in West Virginia for 32
19 years since I finished graduate school at Penn State.
20 But I married a man whose family has
21 lived in the Kanawha Valley for 220 years.
22 I would also like to say that flat land,
23 a good transportation infrastructure, and a
24 willingness to work for it, for all that is needed
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1 for economic development, please explain to me
2 Youngstown, Ohio, and Flint, Michigan, and many of
3 the other cities in the west coast, from which I have
4 hailed.
5 MR. CHAIRMAN: Can you speak into the
6 microphone, please?
7 MS. LEWIS: In a report prepared for
8 West Virginia Manufacturers' Association, in 1925, a
9 book entitled, "The Tax Problem in West Virginia"
10 The conference board said this about land, and I
11 quote:
12 "Land is a common heritage of the human
13 race. Hence its destruction has always been looked
14 upon as an insult to the welfare of human society."
15 "Unlike a healthy climate, water supply,
16 and similar assets which are owned collectively by
17 the entire community. The natural resources within
18 the depths of the earth are subject to appropriation,
19 exploitation, and utter destruction."
20 "Through the operation of natural
21 processes, processes over centuries, and centuries,
22 these assets of the human race have been accumulated
23 for the benefit of mankind; however, once depleted,
24 society has sustained an irretrievable loss, and
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1 future progress is thereby considerably retarded."
2 And you have heard many stories that
3 verify that statement from the conference board. If
4 it was true 80 years ago with the destruction of land
5 looked upon as an insult to the welfare of society.
6 It is certainly true now. And if it is
7 bad for society, it surely cannot be good for the
8 economy, and it surely cannot be good for the future
9 of West Virginia and it cannot be good for the
10 environment, also known as our life support system,
11 or the plants and animals dependent on the land.
12 If it was true 80 years ago, that a
13 plentiful water supply was a community asset, it is
14 certainly true now.
15 And covering up streams and destroying
16 our water wells, certainly cannot be in the best
17 interest of the community. It cannot be good for its
18 economy, and it could not be good for its future.
19 And of course, it cannot be good for the environment,
20 or the plants, and animals dependent on the water
21 supply.
22 It is also true that small alterations
23 in land, and land use, can affect the climate of a
24 small space. Cities, for instance, are warmer than
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1 the surrounding rural areas, and Israel discovered
2 that planting citrus orchards changed rainfall
3 patterns.
4 So it is also true that removing
5 mountaintops, and scraping the lands bare, and using
6 the native hardwood forest, is probably affecting a
7 climate, again, in small spaces.
8 But I don't think you studied that, and
9 I think you should have.
10 Even farmers, and gardeners know that
11 their land can have several different microclimates.
12 Destroying seven percent of the forest in this region
13 also affects the weather in unpredictable ways.
14 Wouldn't thousands of suddenly treeless
15 areas impact runoff from flooding?
16 Oh, you have already discovered that,
17 the DEP says so.
18 Given all this, it only makes sense to
19 move cautiously and to require stringent regulations
20 when allowing a company to make a permanent,
21 uncorrectable land alteration for a short-term
22 economic purpose.
23 All the alternatives in the EIS prevent
24 the long-term protection of the land, and the water,
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1 and the human and natural communities dependent upon
2 them.
3 The proposals in the EIS assume that the
4 problem is with the cumbersome bureaucracy; that is
5 wrong.
6 The problem is with the destruction of
7 the land and the waters. It should be beneath the
8 dignity of the professionals in the agency, to
9 participate in the destruction of water supplies.
10 It should be beneath the dignity of the
11 Army Corps and the Fish & Wildlife, and the others,
12 to allow the stream-buffer rule to be cast aside like
13 an outgrown toy.
14 The EIS appears to begin with the
15 predetermined results, that mountaintop removal
16 mining should continue unimpeded. That is not
17 science. That is politics.
18 To begin with a result, is inherently
19 unscientific. And anything unscientific should be
20 beneath the dignity of the professionals in these
21 agencies.
22 The report should have supported the
23 stream-buffer rule, should have further limited the
24 size of valley fills, mandate the reforestations of
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1 all sites not ready for development, protected water
2 supplies, and should have supported the people of the
3 region who must live with the consequences of
4 destructive mining practices.
5 Several hundred thousand acres sitting
6 idle indicate that there is not a viable market for
7 flat land in these 14 counties.
8 We know that the damage caused by
9 mountaintop removal mining is widespread, severe, and
10 destroys communities.
11 We know that it is getting worse, not
12 better and that too much of southern West Virginia
13 will be a moon state, except where it will be in
14 metal.
15 MR. CHAIRMAN: You are out of time.
16 MS. LEWIS: Governmental efficiency is
17 proposed in this report. It sounds as though the
18 Federal government is proposing a final solution for
19 our mountains.
20 MR. CHAIRMAN: Paul Nelson.
21 After Mr. Nelson we are going to take
22 our last five-minute break.
23 MR. NELSON: My name is Paul Nelson and
24 I live in Boone County, and I am against mountaintop
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1 removal.
2 Here I have a paper that has got 363
3 issued mining permits, not counting the ones that are
4 waiting to be issued -- pending.
5 You keep talking about MTR creates
6 jobs. Well, actually it takes away jobs.
7 I was a deep miner. If we mined this
8 much mineral bone, (indicating) the companies frowned
9 in eight-foot coal. But if you look along the roads,
10 you can see 400-feet plus. They will go for a seam
11 of coal this big and make money, now, that don't add
12 up.
13 Talk about where the economics are at,
14 it is not here.
15 Another thing, we live in the United
16 States. This flag is what we live under, and the
17 Constitution — it is like I have read, it is not
18 saying that any one person has the right, or any
19 certain people to have the power to dominate the
20 whole world with destruction, or give us terrorism.
21 It is supposed to be a free country. We are not
22 supposed to live in terrorism.
23 These are the kinds of things that we
24 live with in our own countries. Many of you have
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1 been to Vietnam, you have seen soldiers lost, and
2 killed due to booby traps. Booby traps is what is in
3 our mountains.
4 What if your kids, or someone you know
5 gets on it, if you do this, you go to jail. This is
6 illegal, then why is nothing being done?
