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Defend Public Land a Legacy of Waste: Realities of a Mining Economy

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Defend Public Land a Legacy of Waste: Realities of a Mining Economy Citizen Journalism for the Great Lakes Spring 2010 Headwaters Defend Public Land for Hunting, Fishing, and Future Generations By Richard Sloat A Legacy of Waste: Uranium Mining in the Serpent River Watershed By Lorraine Rekmans Special Issue: Waking Up to the Realities of a Mining, Mining Economy Land& By Bob Tammen Where do we go from Water here? In This Issue Why a Special Issue on Mining? While other mass industrial activities have had a profound effect on the Great Lakes region, mining, like no other industry, has left deep environmental and economic scars. Editor’s Note . 3 Maps, Facts and Figures Many of us grew up learning of the iron ore heydays of decades past in Minnesota and Michigan, the copper booms of the Features Rio Tinto’s Infamous Treatment of Workers . 12 Upper Peninsula and the uranium booms around Elliot Lake, Ontario. These periods of prosperity certainly employed many, Waking Up to the Realities of a Mining Employment by the Numbers . 13 often at good wages, once miners were able to unionize in an from here. What elements of Sportsmen with the day’s catch, Michigan, industry notoriously hesitant to recognize workers’ rights. the past should be retained? circa 1890s; Photo courtesy Superior View Mining Economy. 4 Minnesota Yet those booms came and went, with the mines often leaving What should be changed? a legacy of pollution and impairment of the region’s other What is holding us back? Defend Public Lands for Hunting, Fishing and Who’s Green? . 14 natural resources – clean water and healthy forests, as well as quality public lands to hunt, fish and spend good time on. Mining is an important part Future Generations . 6 This Land Is Your Land, Or Is This PolyMet’s Land? . 15 of the cultural heritage of the What is But the concern with mining is not only one of maintaining Great Lakes region. Yet, a Freshwater, Mining’s Most Common Casualty. 8 Michigan a clean environment and sound public health. Most former focus on historic mining often Headwaters News? mining regions in the United States and Canada remain leaves the impression that Mining Companies Shake Their Moneymakers . .10 Native American Rights Amidst Rio Tinto’s Proposed Eagle Mine. 16 chronically depressed areas economically. This negative our ancestor’s most important Headwaters News is a new citizen-based media project long-term economic impact to our communities is an issue as contribution to society was focusing on environmental, public health and economic Protecting the Menominee River . 17 critical to any discussion of the region’s future as other mining- digging holes in the ground concerns in the water-rich region from Minnesota to related concerns. and crawling through damp, eastern Ontario. A Letter to Hunters, Fishermen, and Landowners of the Upper Peninsula . 17 dangerous spaces in rickety Editors: Jobs have been rapidly declining in the mining industry and underground mines. This special issue was published with the help of small, Teresa Bertossi, Gabriel Caplett Ontario the US Department of Labor expects a loss of roughly 100,000 but very generous donations, and hundreds of volunteer mining jobs between 2008 and 2018. At the same time, ore Truly, our most important hours from dozens of people – your neighbors. Copy Editors: Ontario Gets a New Mining Act . 18 production and export continue to rise, along with corporate heritage is tied to our love of Barbara Bradley, Catherine Parker profits. The few jobs that are left are typically well paying – this beautiful land, its rivers, We hope that you will join in this regional discussion. A Legacy of Waste – Uranium Mining in the Serpent River Watershed. 19 higher than the private industry average – if you can get one. lakes and forests. Decades of Graphic Design: The mining industry continues to further automate mines, efforts by ordinary citizens to For more information, please visit our website at Gabriel Amadeus Tiller Wisconsin which tends to make mining safer, but at the cost of requiring conserve this cultural bounty HeadwatersNews.net far fewer workers than in the past. Unfortunately, these trends have kept the region unique Contributors: Failed Promises at the Flambeau Mine . 20 do not suggest long-term economic stability for communities from many other areas with If you are interested in submitting photos, video or Lori Andresen, Jack Deo, Laura Furtman, Al Gedicks, dependent upon mining employment. its abundance of quality written content, please contact us at (906) 361-0413 or Ramsey Hart, Ron and Carol Henriksen, IEN, Jessica The Crandon Mine Battle (1975-2003) . 