Thank you, Frank Moe, Adam Harju, their support crew and all who supported their dogsled run to St. Paul. Their efforts highlight a critical threat not only to our fragile environment in the Arrowhead country, but to our jobs and way of life.
Sulfide mining, also euphemistically called “precious metal mining,” is an expensive chase for trace amounts of valuable metals in rock underlying the BWCAW and our homes. Expensive because it takes tons of soil and rock, exposing many different minerals to the air and producing highly acidic water runoff. Our soils are already acidic, compounded by acid rain over the years. Increasing acidity even more with this mining doesn’t make any sense, especially when the principle demand for gold and silver is for investment, not electronics or other industrial uses.
Jobs are almost always the issue used to justify this mining. Mining companies and politicians seek cover by highlighting the great economic impact during high unemployment, particularly in seemingly depressed areas like the north woods. But the jobs go mostly to new workers who will move here, not much for locals.
Unemployment in the Arrowhead counties has been below both national and state figures for some time, suggesting that if jobs really are an issue perhaps they should move mining operations to central Minnesota where unemployment is double what we have on the range. The jobs, like most mining jobs, last only as long as the ores remain profitable or abundant; neither is the case for precious metals here. When the ore is depleted so is the work.
Our economy is not desperate. We rely principally on tourism and service. It is visitors that bring us our largesse. As long as we protect our environmental resource we can maintain or increase that flow. If anything, our natural resources are underutilized, but rather than mining many of us are working to develop more recreational opportunities to expand our attraction; more opportunities for recreation mean more income for more small businesses and the service industry, the heart of the area’s industry. Being low impact or no impact, we can thrive economically and live with the pure waters and wilderness. All that is threatened by the false economy of mining.
HF 2800 has been introduced in the Minnesota house, which would impose conditions mining companies would have to meet in order to secure a permit. If mining is a must, then so is this bill. Please contact your legislators and urge the governor and the legislature to pass this bill. Our way of life is at stake.
Jerry Hiniker
Grand Marais
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