Residents Get Advice on Mine

By Jay Conley jay.conley@roanoke.com 981-3114

A legal defense organization connected with a range of environmental issues across Southwest Virginia on Monday night addressed Botetourt County residents who are opposed to a potential shale mine coming to the area.

Thomas Linzey, an attorney and executive director of the Pennsylvania-based Community Environmental Legal Defense Fund, told about 30 Eagle Rock residents they should urge elected officials to create legislation to ban new mining efforts in the county rather than go through ordinances and zoning restrictions that regulate mining.

“It’s up to you and you alone to chart a new course,” he told residents, who have united under the name Friends of Anthony Mountain.

Residents’ concerns about the opening of a mine range from noise and dust to the effect on water quality of nearby streams and truck traffic.

Botetourt County officials have said they prefer to approve or deny such uses as mining on a case-by-case basis through special- use permits, and question the legality of an ordinance that would outright ban certain types of industries.

Linzey said he has visited a number of localities in Virginia this year to talk to residents about a range of environmental issues.

He was in Bedford County in January offering advice on how residents could urge elected officials to make it illegal for corporations to apply biosolids as fertilizer in the county.

The Bedford County Board of Supervisors instead plans to work with a new law sponsored in this year’s General Assembly session by state Sen. Steve Newman, R-Lynchburg, that gives counties the authority to regulate sewage sludge facilities by requiring a special-use permit.

Linzey also has provided advice to New River Valley residents opposed to Norfolk Southern’s plans to put an intermodal freight facility in the eastern Montgomery County community of Elliston.

It’s unclear if a shale mine in Eagle Rock is imminent.

General Shale Brick, which owns the factory formerly known as Webster Brick in Blue Ridge, has an option to buy a 430-acre tract of land near Eagle Rock. The company is in the process of determining if the site could yield enough shale for a workable pit mine.

But General Shale has said it has no formal plan for creating a mine there and has not decided whether it will buy the property. The company has not applied for any permits to create a mine through local or state agencies.

“Eagle Rock is something we’re considering as part of a longer- range plan and we’ll still be doing some more studying on it at some point,” said Dave McNees, a General Shale spokesman. “But we’ve just not had time to work on that right now and I’m not sure what our schedule is.”

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