Citizens Oppose Mine
Proposed site near Cassville
Morgantown Dominion Post
27 May 2010
By Joel Danoy
More than 50 people filled the Cassville fire hall Wednesday night to
voice their opinions on the pending permit for Patriot Mining Company’s
proposed New Hill West Surface Mine.
In the first and only public comment meeting, the crowd was evenly
split between coal miners working the current surface site and
residents in the surrounding areas who could be adversely affected by
the proposed site.
Measuring 225 acres and lasting for five years, the proposed site is
northeast of Cassville, in Monongalia County’s Clay District.
The mine will operate around the clock, with blasting twice a day. More
than 1,000 homes are within seven-tenths of a mile of the site,
including 14 homes 300 feet away.
Opponents say the new surface mine will only further increase the
damage to an already fragile ecosystem that struggles to survive amid
the current and former mine sites.
John Wood, a Cassville resident of 17 years, said his house routinely
shakes from the blasting at the current mine site. Among the six points
of concern he mentioned, Wood said people living in the area deserve to
enjoy their homes, the beauty of the area and not to have to worry
about a polluted environment.
“This is our home, and we have a legal right to protect it,” he said.
“We need to be concerned and fight to keep the integrity of our homes.”
In an effort to stress the importance of clean, usable water and the
threat a mine presents to it, James Kotcen passed out bottles of
Gatorade to the crowd.
“When you drink this, think about what it would taste like if it was
made with the dirty runoff water created by these mines,” he said.
Many of the site’s opponents are concerned that Patriot Mining won’t
stop with this site. Eva Thompson said officials at the mine site near
her home told her she had two options: Forfeit a small portion of her
land for a runoff pond or have the runoff diverted to a stream running
alongside her property.
“It’s very disturbing to me that I had to choose,” she said. “I gave up
the land, because I did not want it in that stream.”
With only one man speaking in favor of the site opposed to the nearly
15 who spoke against it, the meeting was ready to be adjourned before
Jacob Hartley took the microphone.
Dressed in a blue suit lined with reflective gear, the native West
Virginian said he only decided to speak after hearing everyone else.
His great-grandfather was a coal miner and his father was a surface
miner in Monongalia County.
“Everyone up here tonight, when they spoke said, ‘I came here, I came
here.’ Well, my great-grandfather and my grandmother’s family lived
down here in Scotts Run in the 1930s,” Hartley explained. “I was born
here in West Virginia, and I don’t want to live anywhere else. But I
don’t wont to see it destroyed either.
“You don’t hear anybody complaining about the shopping malls they put
up on top of these hills. I don’t ever hear people protesting about all
those heavy machines used to build the shopping malls. I see people up
there running in and out of these high-end clothing stores and buying
stuff. We don’t need those shopping malls.”
Hartley also addressed what he called the “human element,” as another
aspect of the issue.
“We got some real good, young men working up there ... we don’t want
coal forever, we know that, but this is what we got right now. We need
to make a slow transition away from it.
“The main thing I keep hearing is the big coal corporations; well
that’s not it. We’re just a bunch of regular guys trying to make a
living. I don’t want my kids doing this. Maybe one day I can put my
kids through college, so they don’t have to do this. But right now, we
can’t just say, ‘Stop,’ we have to slowly transition.”
Randy Moore, permit supervisor for the W.Va. Department of
Environmental Protection, said all the comments will be considered when
the DEP makes it’s final decision on the permit in the next two months.