7 It is so sad. When I stand up, I pledge
8 my flag, I do it with pride.
9 When I am seeing what I am seeing,
10 working with the few coal companies, the barrens are
11 doing, they are laughing at this flag. They may as
12 well burn it, as they did in the years that passed,
13 because it means nothing to them to flagrantly break
14 the laws that give us this freedom.
15 What more do we have to do? We don't
16 want to live in Afghanistan, this is our home. We
17 have the richest coal in the United States, here in
18 Boone County.
19 They can mine that mine responsibly, and
20 they would do it right because it is there, and they
21 want it, it is the richest coal. They can deep mine
22 that coal and put everybody to work that wants to
23 work.
24 The mines that I was at was 300-plus
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1 men, and they could have used that many more. 20 men
2 can run a strip, and the biggest part of them don't
3 even live in this state. Because they come in from
4 Alabama, and everywhere else.
5 On the weekends, their money goes out of
6 this state. It is not right. So what do we live in?
7 We live in the United States; we are not a
8 third-world country.
9 That is all I have to say.
10 Thank you.
11 MR. CHAIRMAN: Thank you. We will be
12 taking a five-minute break. We do have several more
13 speakers, so let's try to get back on time.
14 The next two speakers right after the
15 break will be Monty Fowler, and Denise Giardina.
16 Just take a five-minute break, and hurry
17 back as soon as possible.
18 Thank you.
19 (Five-minute break.)
20 MR. FOWLER: For the record, you got
21 mine right. Way to go.
22 My name is Monty Fowler, I am from
23 Huntington, West Virginia. No, I have not lived here
24 my entire life.
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1 Three observations, and then two
2 comments. First, I used to be a reporter in a past
3 life, and we had a name for reports like this, we
4 called them doorstops, because that is the only
5 useful purpose they should ever serve.
6 This gentlemen, is a 4,000-page
7 doorstop.
8 Because for one thing, it is misnamed.
9 You call it mountaintop mining, it is called
10 mountaintop removal. You need to call it what it
11 is.
12 Second, there were studies done on the
13 cumulative economic impacts of the proposed
14 regulations; where are they?
15 I paid for them. I want them in the
16 final report, because they show that the cumulative
17 economic impact of regulating mountaintop removal
18 mining, are minimal. I want those in the final
19 report.
20 Thirdly, the cumulative environmental
21 impacts are not discussed in anything other than
22 vague generalities that agree that well, mountaintop
23 removal mining, might possibly be bad. Duh.
24 I know that studies were done that
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1 looked at the cumulative economic impact of
2 mountaintop removal mining. They indicated that the
3 cumulative impacts were very great and were
4 permanent.
5 I want those studies, and those
6 conclusions in the final report. I paid for them; I
7 deserve to have them in there.
8 Two comments: Number one, none of us
9 would have to be here tonight if you guys, OSM, DEP,
10 EPA, Corps of Engineers — to an extent, Fish
11 & Wildlife — did your jobs and enforced the
12 regulations that we have now. We have wasted $8
13 million because you guys have let the coal industry
14 do basically what they wanted since probably the dawn
15 of time, certainly before I was on this planet.
16 Number two: For you coal guys, I have
17 heard several of you speaking during the break, I am
18 happy to provide your evening's entertainment. I
19 know you think this is a big joke, and that we are
20 just here for you to laugh at, but just remember, to
21 us, this is deadly serious. And in the end, we will
22 win, because we have better t-shirts than you do.
23 Thank you.
24 MR. CHAIRMAN: Denise Giardina. And
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1 then after Denise, will be Jason Bostic.
2 MS. GIARDINA: I am Denise Giardina. I
3 grew up in the coal fields. I live now in
4 Charleston.
5 I am a lay preacher in the Episcopal
6 Church, so this will be a sermon.
7 I have no illusions about the nature of
8 this hearing. It is not a hearing where no one is
9 listening.
10 My apologies to you folks. I should
11 say, no one with any power is listening. If you had
12 any power you wouldn't be here.
13 This gathering is like a show trial in
14 the Stalin Soviet Union. Judgment against the
15 mountains has already been pronounced and we are just
16 going through the motions.
17 The Bush Administration has every
18 intention of allowing the continued destruction of
19 the Appalachian mountains.
20 And let me point out in fairness, that
21 when I say the Bush Administration, I also mean the
22 Clinton Administration before it, and the first Bush
23 Administration, and the Reagan Administration.
24 I have come to speak despite the
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1 scepticism, because I am called as a Christian to
2 speak a word of truth to power.
3 I know that most of the power has left
4 the room, but some of it is still back there, and you
5 gentlemen are in big trouble, so I hope you listen
6 carefully.
7 The coal industry has absolute power, or
8 so it believes, that God says neither principalities,
9 nor power, can separate us from his love. God also
10 told us in Romans that the whole creation will be
11 redeemed.
12 As a Christian, I am told that I should
13 not judge, and yet God does call me to say that
14 judgment has indeed been pronounced.
15 Repentance is still possible, but living
16 at the expense of others, worshiping money and
17 worrying where it comes from, cursing others with
18 power, destroying God's creation, these are the ways
19 to eternal death.
20 I say this not as a judgment, but as a
21 warning. The way to eternal life lies elsewhere.
22 These mountains were the first God
23 created, and if they dare to hold a very special
24 place in his heart, I would not be surprised.
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1 I say this to give comfort to those of
2 you who also love these mountains, because so often
3 we despair what has already been lost.
4 The coal industry is right about one
5 thing, and only one thing: These mountains out there
6 have not been destroyed, these mountains still exist
7 in the mind of God.
8 And God will restore them, as only God
9 can.
10 To claim that a coal company could put
11 back God's handiwork, or that the Government can
12 regulate it, is blasphemy.
13 It is to worship before an idol made of
14 coal.
15 One day, everyone in this room; man,
16 woman and child, will lie under the ground, or be
17 scattered over the earth.
18 My faith tells me that Jesus Christ will
19 return to this earth to judge the living and the
20 dead. There shall be a new heaven and a new earth.
21 Those who live by the compassion, to
22 care for God's world and its creatures, who have put
23 their trust in God, rather than money, will be raised
24 to new and eternal life.
