#Winning

Bolstered by several recent wins in the fight to defeat the 1500MW ODEC coal plant in the Hampton Roads Area, Virginians are stepping up and speaking out to show their support for protecting Virginia ridges from mountaintop removal. Virginia Rising is a coordinated effort from Virginians from the mountains to the Bay, to NoVA, to raise awareness about mountaintop removal and to protect our most important resources – our people.

Recently, hundreds of Virginians and citizens from across the Appalachian region gathered at the EPA headquarters in Washington DC to voice concerns about a proposed mountaintop removal site that would destroy Ison Rock Ridge in Wise County, VA. More than 2,000 residents live in the five surrounding communities would be impacted by this site.

Jane Branham, Wise County resident and Vice-President of Southern Appalachian Mountain Stewards said:

For more than four years, we have fought to keep this surface mine from moving forward in an effort to protect our homes and our families. The state has given A&G coal company permission to blow up our mountain and poison our streams. We are gathered today to send the EPA the message that we need them to intervene. The risks are too serious.

The 1,200-acre mountaintop removal mine would add to the devastation that southwest Virginia residents have endured from mountaintop removal operations. More than 60 mountains have been permanently destroyed by mountaintop removal in Virginia alone and more than 500 mountains in Appalachia total. Residents have reported extensive damage to the foundations of their homes and private drinking wells from nearby blasting. Dangerous levels of ground and drinking water contamination, noxious dust blanketing entire communities, increased flash flooding, and constant dangerous coal truck traffic are direct results of nearby mountaintop removal operations.

Public health risks connected to mountaintop removal are well-documented. Recent studies link mountaintop removal mining to increased birth defects and cancer rates in counties throughout Appalachia.

Congratulations to all Virginians for your winning streak against big coal, and to learn more about how you can get involved, visit Virginia Rising

We wanted to take a moment to recognize the life of Dr. Paul Epstein, a lifelong public health advocate who passed away this week at age 67. He is survived by his wife of 44 years Andy, as well as his children Jesse and Benjamin Eptstein.

Dr. Epstein, a good friend of Appalachian Voices, spent his career illuminating the connection between our use of fossil fuels and their externalized cost to our public health and to our economy. A co-founder of the Global Center for Health and the Environment, the Boston Globe celebrated Epstein as a “tireless activist and champion of human rights, environmental justice, and early sentinel of the dangers of fossil fuels.”

Through his work at Harvard, Epstein helped author a landmark study “Mining Coal, Mounting Costs,” which was covered on NPR’s Living on Earth program.

Epstein was one of the first prominent academics to highlight the negative impacts mountaintop removal has on the Appalachian economy, working tirelessly with Appalachian Voices and others to ensure that his team’s data got into the hands of powerful legislators in Congress.

On a personal note, I have to say what a sweet and humble person Dr. Epstein was. I was always amazed that the guy who had been an adviser on Vice-President Gore’s climate slidesow was willing to work with our peers in such an honest and down-to-earth manner.

For a more complete read on Dr. Epstein’s life and work, please see this lovely piece in the New York Times. He will be truly missed.

Controversial Appalachian politicians promoting mountaintop removal are in the vast minority in their own states

Joe Lovett, as he is known to do, says it best:

A new poll conducted by two bipartisan firms shows overwhelming support for ending mountaintop removal within the Appalachian states of KY, TN, VA, and WV. The poll was commissioned by the Appalachian Mountain Advocates (formerly “Appalachian Center for the Economy and the Environment)”, EarthJustice, and the Sierra Club, and sampled more than 1300 likely voters, oversampling in WV and KY, and has a margin of error of just ±2.8%. These organizations are releasing the complete poll to the public, and you can find the full cross-tabs are here. Without description, voters oppose mountaintop removal 38%-24%. Given a brief description of mountaintop removal, likely Appalachian voters oppose the practice 57%-20%. This announcement comes on the back of a national poll released by CNN last week, showing that Americans across the country strongly oppose mountaintop removal (57%-36%).

The results are astonishing in that Appalachian voters clearly differentiate between coal mining (which they strongly support 61%-21%) and mountaintop removal (which they strongly oppose 57%-27%). These are not “out of state hippies” or “anti-coal activists.” These are the Appalachian people, who clearly understand that mountaintop removal is a unique form of coal mining that has unprecedented negative impacts on our region, and needs to end. In fact, when asked if they supported increasing Clean Water Protections to protect ourselves from mountaintop removal, voters responded with an astonishing 78% supporting an increase in Clean Water Act protections and just 9% opposing.

The support for the Clean Water Act is both deep and wide. According to the pollsters’ memo:

Support for [increasing protections in—the Clean Water Act to safeguard streams, rivers, and lakes in their states from mountaintop removal coal mining] is far-reaching, encompassing solid majorities of Democrats (86%), independents (76%), Republicans (71%), and Tea Party supporters (67%).

