On April 6, 2006–when they thought we weren’t looking–the US Office of Surface Mining, Wrecklamation and Enforcement (OSMRE) announced proposals to dramatically weaken revegetation rules for mountaintop removal mines (and other mines) in Tennessee. You can help stop these proposals!

Briefly, OSMRE proposes to: (1) delete the minimum requirements of eighty percent (80%) ground cover for certain postmining land uses and provide that herbaceous ground cover be limited to that necessary to control erosion and support the postmining land use; and (2) exempt areas developed for wildlife habitat, undeveloped land, recreation, or forestry from the requirements that bare areas shall not exceed one-sixteenth (1/16) acre in size and total not more than ten percent (10%) of the area seeded.

While the picture above depicts how the landscape looks before revegetation, according to an artist’s rendition, this this is what the landscape will look like after OSMRE’s rule changes have been implemented by the mining company

You can help stop these proposals by contacting OSMRE no later than 4:00 p.m. e.s.t. on May 8, 2006. For more information on the proposal and how to file comments, go to https://a257.g.akamaitech.net/7/257/2422/01jan20061800/edocket.access.gpo.gov/2006/pdf/06-3260.pdf

While many self-proclaimed environmentalists get in their cars tomorrow to drive to any number of Earth day celebrations, my wife and I will take a road less traveled.

This journey began long ago when I too would get caught up in the hype of joining like-minded folks at Earth day festivities. Mercifully, that all came to an abrupt end following an Earth day celebration sponsored by my college–S.U.N.Y. College of Environmental Science and Forestry–in 1991.

It was a beautiful festival, complete with bands, frisbees, dogs, kids and concessions. As the buzz of that gorgeous spring day began to fade while walking home that evening, I was struck–and not for the first or last time–by my inability to see what was actually happening around me.

Leaving the quad that night, I passed a number of trash cans overflowing with the disposable debris generated by the day’s events–paper plates, plastic cups, napkins, food wrappers, diapers, etc. I was physically sickened.

While I had taken my own coffee/beer mug to the party, I somehow felt that I could do more. So the next day, I vowed to celebrate Earth day in a more respectful manner. Over the years, my celebration has evolved.

Today, my wife and I begin those 24 hours by unplugging every electric appliance in our home–no radio, no TV, no computers, no phone/answering machine, no refrigerator (they can usually be shut down for 24 hours if you keep them closed and cover them with a few blankets). For sustenance, we rely solely on air and water (no need for the stove). For travel, if necessary, we walk or bike. When the sun goes down, we go to bed, when it rises the next day, we break fast.

While I know that our celebration may be a bit rigorous for many (and seem awfully self righteous to others), I urge you to think about how you will celebrate this and future Earth days.

Appalachian Voices’ interns are making the news! Erica Palmer planned our 4th Annual Dine Out for the Mountains, which was a great success with 21 participating restaurants. I hope everyone had a chance to dine out for the mountains yesterday.

Appalachian Voices would like to thank the following restaurants for their participation and support of Appalachian Voices: In Boone: Black Cat Burrito, Boone Bagelry, Boone Drug Downtown, Café 161, CiCi’s Pizza, Coyote Kitchen, Dos Amigos, Joe’s Italian Kitchen, Makoto’s, Melanie’s, Mellow Mushroom, Mr. Original Gyros, Murphy’s Restaurant, Our Daily Bread, Peppers, Red Onion Café, The Bistro, Wildflower

In Blowing Rock: Canyons

In Foscoe: Jonson’s Bakery

In Banner Elk: Good Eat’s

Check out the article from the Mountain Times.

Once again the mysterious lights will be glowing and gliding across the dusky slopes of Brown Mountain in Western North Carolina. And once again scientists, paranormal researchers, and the just plain curious will converge on upper Burke County to view these tantalizing and legendary lights. But this year things have changed. This year the lights attain celebrity status as the subjects of a three-day festival to be held in their honor. On the weekend of June 9, 10, and 11 the historic village of Linville Falls in the Blue Ridge mountains will host a festival whose main event will be evening tours to a nearby lookout point from which the lights have been observed for generations.