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1 Those who have lived life based on
2 greed, and power and destruction, those who have put
3 these things ahead of the love of God, and their
4 fellow human beings, those who destroy God's
5 creation, or allow it to be destroyed, will die
6 eternally, they will have only one soul. And on top
7 of their graves, will be reborn in all of their
8 glory, the most beautiful mountains that God ever
9 created.
10 I close with the words of the Prophet
11 Amos, "For woe he that formath the mountains, and
12 created the wind, and declared unto man what is His
13 thought that maketh the morning darkness, one
14 treadeth upon the highest places of the earth, the
15 Lord, the God, the Host, is his name, and you cannot
16 stand against him."
17 MR. CHAIRMAN: Jason Bostic.
18 Then after Jason will be Nick Carter.
19 MR. BOSTIC: Good evening. I am Jason
20 Bostic, the Regulatory Affairs Specialist for the
21 West Virginia Coal Association.
22 For the record, I am a life-long
23 resident of the coal fields of West Virginia, having
24 spent most of my life on Cabin Creek, West Virginia.
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1 Like my colleague, Mr. Hamilton, who
2 spoke to you earlier, I am speaking tonight to urge
3 the adoption of Alternative 3.
4 The U.S. Army Corps of Engineers
5 regulations provide for the issuance of general, or
6 nationwide permits. In cases where proposed
7 activities are similar in nature, and have only
8 minimal, individual, and cumulative impacts.
9 The draft EIS finally provides clear and
10 convincing evidence that mining has minimal and
11 temporary impacts, and as such, should qualify for
12 authorization under a nationwide Permit 21 process.
13 For example, the United Technical
14 Studies tell us that if mining were to continue, even
15 without any of the new restrictions proposed, the
16 United states West Virginia will remain one of the
17 most heavily forested states in the nation.
18 Other terrestrial technical studies have
19 found that mining's temporary disturbance to
20 West Virginia's landscape. It is fostering a diverse
21 bird/animal habitat.
22 Species that are generally declining in
23 this state, are found in abundance on mine sites. If
24 mining continues at current levels, only 2.5 percent
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1 of the streams in West Virginia will be impacted by
2 mining activities.
3 Again, this assessment assumes that the
4 guidelines, and the other measures described in the
5 EIS, will never be implemented.
6 Other technical studies as part of the
7 EIS, have also found that valley-fill construction of
8 mining activities, from adversely impacting streams.
9 A macrophyte vertebrate, or bug study,
10 found that streams and valley fills from their
11 headwaters are in good, to very good condition.
12 The same study found that mining
13 activity was not contributing to excessive streambed
14 sedimentation.
15 A chemistry study found that certain
16 mineral constituents, are generally elevated
17 downstream of valley fills. But according to the bug
18 study that I mentioned earlier, which showed field
19 streams to good, to very good streams, the elevated
20 parameters are not causing an adverse impact.
21 Even more important, as far as the EIS
22 is concerned, is the conclusion that any earth-moving
23 disturbance in central Appalachia will have similar
24 downstream results, because of the very nature and
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1 geology of the soil in the area.
2 An additional advantage of Alternative
3 3, is that it ensures the maximum level of public
4 participation in the permitting process.
5 The Surface Coal Mining and Reclamation
6 Act is perhaps the most citizen-friendly law in
7 existence in the United States today.
8 Further participation in the permitting
9 process is an inherent theme found throughout both
10 the statute, and the implementing regulations.
11 And finally, Alternative 3, would
12 facilitate an expedited permitting process for mining
13 operations by placing the majority of the
14 decision-making responsibility, with the agency best
15 suited to make those decisions, the SMRCA authority.
16 AUDIENCE MEMBER: We can't hear you.
17 AUDIENCE MEMBER: Time.
18 MR. BOSTIC: I can do it again.
19 Thank you.
20 MR. CHAIRMAN: Nick Carter. Then after
21 Nick Carter will be John Taylor.
22 Is Nick Carter here?
23 (No response.)
24 MR. CHAIRMAN: He spoke earlier, he did.
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1 John Taylor?
2 Then after John will be Fred Sampson.
3 MR. TAYLOR: John Taylor. Resident of
4 Rand, Kanawha County, West Virginia. I am a board
5 member of the Ohio Valley Environmental Council and
6 also the West Virginia Environment Council.
7 You all are the daddy's and mama' s of
8 this -- I guess this is your vision. But after
9 reading it and listening, I have to quote from Hank
10 Williams, Jr., "If this is the Promised Land, I have
11 had all that I can stand."
12 Let me pick up a theme that some of the
13 brothers and sisters have talked about, and that is
14 creation and spirituality, and so forth.
15 The last speaker talked about the Book
16 of Amos. One of my favorite books. And one of the
17 quotes from there is, "Woe to those who are at ease
18 in Zion."
19 You all are at ease in Zion.
20 Waters of righteousness will pour down
21 over you.
22 I want to talk about some things that
23 are all written in a book. First, we will talk about
24 the creation as described in the first two chapters
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1 of the Book of Genesis.
2 You all know this, you go to Sunday
3 School, church. It says, God created everything,
4 found it good. In fact, God found it very good. And
5 there is mention explicitly of mountains.
6 The destruction of mountaintop removal
7 coal mining, I hope you all have seen it. I hope you
8 all understand that each blast is 30 times bigger
9 than the blast that took out the courthouse in
10 Oklahoma City.
11 You do know that, don't you? I mean,
12 you did write this.
13 Paul tells us in Galatians, Chapter XI,
14 Verse XII. "God is not mocked."
15 God is not mocked.
16 What you all are doing, or approving of,
17 is a mockery of God's creation. You will reap what
18 you sow.
19 Chris Hamilton, and Mr. Bostic told us
20 that this will reap dollars in tourism, and other
21 commercial benefits.
22 I am sorry, Chris, I thought you had
23 more depth to you. We are sowing -- you are not
24 going to harvest dollars from tourism. What do you
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1 think, do you think they will come to look at it?
2 We are going to reap — we are reaping
3 bare dirt, dry rocks, water that is previously
4 befouled, barren soil, floods; that is what we will
5 reap. Because of what is being sowed here.
