Redwood Reader

14. The 1872 Mining Law
Working on planning for Gilham Butte earlier this week I was surprised to see that it was not possible to preclude entry to BLM for mining purposes even when the area has various designations as an old growth biological reserve. The main thing preventing it is management decision and lack of any subsurface minerals worth extracting. It seemed to be saying tearing up the ground is a protected activity even when the primary aim is ecosystem restoration. That will change as technology leads us from one resource to the next over time, like Douglas fir being of low value until plywood and balloon framing brought huge new demands for these products, resulting in the decimation of PNW forests in the last half century. Seen as a principle economic powerhouse in the rural communities, people allowed destruction of related resources in order to derive the benefits of economic surety, without understanding the biological processes actually occurring in those forests. The biological understanding is now at hand and a new day is about to dawn in land use. The folks who fought to save forests, streams, T & E species may have to take a back seat however, when mineral extraction becomes the primary purpose. While the company, Texas originated Weaverville based Master Petroleum claimed it didn't intend to tear up the environment, the vey prop[osal is in contrast to many years of work on several fronts. Entering a wilderness area through a strip mine degrades the experience. Visual resource values are impacted. Noise degrades wilderness and wilderness experiences. Logging to get at the minerals below will come under THP review. One hundred feet is insufficient riparian buffer. Diversion of 100,000 gallons a day from a primary Trinity feeder flies in the face of ongoing water allotment disputes in the Trinity and Klamath Rivers. Add increased runoff from removal of biological precipitation interface and storage system and major impacts are assured, even in the most compliant plans, because the biological interface is not commonly understood or legally protected.
As of yet no air quality standards for re-emission of soil stored CO2 have been put forward, but it is inevitable with the knowledge in hand and the global environment rapidly showing the effects in a variety of ways. EPA must be made to understand how much of current atmospheric carbon dioxide has been put there by ground clearing and disturbance. Until that happens in forestry (it is already well documented in agriculture but practices and concerns so far have not been carried over to development, recreation or forestry), probably the greatest concentrations of glomalin, air quality will continue to suffer.
Mining is a necessary activity for strategic materials at times, and at other times it is the function of economic opportunity. Gold traditionally rises in times of world turmoil, and the price has risen from about $250 per ounce to nearly $400 since gold was determined to exist in 2000 and the War on Terror began a year later. Opportunity enterprises jump at chances to cash out in good market times and carefully rethink plans when profits threaten to disappear. The worldwide shortfall is a political condition and not related to National Defense. The plan is open for comment until August 26. Local governments, agencies, tribes, non-profits and concerned individuals need to respond to this plan, and let it be known downstream and backcountry users can and will fight the plan beyond profitability.
The real problem here is not the company itself, but the archaic laws still on the books that allow biological and environmental destruction in the name of free enterprise. These laws only benefit large outfits, and the Forest Service made a point of removing gold dredgers because of riparian impacts. Our Congressional leaders need to rewrite laws with such profound impacts more often than every 130 years. Legislators legislate due to public pressure. The Forest Service has a mandate to protect the future resources of the country, particularity biological resources as it is in the Department of Agriculture. Government land holders must not be held hostage to destructive practices that benefit the few. Insuring against pit failure dismisses the likelihood of ground failure due to practices already known to cause ground failures, such as tree removal and runoff diversion.
From BLM's Regional Management Plan we find:'The RMP section entitled “Area Wide Decisions declares, "No public lands in the planning area are suitable or available for agricultural entry....because of the rugged topography, small tract size, unsuitable soils and lack ofaccess.” It follows with the declaration, “Public lands (including mineral reserve lands) are available for mineral leasing and mineral materials sales, and are open to entry under the Mining Law of 1872. All mineral actions must be consistent with Management Area Resource Condition Objectives (1992 RMP p8). The RMP section entitled “Determinations Not Made In This Plan notes the following that apply to this Plan:
Access Routes: Specific access routes have not been identified but access which is necessary to meet the resource condition objectives and fully implement the land use allocations will be required...". This would seem to mean mineral extraction has the highest priority of all, and that it can be argued that access must be provided for it.
In these cases the governmental agencies hands are tied, often to the exasperation of dedicated employees working on the landscape level. Where strategic materials on public lands are concerned, Congress should ensure extraction in the least destructive manner possible. Destructive land use practices in response to consumer driven markets should be outlawed entirely on public lands. In a word, as biological creations, we have much more to gain from protecting biological resources than we do from extracting mineral wealth.
Mineral extraction laws must be brought up to date.
Comments can be sent to Michael Mitchell, Shasta-Trinity National Forest, P.O. Box 1190, Weaverville, 96093. Closing date is August 26.

Rich McGuiness 5/22/2004


Canyon Creek gold mining dredges up nuggets of concern http://www.times-standard.com/Stories/0,1413,127~2896~2165744,00.html
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