Activities planned for this first year festival include mountain music and storytelling, lectures on the legends of the lights and the results of the latest scientific investigations, crafts demonstrations, book, video, and DVD sales, and, of course the hospitality that has made Linville Falls a byword in Blue Ridge tourism. A Friday evening bonfire in the village will draw many who have seen the lights to an ³open mike² session to share their experiences. On the evening of Saturday, June 10, visitors will ride shuttle vans four miles along Linville Mountain to Wisemans View, perhaps the most popular vantage point for sightings of the lights. The following Sunday will feature a church service (interdenominational) at Wisemans View. The festival also honors the local Wiseman family. It was young Lafayette (or Uncle Fate) Wiseman who often viewed the lights from this ledge on the western side of the Linville Gorge and who passed on to his great-nephew Scotty Wiseman the tale recounted in the latter¹s1960¹s hit song, ³Brown Mountain Light.² The Brown Mountain Lights are perhaps North Carolina¹s most famous mystery, continuing to this day to defy scientific explanation. Seen most often on clear summer evenings after rainfall, they have appeared at times when no man-made light source could have been active in the area. Glowing balls of light in red, orange, green, and blue, the lights move across Brown Mountain, a long flat ridge about 2,600 feet in elevation, in unpredictable patterns. They have been the subject of U.S. Geological Survey studies and have added local color to a murder mystery, W. Anderson¹s 1940 novel, Kill One, Kill Two. Now, finally, the Brown Mountain Lights are receiving their deserved acclaim as the ³superstars² of this portion of the Blue Ridge.

For information on food and lodging, schedule of events, and links to further information on the festival, visit : www.linvillefallsvillage.com or call Chris Blake at (828) 765-6846 or Shirley McNeil at (828) 766-6284.

Appalachian Voices’ volunteers and interns gave hundreds of hours to protect the mountains. We would like to thank them for their work and let everyone know what they accomplished!

We had 48 volunteers this semester working over 600 hours working on our Clean Air Campaign, Mountaintop Removal Campaign, the Appalachian Voice, and our Sustainable Forestry Program and held 13 volunteer nights at our Boone office. In addition, we have 41 volunteers distributing the Appalachian Voice to over 230 locations in 7 states.

We can always use more help. If you are interested in becoming an intern or volunteer, visit our volunteer section or email Shelly at outreach@appvoices.org.

Clean Air Campaign volunteers organized a bake sale in Virginia to buy AEP a scrubber for their plant in southwest Virginia. We were a few dollars short, but attracted considerable media attention and also educated hundreds of Virginia voters about clean air.

Our Clean Air volunteers also continued working to pass clean air resolutions across North Carolina. Over the last year, our volunteers have passed resolutions supporting our clean air protections in eleven cities and towns and three counties in western North Carolina.

Our Mountaintop Removal (MTR) Campaign volunteers have also accomplished some amazing things. During our volunteer nights, volunteers called members and activists across the country urging them to write their representatives and talk to their friends and families about the devastating effects of mountaintop removal coal mining. Our volunteers made hundreds of calls talking to over 200 people in 22 states, generated 28 letters to representatives and 10 letters to the editors in papers across the country.

Our MTR interns also organized our Congressional Briefing in Washington, DC at the end of February. Another intern researched the social implications of MTR and worked with Rawl, WV residents to tackle water quality issues related to mining operations. In addition, interns worked with Google Earth to make a comprehensive map of the extent of mountaintop removal in the Appalachian region.

Sustainable Forestry volunteers and interns dedicated many hours assisting our AmeriCorps member conduct research, write articles, and finalize sections of the second edition of our “Managing Your Woodlands Guide,” which will be available this June.

Many thanks to the following for the dedicated work this semester. We could not have accomplished so many great things without them! Adam Wells, Abby Pifer, Andrew Cornelius, Austin Hall, JW Randolph, Nancy Benson, Stephen Callihan, Steve Wussow, Erica Palmer, Brenda Huggins, Erin Garcia, Anita Henson, John Whilden, Judi Bell, Susan Hazlewood, Sara Ashton, Mareshah Abers, Sarah Balmer, Andrea Juliani, Ashlee Lafferty, Barbara Gravely, Daniel Brookshire, Mike McCoy, Rachel Harrington, Sarah Burkhart, Adam Johnson, Jenni Meyer, Will Moyer, Bryan Shea, Nicole Colston, Christin Ripley, Halley Jobsis, Theo Saslow, Lurissa Tucker, Samantha Caldwell, Kirk Kornegay, Ali Mandsager, Anna Heinermann, Wilson Klein, Matthew McConnell, Ryan Little, Mac Morris, Sonny Miksa, Lauren Smith, Dylan Tuno, Holly Hernandez, Patrick Casebere, Amanda Koontz, Anna Sittig, Tom Cannon, Adam Kota, Chelsi Alfaro, Georganna Morton, Thomas Allen.