6 God is not mocked.
7 That is what I have to say.
8 AUDIENCE MEMBER: Amen.
9 MR. CHAIRMAN: Fred Sampson. Then the
10 next speaker is Leon Miller.
11 MR. SAMPSON: Fred Sampson. Clay
12 County.
13 We will soon have a 1,734.08 mountaintop
14 removal line up in Clay County. Where there has
15 already been approximately 30,000 acres in Clay and
16 Mingo County, Nicholas County that has been torn up
17 by surface mining.
18 I am totally opposed to the method of
19 mountaintop removal mining. This EIS seems to be a
20 sham in that it tells about all of the devastation
21 caused by mountaintop removal mining. And yet there
22 are alternatives that they are going to let it
23 continue. That is not consistent.
24 We expect our Federal agencies and our
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1 state agencies to be consistent. We also, citizens
2 of West Virginia, believe in holding folks
3 responsible.
4 You all are responsible and so you will
5 be held responsible.
6 West Virginians are provided by our
7 Constitution, the right to pursue life, liberty and
8 happiness, without fear of: a., having their houses
9 blown off their foundations; b., having their water
10 supply destroyed; c., children unable to play in
11 yards, due to blasting be allowed within 700 feet of
12 a home, yet no miner with a hard hat, is allowed
13 within 1,000 feet of blasting; d., flooding washing
14 away all of our possessions, as well as human life;
15 e., fear of all of the above.
16 Fear, being the most important.
17 If you have ever lived with fear, you
18 know what I am talking about. If you haven't lived
19 with fear, you should sometimes be afraid.
20 Previous speakers have told you why.
21 The EIS calls for more protection that
22 the current administration and King Coal has.
23 Where will us citizens get the full
24 level of protection promised in our National
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1 Constitution. We asked you all to do it.
2 We expect it from you.
3 Any mine this large, as large as this
4 one involved, should be allowed within 100-feet
5 buffer zone of our streams, and should not be
6 allowed.
7 Any mining done within 100-foot buffer
8 zone of streams is illegal, at present, and should
9 remain illegal.
10 Friends of Coal are here this evening,
11 and the ones that are present, and others, they are
12 friends of death and the destruction, caused during,
13 and after the mining of coal.
14 Coal, when you burn it, goes up into the
15 air, and causes acid rain and asthma, and other
16 things.
17 I am 73-years-old, I carry this at all
18 times because of the air I am breathing.
19 One of the last things that I want to
20 talk about off the top of my head, is that I am
21 totally uncomfortable when I am in flat country. I
22 can't hardly stand western Texas, or Illinois.
23 Mountains are my home, the trees on our
24 mountains are my protection, my comfort. I don't
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1 believe that I can live in flat country. We don't
2 need anymore flat country here in West Virginia. We
3 need to leave the mountains the way they are.
4 I appreciate you coming.
5 Thank you.
6 MR. CHAIRMAN: Leon Miller.
7 Then after Mr. Miller will be
8 Larry Gardner.
9 MR. MILLER: Hi. I am Leon Miller. I
10 am from Ripley, West Virginia.
11 My home is originally Boone County, my
12 wife's family lives in Lincoln County, right near the
13 Hoebet 21, Massey mine.
14 We have watched them for 20 years,
15 they've worked all the way around us. We have
16 endured it.
17 And our understanding, the home place
18 was left to my wife's father, and his seven brothers
19 and sisters. And we understood that it was going to
20 be a meeting place that could never be sold.
21 Well, our family found out something
22 different that we didn't know, so he went to Florida,
23 and he went to Kentucky, and he went to Illinois, and
24 he found people that was willing to sell.
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1 So I am sure that there is not five
2 people in this audience other than a coal company,
3 knows what a partition is. When they get one -- all
4 they have to do is get one person to sell, and then
5 they can force the rest — they can force it into the
6 courts, and then the Judge decides in whose best
7 interest it is.
8 Well, they have got two-thirds of it.
9 The rest of it stood standing. And we stood still.
10 The fact of the matter is that my wife and I bought
11 it as soon as our cousins were going to sell. We
12 used our life savings to try to save it.
13 We went through the courts of Lincoln
14 County. The judge decided that the best use of land
15 was for the coal company. He didn't consider -- a
16 partition suit is supposed to be, can you divide the
17 land? We got a mining engineer that did a study, and
18 he concluded that every bit of the coal on the land
19 could be mined, and we could stay on the 25 acres
20 that were still remaining.
21 The judge decided that was not good, and
22 he thought that we shouldn't really waste anymore of
23 our money pursuing this thing. We did, and we are.
24 It is in the State Supreme Court; we have used our
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1 whole life savings working on it.
2 We don't know whether we are going to
3 win it or not. I always thought that if you paid
4 your taxes and lived right, that life was fair.
5 Life is not fair. The coal company and
6 the big business is running this country. And they
7 have ruined this country.
8 All we need is some help. We need some
9 help. We need some help from you people. We are all
10 going to live for a while, and you think we are going
11 to live like this forever, but we're not. One of
12 these days, we are going to answer.
13 I have got to answer for mine, and I
14 don't have to look back too much for my answers. I
15 hope you don't.
16 Thank you.
17 MR. CHAIRMAN: Blair Gardner.
18 And then Elaine Purkey.
19 MR. GARDNER: Mr. Chairman, good
20 evening. My name is Blair Gardner. I am an attorney
21 here in Charleston, West Virginia, with the law firm
22 of Jackson & Kelly.
23 I live here in Charleston. I have
24 resided here for two years. I have worked on various
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1 aspects of this document this evening that we are
2 commenting on. Both with my present employment, and
3 previously with my employment with a major coal
4 company, that have mining operations here in West
5 Virginia.
6 I do not have prepared remarks. I can
7 tell you that I cannot speak with the eloquence of
8 some of the speakers, such as, Ms. Giardina this
9 evening. But I will try to make my remarks at least
10 more temperate than some that I have heard from
11 members of the audience.
12 Members of the panel, contrary to what
13 some people here this evening have thought, the EIS,
14 as you know, is dedicated to a process. It was not
15 dedicated to an outcome.