21 public lands for hunting, [email protected] Koski, Bill Krupinski, Liana Loonsfoot, Sherry Loonsfoot, As evidenced by this economic reality, this is a complex fishing, camping and other Zachery Luhellier, Jon Magnuson, Elanne Palcich, Alexis Exhibit issue – one that cannot be divided into two starkly opposite recreation. It is this heritage Headwaters News relies on donations from generous Raney, Lorraine Rekmans, Greg Seitz, Richard Sloat, Bob and competing sides with any honesty. There are no definite that miners of decades past readers to help us continue this media project. Please Tammen, Rico Torreano, Marla Tuinstra, WMAN The Hard Facts on Hardrock and Uranium Mining . 22 answers in the mining, lands and water debate or concrete lived and worked for and send donations to: Headwaters News, PO Box 833, solutions as to what the future of this region should be. ensured would be left for their Marquette, MI 49855 The Last Word Solutions should come as the result of an ongoing, open and children. It is this part of our Cover photo: Courtesy Jack Deo, Superior View respectful discussion among citizens of the Great Lakes region. heritage that makes the future This Page: Rock River Falls, MI; Photo courtesy Gabriel Caplett Human Rights, Rio Tinto and the Integrity of Protest . 23 To make that discussion productive, we must first recognize of this region worth fighting where we are in order to better determine where we will go for. Editor’s Note 3 View of Minnesota’s Iron Range; Photo courtesy Lori Waking Up to the Realities Andresen of a Mining Economy By Bob Tammen In 1969 I went to work for In Minnesota and elsewhere sales to China by nearly ten American worker. From of mining are fairly well Promoters claim we should US Steel at their Minntac around the upper Great times from 2000 to 2006. In 2001 to 2007, before the documented and pretty much mine copper here so we don’t plant, in Minnesota. On a Lakes, many of our leaders 2008, when asked what other current recession, US trade ignored by regulators in mine it in some foreign large sign at the main gate, have said that we need to rapidly growing primary with China cost roughly mining country. country with lower standards, Minntac advertises itself as mine low-grade ore bodies markets the company saw, in 2.3 million, mostly yet they never identify a the largest taconite mining so we can use the minerals addition to China, CEO Tom manufacturing, America Minnesota has a sweetheart polluting mine that will be operation in North America. for manufacturing. The Albanese said, “China, China workers their jobs. This trend arrangement with the mining closed down if we open up a The main street of Mountain problem is, they’re so focused – and then again, I would say, is expected to continue. industry whereby they create mine in our wetlands. That’s Iron begins just a half-mile on extracting minerals that China.” “Voluntary Investigation because we won’t actually from the main gate. During they have no energy for According to the Natural And Cleanup” agreements. replace a polluting mine my bachelor days I rented an promoting manufacturing. The US has rapidly increased Resources Research Institute, You don’t have to be a someplace else. We’d just be apartment on the main street We have an educated work exports of raw materials “There are real opportunities hardened cynic to suspect competing with them in a of Mountain Iron. There was a force and a strong work such as food crops, metals for Minnesota to be a supplier that voluntary activities in race to the bottom. grocery store next door and a ethic. So why don’t we have the mining industry will lead bar across the street. Life was a manufacturing industry? us to the same wonderful New copper mining would be Listening to a mining company representative brag the economy and the good. It’s because our culture is outcomes we got from a wetland killer and an energy environment, we don’t often dominated by the extraction According to economist Thomas M. Power, “some citizens voluntary regulation in the pig. It’s capital intensive and about their contributions to our economy is like address the culture of an Last winter Pat and I went to mindset that keeps leading and leaders” in Minnesota’s Iron Range are stuck with the financial industry. job stingy. There’s nothing established mining area. If a meeting in Mountain Iron. us to dead-end development belief that mining is essential to the regional economy, radical about opposing new listening to a rooster on a dunghill crow until he makes you want to know what a We drove past the main gate projects. even though mining jobs contribute to only five percent In the upper Great Lakes we copper mining in wetlands mining economy looks like, of Minntac and into town. of personal income on the Iron Range and a scant two- have leaking tailings ponds, around the Great Lakes. the sun rise. don’t just picture ugly waste The bar is still there but the The proposed PolyMet tenths of one percent for the state: blowing dust, polluted surface dumps, polluted tailings grocery store is gone.
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