I attended an EPA hearing on May 11th titled, “EPA Mining Policies: Assault on Appalachian Jobs – Part II” by the House Committee on Transportation and Infrastructure.” House Republicans framed a mythical tone that President Obama’s EPA has killed coal mining jobs by using its authority under the Section 404(C) of the Clean Water Act. One interesting note about this hearing is that through an Open Secrets search, I discovered $23,950 in campaign donations in the 2010 election cycle by Koch Industries to five Republicans present at the hearing. They include James Lankford (OK), Don Young (AK), Rob Gibbs (OH), John Mica (FL), and Larry Bucshon (IN). A lobbying group in attendance was FACES (Federation for American Coal, Energy, and Security). They all wore shirts with the slogan, “Protecting American Coal Jobs”. They looked like they were actual West Virginia coal miners, but were really paid by a K Street lobbying firm to sit in on the hearing. While the Koch Brothers make far money off oil than coal, the candidates they and other powerful lobbyists support have a profit-first, anti-regulatory mentality, which plays directly into the hands of the coal companies.
Nancy Stoner, Acting Assistant Administrator of the Office of Water at the EPA, faced relentless attacks from House Republicans, who accused the EPA of using this act to slow down permitting for coal mines , stopping precious metals mining, and of shutting down American energy production. Representative Young, who is nearing 80 years old, even suggested that Congress should defund the EPA and claimed the Obama Administration has a policy of anti-worker and non-production. Clearly, Alaska’s youth need to send him into retirement in 2012 by electing someone who cares about the damage that coal mining does to our environment.
Stoner’s defended the EPA by stating that it seeks to reduce coal pollution, not coal mining. She gave solid testimony as to the Clean Water Act’s purpose in protecting America’s waters and wildlife, stating that clean water supports jobs. The EPA works with mining companies to suggest how mining projects can proceed, while protecting waters. Some companies do incorporate the EPA’s suggestions. The EPA rejected the permit for West Virginia’s Spruce Mine. The corporate owner of this mine rejected the EPA’s advice on protecting waters to be affected by this mine.
The reality is that the coal companies themselves are killing jobs using machinery to extract the coal through mountaintop removal coal mining, not caring about the communities they live in. In 1940 West Virginia coal mining employment totaled over 130,000. Then, there was a sharp decline in the 1950’s, during which coal mining employment dropped there by 50% in less than five years. By 1960, it fell to just above 40,000. As of 2008, the coal industry employed only 21,190 people in West Virginia. Which means the House Republicans did not do their homework to the trend of the long-term decline in coal mining jobs.
The hearing proved that activism to move college campuses beyond coal is absolutely critical to the movement. That needs to progress to moving communities beyond coal. The best way to help Appalachian communities beat the coal mining companies is to bring down the nationwide demand for coal, which Harvard researchers estimate is costing America $500 billion annually. This includes damage done by extreme weather events related to climate change, mining accidents, and widespread public health problems from both coal mining regions and areas near coal-burning plants. It is important to note the wealthiest areas of West Virginia are those where coal mining does not take place. Activism in both the coal mining regions and all across the nation will stop the assault not just on sustainable development in Appalachia, but all across America, too.
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