16 We have spent four years, millions of
17 dollars, I am certain. We have had a study that I
18 believe I have been told weighs 38 pounds.
19 Surely, if the process of mining by full
20 extraction method is as destructive as so many people
21 here have described; why would it take so many pages
22 to describe that process?
23 The reason is because it is not
24 destructive in the way that people have described it.
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1 We have found two significant, perhaps,
2 consequences, of this form of mining that has been
3 studied. One, that there is a change in the
4 distribution of population of certain insects in
5 streams below valley fills.
6 Second, as people have noted, there is a
7 difference in the water chemistry. In some cases, it
8 does not comply with current Clean Water Act
9 standards. That is it.
10 We have spent four years, and millions
11 of dollars to learn what I think people probably knew
12 prior to the time that this study began.
13 It is time to end the process. It is
14 time to come to conclusions. The mining industry in
15 West Virginia has been told at nauseam is that it is
16 a competitive industry competing not only for the
17 mines, elsewhere in the region, but elsewhere across
18 the United States.
19 Over the last four years, the industry
20 in this state has been subjected to standards not
21 applied anyplace else in the United States. The
22 industry is prepared to accept the outcomes of the
23 EIS.
24 We prefer Alternative 3, in terms of the
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1 process, but it is time to bring this to a close.
2 Give the companies that are attempting to mine coal,
3 clear process and standards that they can meet and
4 let them get on with the business of mining coal.
5 As it has already been stated, the
6 process for permitting mines is open to challenge
7 repeatedly throughout the process.
8 If people here this evening, or others,
9 who oppose it, do so; they have the opportunity
10 afforded by the law and have been afforded for the
11 last 25 years.
12 One final comment, one of the companies
13 that currently mines coal in West Virginia last month
14 announced that it was making a major investment in
15 acquiring new operations in Wyoming.
16 The amount of money that has been
17 announced in that transaction, is about the amount of
18 money, I believe, it would take to capitalize the
19 Bruce Fork mine that was closed by the first
20 litigation in Bragg vs. Robinson, that was commenced
21 here in U.S. District Court, back in 1998.
22 I, for one, am disappointed that that
23 investment has gone out west, and not here to West
24 Virginia.
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1 I have known many, many people here in
2 the industry in West Virginia, who have worked. The
3 one thing that I can observe about all of them is
4 they want a job, but they want it here in
5 West Virginia. Let's bring this process to a close,
6 and try to accomplish that.
7 Thank you very much.
8 MR. CHAIRMAN: Elaine Purkey.
9 The next speaker will be Sharon Murphy.
10 MS. PURKEY: My name is Elaine Purkey,
11 and I am from Lincoln County, West Virginia.
12 I would like to answer one of the
13 questions that he just asked. What if we spent four
14 years, and millions of dollars doing? Trying to call
15 a pure hell, heaven, that is exactly what we have
16 tried to do.
17 That is what it was set out to do it was
18 trying to call mountaintop removal something that it
19 wasn't, and they have tried it they have done it four
20 years. It was supposed to have been two years, and
21 they changed it to four.
22 On paper it looks real good. The facts
23 look real good on paper, but all of these people down
24 here are living proof that it does not work. What is
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1 on that paper does not work.
2 They are living in the hell that those
3 numbers on the paper create every day. And they fear
4 for their lives every day.
5 I did not come here to say that, but I
6 do want to say that I do disagree with — I want to
7 vote against — if there is any such thing as
8 voting -- active Alternative 3. And my reason for it
9 is because the coal industry is for it, and my 33
10 years of experience with mining, is that if anything
11 is good for the industry, it is bad for the people.
12 I was asked to come here to sing a
13 song. I know that you have heard poems and stuff. I
14 wrote the song for Larry Gibson. And I want to give
15 this song to -- in addition to him, to Frieda
16 Williams, the people at Coal River Mountain Watch,
17 and all of you other people out there who really,
18 really, believe that we are the keepers of our
19 mountains.
20 And now, since you people are here,
21 supposedly doing the job that Janet read — or one of
22 the other ladies read — that you are supposed to be
23 doing, you are the keepers of the mountains, too, and
24 this is a message that we the people have for the
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1 industry, and anybody else who comes in here to rape
2 West Virginia.
3 "In southern West Virginia.
4 The place where I was born.
5 There's something evil happening.
6 There's something evil going on.
7 They are tearing up our mountains.
8 They are taking away our hills.
9 They are taking all of our homeland,
10 and making valley fields.
11 When will they stop this destruction?
12 Oh, when will they ever leave?
13 Just go back to where they came from,
14 let us live in our mountains
15 and be free.
16 We are the keepers of the mountains.
17 As Larry Gibson has said,
18 Love em, leave em, but I warn you,
19 Don't destroy them,
20 or leave them for dead.
21 Cause we will hunt you down
22 like outlaws.
23 We will expose you for what you are.
24 Greedy, thieving murderers,
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1 who buy and sell our law-making liars.
2 Now the moral of my story,
3 Just listen to what I say.
4 We will protect our home,
5 our mountains,
6 you can do the same,
7 or you had better stay away."
8 Thank you.
9 MR. CHAIRMAN: Sharon Murphy.
10 Then after Sharon it will be Maria
11 Pitzer.
12 MS. MURPHY: Hello. My name is
13 Sharon Murphy, and I live in Scot Depot,
14 West Virginia.
15 And I just wanted to say that I am from
16 a third generation of coal mining. Like my father
17 and grandfather, we had to go underground. Due to
18 education and technology, my job deals with computer
19 drafting.
20 With that job, I have worked for the
21 coal companies for about 14 years. In that time,
22 I worked mainly in the engineering department.
23 I know firsthand that the coal industry
24 is the only one that is required to provide a service
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1 long after they are through with their jobs. The
2 service is called reclamation. Something that we
3 have not heard much about here tonight.
4 Before we get a permit approved, we have
5 to submit a permit application. In that application,
6 there is one thing called a Planting Plan, and that
7 must be approved by all State agencies.
8 In that plan, it tells us what kind of
9 trees that we can plant, how many of these species we
10 must plant, what kind of grass mixture we must seed,
11 and et cetera.
