West Virginia Residents in Court to Stop Mountaintop Removal

HUNTINGTON, West Virginia, October 1, 2007 (ENS) - Boone County residents are asking a federal judge to stop a coal company from cutting off the top of a nearby mountain to get at the coal within and dumping the tons of waste rock and dirt into the stream in the valley below. The residents say the proposed valley fill would destroy their community, disrupt their lives and devalue and damage their homes.

Judge Robert "Chuck" Chambers of the U.S. District Court for the Southern District of West Virginia will accept additional briefs in the case of Ohio Valley Environmental Coalition vs U.S. Army Corps of Engineers. He is expected to deliver a ruling by mid-October.

The Callisto Mine, operated by Jupiter Holdings LLC, has agreed to hold off on any valley fills until the judge rules. The same judge has previously ruled twice that permits very similar to the one being challenged were in violation of the law.

The coal industry and the Corps have appealed the judge's earlier rulings to the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Fourth Circuit.

Shane Green, who is now 35, grew up in the last house up Dry Branch hollow, the closest house to the proposed valley fill. "With all the blasting, the house will be completely unlivable," he said. "You will have to condemn this place. It's disturbing the peace too. You'll be sitting here one evening, the lampshades shake, stuff starts vibrating off the table. That's disturbing the peace and they don't care. We are like rats to them."

Green's brother Timothy said, "My dad won't be able to retire in peace if that valley fill goes in up there. He was going to build a new place here and he's not going to do it now."

The plaintiffs say the Callisto Mine will permanently destroy 5,750 feet of streams in tributaries of Roach Branch, Dry Branch, and Lem White Branch of Pond Fork, streams that eventually flow into the Little Coal River.

Mountaintop removal mining already has permanently buried or impacted more than 1,200 miles of streams and destroyed over 387,000 acres of the forests in central Appalachia.

"We'd rather not have the valley fill up there," said a resident of Dry Branch who did not want to be identified for fear of retaliation. "This is our home and we are not planning on moving. We've been here all of our lives, we've raised our children here. You could have a big rain and that valley fill would cause a flood and wash away the home we have lived in for over 40 years."

"Our community is disappearing. If Jupiter gets this permit, it will be the proverbial nail in the coffin," said Maria Gunnoe, who lives in the shadow of the Callisto Mine and is an organizer with the Ohio Valley Environmental Coalition, based in Huntington.

"It will literally depopulate the little bit that's left of our home," said Gunnoe. "Mountaintop removal is illegally polluting life-giving streams and depopulating communities for a few outside jobs and profits for coal companies. Nothing but devastation comes back to the communities where this coal is mined."

"Coal companies are again trying to create a false economic crisis by threatening to lay off miners and scaring the public with fears about more job losses," said Cindy Rank, Mining Committee chair of the West Virginia Highlands Conservancy, which is a co-plaintiff in this case.

"This is a smoke screen that is designed to obscure the culture of lawlessness that pervades the permitting process for coal mines and valley fills," said Rank. "There are harms on all sides of this issue and brave residents are speaking up about the very real threats to their homes and the lives they've made for themselves in the area that will be impacted by this mine."

The U.S. Army Corps of Engineers approved the Callisto permit on March 15 of this year. Just a few days later, federal Judge Chambers ruled that four similar mountaintop removal mining permits violated the Clean Water Act and the National Environmental Policy Act. The Callisto Mine along with three other large surface mining permits were later added to the case.

Judge Chambers ruled that the Corps has no valid method for measuring the environmental harm from filling streams with mining waste nor any scientific or rational basis for claiming that it can mitigate that harm.

As a result, each new valley fill adds more permanent damage to the tally of streams lost and communities destroyed.

"The Corps is ignoring both the law and the science when it issues these permits," said Judy Bonds, co-director of Coal River Mountain Watch. "Our state government needs to diversify our economy so that people can have jobs that don't threaten communities and sacrifice our precious streams and life-giving waters."

This most recent challenge to mountaintop removal coal mining as well as the March 2007 case were filed on behalf of the Ohio Valley Environmental Coalition, Coal River Mountain Watch and the West Virginia Highlands Conservancy by Earthjustice, the Appalachian Center for the Economy and the Environment, and Public Justice.

Copyright Environment News Service (ENS) 2007. All rights reserved.