Virginia Forest Watch stopped this sale once. Now we need your help to do it again.

Your comments are needed to stop an extensive LOGGING and ROADBUILDING project in the Jefferson National Forest in Bland
County. Comments are needed by approximately April 26, ’06.

The project is located on aptly named “Round” Mountain, a 3592 ft. mountain on the eastern wing of Garden Mountain. In 1987, Dr. Richard Hoffman described the 5×8 mile bowl called Burkes Garden as the ” most interesting single natural area in Virginia.” Adjacent Round Mtn is not as well known, but contains extensive tracts of intact forest and old growth forests on its north side.

In 2005, Virginia Forest Watch forced the Forest Service to halt the project because the Forest Service failed to properly examine the impacts of converting numerous antiquated woods roads on the mountain to modern logging roads. Now the Forest Service has revived the project with little improvement.

The logging and roadbuilding project should not go forward.

Comment points –

– The proposed project involves extensive roadbuilding (construction of 2.5 miles of roads plus additional skid trails), logging (102 acres), and so-called “oak enhancement” (447 acres), a silvicultural treatment (habitat manipulation) which simulates logging over a large area. The Forest Service should carefully monitor the impact and
effectiveness of the large-scale non-commercial “oak enhancement” treatment on oaks, other tree species, wildlife, native plants, soils, waterways and other resources, since this is a relatively new treatment that has not yet been studied over a large portion of the New River Valley Ranger District.

– Many of the logging units and oak enhancement treatments are planned in a significant 4,869 acre tract of forest on the north side of Round Mountain; and adjoining or near several extensive old growth forest tracts recognized by the Forest Service.

– Wolf Creek, downstream, is a state-listed impaired waterway. The Wolf Creek watershed is also listed a Forest Service designated
Priority Watershed, due to several unique aquatic species found in the watershed. Priority watersheds are watersheds “where forest management activities may make a difference.” (Jefferson National Forest Plan 2-2 to 3).” Forest Service stream surveys indicate that many of the tributaries of Wolf Creek that originate in the logging project area are already in “very poor” or “poor/fair” condition and/or are “extremely acid sensitive.” Logging and skidding could further damage Wolf Creek and its tributaries.

– Logging and roadbuilding here will damage mature and old growth forests, unfragmented forests, soils, watersheds, recreation, and scenic values. Previous logging projects on the mountain (for example, the East Round Mountain project in the 1990s) have already had negative impacts on many of these resources. There is no need for further logging on Round Mountain.

As part of this project, the Forest Service proposes planting blight-resistant American chestnut seedlings in the even-aged logging units should such seedlings come available in the future.
We think planting chestnuts is an excellent idea, but we ask the Forest Service to
consider an alternative calling for the planting of chestnut seedlings in old roadbeds and previous cutting units INSTEAD OF creating newly logged sites. This will allow these old
sites to heal. Many of the old roads proposed for road reconstruction are old roads dating to the 1930s and 1940s, or are illegal roads. As such, they may be far less heavily compacted than modern Forest Service roads and, once examined by the agency, may be determined to be good sites for American chestnut restoration. We encourage planting chestnuts on these sites.

– [Please add additional concerns if you have any additional personal concerns about the project.]

Send comments to: Cynthia Schiffer, District Ranger, New River Valley Ranger District, 110 Southpark Drive, Blacksburg, Va. 24060.
Official comments must be postmarked by approximately April 26, ’06 – comments are not as effective after this date, but please write to express your concern even if you miss the deadline! They need to hear from us! Please make other public officials aware of the project, for example, US Congressman Rick Boucher or local officials, as appropriate.

PROTECT VIRGINIA’s FORESTS with
Virginia Forest Watch