12 Our water discharge is regulated through
13 anti-depth, and TMDL laws. Some of the most current
14 laws, are Contemporaneous Reclamation, that requires
15 us to reclaim closer to the actual mining, and that
16 in turn, decreases the amount of disturbed land, at
17 any one given time.
18 Our valley-fill sizes have been
19 decreased by more stringent AOC Standards, which is
20 Approximate Original Contour Standards. We must
21 comply with SMRCA regulations, which stands for
22 Surface Water Runoff Analysis. That means that there
23 cannot be more runoff during, or after that mining
24 process than what was recorded before that mining
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1 began.
2 With these many facts and all of the
3 State and Federal regulatory agencies that monitor us
4 every day, how can the people here assume that we are
5 not environmentally safe.
6 One other thing I would like to state is
7 that I currently live in Putnam County. I have only
8 been there four years. I was born and raised in
9 southern West Virginia, and I know firsthand about
10 the rugged terrain. I know about the brush, I know
11 about the briar thickets that are there.
12 I witnessed a surface mine that came
13 into our area, they created jobs, they told us we had
14 30 years of mining there, but because of your-all's
15 regulations, and because the small profit margins
16 that company made, I was laid off after three years.
17 I had to pull my kids out of that
18 community, start them in a new school, and start a
19 new life in this Putnam County.
20 Yes, it was hard to leave my family, but
21 I didn't have a choice. But you know what? We
22 should never sacrifice environmental safety for
23 economic growth.
24 I go back and visit my family every
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1 chance I get. They are an hour and a half from
2 Charleston, over an hour from Huntington, and there
3 is nothing there for recreation except that surface
4 mine that was left.
5 Today there has been people who have
6 purchased land on that surface mine from that coal
7 company. They have built homes, pasture fields full
8 of cattle, full of horses. We ride 4-wheelers. I
9 horseback ride on the hollows, every chance I get.
10 We snow sleigh ride in the wintertime.
11 Now, that is the devastation that these
12 people want you to feel like that we are doing.
13 I am here to say that I want to work. I
14 want to provide for my family, and I want to continue
15 to live in this state. That is all I ask you all to
16 give.
17 I help pay the taxes that give you
18 your-all's jobs, base those jobs on facts and
19 statistics, and not the emotion that is out there in
20 this room tonight.
21 That is all I am asking.
22 Thank you for your time.
23 MR. CHAIRMAN: Maria Pitzer.
24 Then after Maria, will be John Barrett.
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1 MS. PITZER: Sharon, you need to come to
2 my house.
3 My name is Maria Pitzer. I am from
4 Boone County, West Virginia.
5 I have two children, a 12-year-old boy,
6 and a 9-year-old girl.
7 MR. CHAIRMAN: Please speak into the
8 mic.
9 MS. PITZER: We are from Bob White in
10 Boone County, West Virginia. I have two children, a
11 9-year old girl, and a 12-year-old boy.
12 We are against mountaintop removal. We
13 are a family that lives in the constant shadows of
14 mountaintop removal valley fills and slurry ponds.
15 The mining around us has destroyed our
16 quality of life. The blasting from the mines is a
17 constant reminder of why our lives have changed so
18 much. My children are not allowed to play in the
19 water that runs through our property, because the
20 pond is running straight into it.
21 The aquatic life in this stream is all
22 but gone. Catching fish — or catching bait, or
23 fishing, is a waste of time. Now there isn't
24 anything to catch.
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1 Who can say with the upmost certainty
2 that this will not endanger my children' health?
3 You, the panel of people that say that what the mine
4 companies are doing is okay? You have not yet been a
5 trustworthy source, at all.
6 I have lived on this same property for
7 35 years, in the same town, with the same people.
8 And they are all saying the same thing, mountaintop
9 removal is going to run us out.
10 We were flooded in 2001, three times.
11 In 2002, we were flooded again.
12 In 2003, we were flooded horribly.
13 The storms was what the mine companies
14 called once in a 100-year of storms. I heard it was
15 an act of God. That is like saying that the Buffalo
16 Flood was an act of God.
17 I remember when I was a child, it rained
18 until I was running in water to my knees in the same
19 yard that washed in. The very, identical, same yard,
20 35 years ago. Same amount of water.
21 Why didn't these catastrophic floods
22 happen then? Why are they happening now?
23 Mountaintop removal is why.
24 If you poured water onto a rock, it is
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1 going to roll off. If you pour it into dirt, it is
2 going to absorb. Common sense tells me that.
3 The flood on June 16th, ruined our
4 life. The rains came down the hollow, coming through
5 our property. It rose so fast that we didn't have a
6 chance to get away from it. We were trapped in every
7 direction.
8 The river running by me was still clear
9 and the hollow washing into this river was raging.
10 I was being flooded by a stream that
11 three years ago, before this stripping started, I
12 could step over.
13 Within three hours after it started
14 raining, I had lost everything that I had. The mud
15 slide tore through my barn, my orchard of fruit
16 trees, with one of my dogs tide out. The water and
17 mud came so fast, that I didn't get a chance to get
18 my dogs out. My dog, of eight years, died. A
19 horrible death, might I add.
20 As the water continued down and filled
21 five-foot culvert that had just recently been put in
22 in 2001, this was in there from 1981, until 2001, a
23 three-foot culvert. When we replaced it, we replaced
24 it with a five-foot culvert thinking that this would
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1 help.
2 The mud slide came in, it plugged up the
3 five-foot culvert, and the water washed around the
4 five-foot culvert. It took out my septic system, it
5 took out my access, it took out my water, it took my
6 yard, it took my driveway; it took everything.
7 Okay. It did stop 20-feet short of my
8 house. I have sinkholes around my house that you
9 could fit a 50-gallon barrel down in.
10 As of right now, my house is okay. My
11 home, when I look out my window, it is destroyed.
12 Our life, as we have always known it, is
13 now nonexistent. Hikes through our own property, is
14 now unsafe, due to the mining breaks, and slides,
15 coming in behind us.
16 The heritage that I had grown up
17 knowing, will no longer be passed on. It is not
18 there to pass on; it is being destroyed with each
19 blast.