Our movement to end mountaintop removal and increase protections within the Clean Water Act is working, and has strong popular support not just across the country, but across all political lines and all geographic lines. This new poll confirms that voters across the Appalachian region feel just as strongly about protecting the Clean Water Act, and protecting our mountains.

But of course, you’ve noted a lot of Appalachian politicians saying just the opposite…

Throughout the last two years, Democratic Congressman Nick Rahall (WV-03) has made promoting mountaintop removal his #1 issue in Washington. Time, after time, after time the Congressman has fought Congressional and Administrative efforts to protect Appalachian citizens from the impacts of coal, joining the most radical elements of our Congress in calling regulation of mountaintop removal , and gleefully ignoring the flood of new peer-reviewed scientific studies showing horrific health impacts to his constituents. After the 2010 elections, Rahall was joined in Congress by Senator Joe Manchin, whose defense of mountaintop removal has been equally verbose, and perhaps even more willfully ignorant.

Other coal-state politicians have shown a desire to bend over backwards to the demands of a radical and shrinking regional coal industry. This includes Republican Senators Mitch McConnell and Rand Paul of Kentucky, Senator Rockefeller of West Virginia, Representatives Shelly Moore Capito and David McKinley of West Virginia, and Morgan Griffith of southwestern Virginia.

They’ll all be disappointed to know that most of their constituents, including a majority of Republicans, Democrats, and Independents oppose ending mountaintop removal, while even 67% of tea party supporters support increasing protections within the Clean Water Act. Not only that, but those who want more protections from mountaintop removal are more likely to help them make a decision in the voting booth.

It sure does make Senator Lamar Alexander (R-TN), who supports ending mountaintop removal, look awful smart.

There is hope yet for Rahall and his Congressional comrades. He has known for a long-time that the writing is on the wall for mountaintop removal. Just two short years ago he said:

The state’s most productive coal seams likely will be exhausted in 20 years. And while coal will remain an important part of the economy, the state should emphasize green job development. That is especially important as pressure against mountaintop mining increases. Pressure is coming from both Republicans and Democrats. During the 2008 presidential race, Republican nominee John McCain came out in favor of ending mountaintop mining. It’s something that’s evolving over time in our industry and the responsible segment of our industry realizes that.
– Congressman Nick Rahall (D-WV-03), 04-02-09

This was, of course, before he learned that these words upset Don Blankenship, and went on a full-court press to promote mountaintop removal and eliminate the few citizen protections that re currently in place. Thanks to our friends at Appalachian Mountain Advocates, EarthJustice, and Sierra Club, we now know that Nick Rahall can feel free to express what he already knows – we must protect his constituents and end mountaintop removal. And he can do it knowing that West Virginia Democrats, West Virginia Republicans, and even West Virginia Tea Party members support increasing Clean Water Act protections regarding mountaintop removal.

Thoughts on Justice in the Coal Bearing Areas of Appalachia

Tim DeCristopher, an native West Virginian, has been sentenced to 2 years in jail plus a $10,000 fine for putting a false bid on an oil lease at a public auction, essentially nullifying the results of the auction. The punishment Tim received is roughly equal to that of a Kentucky company which sent a boulder the size of a mini-van into a nearby house in 2009. The only difference is that when the company allowed that boulder to crash into that house, nobody went to jail. That $10,000 fine obviously didn’t do much to how business is done, as another boulder flew into the home of a Kentucky family with children (2 and 6 years old) again this week.

DeChristopher’s entire statement is below, but in this section he specifically addresses mountaintop removal in a manner that we hear time and time and time again from citizens having to live with the impacts of this horrible practice. I hope his words serve as food for thought for all of us.

…I have openly and explicitly called for nonviolent civil disobedience against mountaintop removal coal mining in my home state of West Virginia. Mountaintop removal is itself an illegal activity, which has always been in violation of the Clean Water Act, and it is an illegal activity that kills people. A West Virginia state investigation found that Massey Energy had been cited with 62,923 violations of the law in the ten years preceding the disaster that killed 29 people last year. The investigation also revealed that Massey paid for almost none of those violations because the company provided millions of dollars worth of campaign contributions that elected most of the appeals court judges in the state. When I was growing up in West Virginia, my mother was one of many who pursued every legal avenue for making the coal industry follow the law. She commented at hearings, wrote petitions and filed lawsuits, and many have continued to do ever since, to no avail. I actually have great respect for the rule of law, because I see what happens when it doesn’t exist, as is the case with the fossil fuel industry. Those crimes committed by Massey Energy led not only to the deaths of their own workers, but to the deaths of countless local residents, such as Joshua McCormick, who died of kidney cancer at age 22 because he was unlucky enough to live downstream from a coal mine. When a corrupted government is no longer willing to uphold the rule of law, I advocate that citizens step up to that responsibility.

This is really the heart of what this case is about. The rule of law is dependent upon a government that is willing to abide by the law. Disrespect for the rule of law begins when the government believes itself and its corporate sponsors to be above the law…

The rest of his statement is below the fold:
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