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Re: [OM] Some pictures from our trip to Washington state -, , Calling Na

Subject: Re: [OM] Some pictures from our trip to Washington state -, , Calling Nathan
From: Scott Gomez <sgomez.baja@xxxxxxxxx>
Date: Tue, 15 Sep 2015 20:06:49 +0000
You're correct. Mike. Federal rules regarding both mining and grazing in
the west have never provided adequately for the losses to taxpayers.
Companies and ranchers pay little or nothing for the resources they gain,
and usually nothing at all to remediate when they're done.

Locals who have been in this area for years know well that EPA is just the
scapegoat at this point. My wife's family, for example is very deeply
rooted in this area. I tease her that she's related to at least half the
town of Aztec, NM, 25% of Durango, CO, and that Silverton nearly became a
ghost town because so many of her relatives left. Many of the older folks
worked in the mines. Her Dad and uncles had lots of stories.

Many of the old mines' tunnels interconnect underground, or leak through
the ground from one to the other, and a very wet winter is enough to cause
them to overflow the mostly inadequate measures taken by the companies who
abandoned them.

Unreported in most of the news stories is that the governments of both
Silverton and Durango, CO have resisted efforts by EPA in the past to
properly clean up the sites (it would require superfund designation)
because they believe it will seriously hurt the tourist business. Also
mostly unreported was that a large part of the loudest complaining and
finger-pointing came from folks who are a) wealthy, b) summer residents,
only, of the two Colorado towns and c) mostly ignorant of the issues
regarding old mines, thinking they're "interesting historical relics" only.

Like many issues, it's a complicated mix of local and non-local interests,
tourism vs. resident concerns, and who-the-hell-knows what all else. If the
data about the old mines could be enough to drive the decision-making, it
would be pretty difficult to argue that anything but superfund designation
and remediation was the right path.

On Mon, Sep 14, 2015 at 3:27 PM Mike Lazzari <watershed@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxx>
wrote:

> > That said, the Feds did little to ameliorate the escalation, as they
> mostly
> > communicated poorly, or not much at all.
> [rant]What really gets me is that everyone was/is blaming the feds
> (actually contractors). They're spending tens/hundreds of millions of
> taxpayer dollars to clean up after the mining companies who skipped
> town. WTF!  Talk about welfare! I'd much rather see the poor working
> families around here get some help.[/rant]
>
> M
> --
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> --
---
Scott
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