20 Everyone who has had a hand in allowing
21 this mine practice to continue is guilty of allowing
22 the heritage of the people of the State of West
23 Virginia to be just wiped out, faded away. If that
24 is okay with you. That is not okay with me by no
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1 means.
2 I am of Cherokee nationality, and we
3 have always been taught to live off of the land.
4 MR. CHAIRMAN: You are out of time.
5 MS. PITZER: Okay. I have one more
6 statement: If you can sleep with yourselves, then I
7 ain't got no choice but to stay up with the storm, do
8 I?
9 Thank you for destroying mine and my
10 children's life.
11 MR. CHAIRMAN: John Barrett. Then after
12 John will be Lisa Millimet.
13 MR. BARRETT: Thank you. My name is
14 John Barrett, and I am a lawyer here in Charleston
15 and I am with the Appalachian Center for the Economy
16 and the Environment, and I am making this statement
17 on behalf of the Center.
18 When we settled the Bragg case in 1998,
19 the Federal agencies promised to perform a
20 comprehensive EIS, that would show the environmental
21 and economic impact of MTR, and propose alternatives
22 to MTR.
23 Incredibly, nearly five years later, the
24 agencies have produced a draft document that
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1 demonstrates the devastating environmental impacts of
2 mountaintop removal, while simultaneously proposing
3 to make permits for these mines easier to receive.
4 These agencies appear to be operating in
5 an environment where they believe they are beyond
6 accountability.
7 The draft EIS audaciously tells us that
8 down is up, and up is down, and dares the public to
9 challenge them.
10 The Bush Administration has done its
11 best to undermine the good science and economic
12 analysis that was performed by scientists and
13 economists.
14 When the Clinton Administration started
15 the EIS process, it was by no means slanted towards
16 environmental interests.
17 Indeed, many in the environment of the
18 community did not want to settle the Bragg lawsuit,
19 because they didn't trust the Clinton Administration
20 to stand up to the coal industry in West Virginia.
21 Little did we know then just how bold
22 the Bush Administration would be in its attempt to
23 warp the scientific and economic analysis in favor of
24 the coal industry.
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1 A draft EIS is a dishonest document.
2 Those who wrote it are motivated not by science, or
3 the desire to complete a thorough economic analysis
4 of MTR. Instead, they are motivated by the coal
5 industry.
6 For instance, we understand that Steven
7 Guiles, Deputy Secretary of the Department of the
8 Interior, played a significant role in the design of
9 the document.
10 Mr. Guiles is a former, and no doubt
11 future, coal industry lobbyist. He should have
12 recused himself from the process based upon its
13 conflict of interest.
14 We move beyond the point where the
15 administration is influenced by coal industry
16 lobbyists. The Bush Administration coal regulators
17 are the coal industry.
18 The destructive effects of mountaintop
19 removal coal mining are well documented in the over
20 30 scientific studies contained in the draft EIS.
21 So, it is astounding that the draft EIS
22 proposes not only to allow more of this destruction,
23 but also to make it easier for the coal industry to
24 continue to destroy the environment, and the economy
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1 of central Appalachian.
2 The draft EIS misrepresents the adverse
3 economic impacts, the environmental impact, of a
4 mountaintop removal operation. Attempts to skirt the
5 clear requirements of NEPA, and willfully excludes
6 and ignores the economic evidence that support
7 stricter environmental controls.
8 The studies clearly demonstrate that
9 mountaintop removal valley-fill coal mining is
10 already caused extensive ecological harm.
11 A few of these harms include impacts to
12 an estimated 11.5 percent of the region's forests,
13 which are the most diverse and valuable hardwood
14 forests in the world.
15 Fundamental damage to the terrestrial
16 environment that would prohibit the growth of mature
17 forests for 100 years, or more.
18 Buried or damaged over 1,200 miles of
19 streams.
20 MTR operations spew selenium into the
21 region's rivers and streams at toxic levels.
22 MTR causes headwater streams to lose
23 their abilities to maintain their nutrient cycling.
24 MTR adversely impacts the total aquatic,
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1 genetic diversity of the nation.
2 MTR harms 244 vertebrate-wildlife
3 species due to loss of forests.
4 MTR causes ecologically significant loss
5 of breeding habitats for three-fourths of the
6 interior bird species.
7 MTR increases the severity of dangerous
8 flooding that would damage personal property and
9 communities downstream from mountaintop removal coal
10 mining.
11 These facts substantiate what citizens
12 have long known mountaintop removal coal mining is
13 devastating to the environment, and to the
14 communities in the coal fields.
15 I am running out of time.
16 The document violates NEPA. The EIS
17 does not include a reasonable range of alternatives.
18 NEPA requires that an EIS rigorously explore, and
19 objectively evaluate, all reasonable alternatives.
20 In addition, the EIS does not present
21 valid reasons for the elimination of proposed
22 alternatives from detailed analysis.
23 The EIS assumes that changing the stream
24 buffer-zone rule is part of even the "No Action"
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1 Alternative. The EIS fails to address, or remedy
2 violations of the Clean Water Act.
3 The EIS must remedy violations for
4 selenium pollution.
5 The EIS cannot legally adopt any
6 alternative that would allow the use of nationwide
7 permits.
8 Thank you.
9 MR. CHAIRMAN: You are out of time, sir.
10 MR. BARRETT: Thank you.
11 MR. CHAIRMAN: Next speaker is Lisa
12 Millimet. And then the following speaker after that
13 would be Bill McCabe.
14 MS. MILLIMET: Good evening. I didn't
15 mean to speak here. I didn't even mean to come here
16 tonight. I am visiting a friend in Sutton.
17 My name is Lisa Millimet, and I am a
18 filmmaker, and a writer, and a documentarian from New
19 Hampshire.
20 I just want to say thank God for the
21 emotion in this room.
22 I think everybody sitting out here knows
23 that this could never happen in a town like I come
24 from.
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1 You all would have been run out on a
2 rail. You would never have been allowed into my
3 town.
4 Because I live in a town with money, and
5 so-called education, and no history of exploitation.
6 And I thank the people all in these seats, and I give
7 you my incredible and full respect and empathy.
8 Know that this is because West Virginia
9 has been being raped for over 100 years. If you
10 study the history of West Virginia, you will
11 understand that.
12 I live in the town Leonard Bernstein
13 wrote "Westside Story" in, and a playwright wrote
14 "Our Town" about George Wilder.
15 It is a rich town. It is a town where
16 people are educated and have organic food. West
17 Virginia's so-called poor, and ignorant.
18 But I will tell you, I have been coming
19 to this state for 35 years, and the finest people
20 that I have ever met have been in West Virginia.
21 I have been writing a book about West
22 Virginia and the last of the old-time mountain people
23 for 8 years, and it is going to be published next
24 year. And I made a short documentary for Larry
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1 Gibson about mountaintop removal.
2 I was run off and threatened with my
3 life on that mountain, and I was run off at 70 miles
4 an hour, doan 11 miles of a mountain. And it has
5 effectively ended that documentary. Because, I don't
6 want to die for this, to tell you the truth.
7 I will just say that in my travels
8 around the states in my 35 years, in my documentary
9 work in this wonderful state, almost invariably
10 everyone has told me, all of the people in the
11 hollows, the mountains, the cities and the towns,
12 that they are against mountaintop removal.
13 The thing that I noticed that I want to
14 share with all of you, whether you have any power or
15 not, I want it said for the record, that like the
16 Vietnam War, and so many people from West Virginia,
17 were valiant to fight in that war. But like that
18 war, this will be stopped.
19 And it is not because of the emotion
20 only, it is because that is what happens. That is
21 what happens when people are exploited. You can only
22 keep them down so long.
23 And it is not a question of religion, or
24 my opinions, that is what happens.
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1 The people will rise up, many of these
2 mountains will be gone, many of the people in this
3 room will be dead by the time it is stopped, but it
4 will stop. And you would be wise, you would be wise
5 to pay attention to the people that I hear in and out
6 of this state.
7 I have shown my film around the country,
8 and there will be critical mass at some point.
9 It is money. It is business, as usual,
10 and it is disgusting.
11 MR. CHAIRMAN: Bill McCabe.
12 MR. McCABE: I am Bill McCabe. I am the
13 Appalachian organizer for Citizens Coal Council, and
14 I am speaking for Citizens Coal Council, at least the
15 initial part of my remarks.
16 I was talking with a fellow the other
17 day in Kentucky, who made a comment that really
18 struck home to me. He said, it doesn't seem to
19 matter what we expect from the Government, they
20 successfully score beneath our expectations.
21 Congratulations, you all have done it
22 again.
23 The CCC leaders, and our membership
24 groups, were not naive enough to hope that the draft
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1 EIS would tell the truth, that mountaintop removal
2 and valley fill is simply too destructive to be
3 allowed to be considered a responsible way to mine.
4 It may be the cheapest for the
5 companies, but it is environmentally, socially,
6 psychologically, and, yes, economically — it is
7 simply too expensive to allow it to continue.
8 Even though CCC never expected a
9 truthful analysis, we were enough of Americans, and
10 probably naive enough to believe that we could trust
11 our government when they negotiated with us. When
12 they promised to conduct a study that would be
13 thorough and effective. When they negotiated and
14 promised that the studies would look at ways to
15 reduce the damage.
16 Again, you underachieved.
17 Your research was so contradictory to
18 President Bush's agenda, or probably to Bill Rainey,
19 and the economists agenda, that some of the most
20 important fact sources and analysis were simply
21 ignored.
22 I apologize, one of the advantages of
23 being last is that you are going to expect some
24 applause because you are last, and people get to go
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1 home, but the disadvantage of going last is that many
2 of the comments that you worked hard to make, have
3 already been made. It just points out the importance
4 of these comments.
5 It is simply beyond my comprehension how
6 a group of highly paid bureaucrats can write a report
7 that simply does not have any logic to it.
8 Your science says one thing, and your
9 conclusions say another. Well, I am not sure for CCC
10 and our member groups why we bother. Probably
11 because we are organizers and eternal optimists. So
12 I would simply suggest a fourth option.
13 That option is to enforce the laws that
14 have existed for 25 years. Strictly enforce the
15 laws, and if you do that, there will be no
16 mountaintop removal, because it will be too expensive
17 to use that method.
18 The remainder of my time I would like to
19 use to speak individually, and have that reflected.
20 A lot of my family has been in West
21 Virginia — as many people have mentioned — a long
22 time.
23 Growing up, I had the privilege to
24 travel the country, and whether it was California, or
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1 New York, or South Carolina, I was always the poor,
2 dumbass hillbilly, because I was from West Virginia.
3 But being stubborn, that didn't bother
4 me. I have always been proud to be a West Virginian.
5 I have always been proud to be from the mountains of
6 Appalachia. But never, never, have I been so proud
7 of so many people who spoke so eloquently and so
8 bravely against this horrible bunch of crap.
9 Thank you.
10 MR. CHAIRMAN: I would like to thank
11 each of you for coming this evening and presenting
12 your comments.
13 I have no more cards, no more speakers.
14 But if you do have comments that you
15 would like to make, remember we have the comment box
16 out back. The written comment period does not close
17 until August 29th. So you will still have time to
18 submit those if you like.
19 Thank you all for coming this evening.
20 Please be careful going home.
21 Thank you.
22 (Public hearing concluded.)
23
24
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1 STATE OF WEST VIRGINIA, To-wit:
2 I, Michele G. Hankins, a Notary Public and
3 Court Reporter within and for the State aforesaid, do
4 hereby certify that the hearing was taken by me and
5 before me at the time and place specified in the
6 caption hereof.
7 I do further certify that the hearing was
8 correctly taken by me in stenotype notes, that the
9 same was accurately transcribed out in full and
10 reduced to typewriting, and that said transcript is a
11 true record of the testimony.
12 I further certify that I am neither attorney
13 or counsel for, nor related to or employed by, any of
14 the parties to the action in which these proceedings
15 were had, and further I am not a relative or employee
16 of any attorney or counsel employed by the parties
17 hereto or financially interested in the action.
18 My commission expires the 29th day of December
19 2003.
20 Given under my hand and seal this 28th day of
21 August.
22
23 Michele G. Hankins
Notary Public
24 Court Reporter
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