Copyright 1999 Federal Document Clearing House, Inc.
Federal Document Clearing House Congressional Testimony
June 15, 1999
SECTION: CAPITOL HILL HEARING TESTIMONY
LENGTH: 2068 words
HEADLINE:
TESTIMONY June 15, 1999 DANNY E. ROBERTSON SENATE ENERGY &
NATURAL RESOURCES FORESTS AND PUBLIC LANDS MANAGEMENT CROWN JEWEL MINE
BODY:
Statement of Danny E. Robertson Operations
Manager - Crown Jewel Mine Battle Mountain Gold Company on Issues related to the
March 25, 1999 letter from the Department of Interior which vacated the Record
Decision and disapproved the Plan of Operations for the Crown Jewel Mine in
Okanogan County, Washington before the Subcommittee on Forests and Public Land
Management of the Energy and Natural Resources Committee United States Senate
June 15, 1999 My name is Danny E. Robertson. I'm not a lawyer, and I don't
pretend to understand the nuances of the law, but I think I have common sense. I
hope my comments will be taken in that light as we discuss the outrageous
impacts brought on by the illogical Solicitor's Opinion. I am the Operations
Manager for the Crown Jewel Mine. I am an engineer by profession and have been
in the mining business for close to 25 years. Some time fairly early in my life,
it became clear to me that you can't put rock from a twenty acre hole on a five
acre piece of real estate. I know that some people would have you believe that
large scale industrial mining is a recent development made possible by
technological advances such as chemical leaching. If there is any need, I'm here
to tell you that that is nonsense. As a boy, I remember a field trip to see the
Chino Pit outside of Silver City, New Mexico. It was bigger than twenty acres.
The history of the American West is the history of large scale industrial
mining. From the days of the Comstock Lode, the mining industry has moved very
large quantities of rock. The American West is dotted with large historic mines,
such as the Comstock Lode in Nevada, Bingham Canyon in Utah, Lead in South
Dakota and Lavender in Arizona. I've worked for Battle Mountain for over 14
years. Battle Mountain is a U.S. company with operations in the United States
and other countries. Battle Mountain's Statement of Environmental Policy and
Principles states that: As a society, we must balance the creation of jobs,
goods and services that supply our needs, wants and economic growth with the
resulting consumption or use of the earth's lands and resources. BMG recognizes
that mining activity impacts the natural and human environment as well as the
economic environment and responsible mining must involve a commitment to
environmental stewardship in all phases of our operations. My annual bonus is in
part dependent on the environmental performance of the Company. The Crown Jewel
Project is located in the state of Washington. The property position has
remained largely unchanged since 1992. The proposed mine is located in an area
that has largely been previously mined or clear cut. There are no real
environmental issues with the Project, no endangered species, no cultural
resources, no extensive wetlands. The proposed mine is in an extremely
economically depressed area with high unemployment. The poverty rate for
Okanogan County is nearly twice the state average. Because of financial
constraints, the County isn't replacing two public health nurses. This leaves an
area the size of Connecticut with two public health nurses. Battle Mountain has
targeted eighty percent of its approximately 140-member workforce for local
hire. Payroll at Crown Jewel will be almost $5 million each year. Battle
Mountain will pay in excess of $1 million a year in state and local taxes.
During construction, state and local governments will see a one-time infusion of
almost $3 million. The Project has overwhelming local support, including the
support of organized labor and local governments. The Crown Jewel permitting
process has been unprecedentedly thorough. Of the $80 million Battle Mountain
has spent on the Project to date, some $20 million has been spent on permitting.
The Plan of Operations was submitted in 1992. The draft EIS was issued in
mid-1995. According to the Director of the Washington Department of Ecology the
permitting process has represented "the most rigorous environmental. analysis
the state has ever conducted on a project of this type .... No other proposal
has received this level of environmental scrutiny." In January of 1997, the
final Environmental Impact Statement and joint Forest Service/BLM Record of
Decision were issued for the Project. The multi-volume Environmental Impact
Statement considered numerous potential alternatives. The Record of Decision
selected the alternative for development (that is the configuration) of the
Project. The Record of Decision stated that the Selected Alternative is
11consistent with all laws, regulations, and policies" and "will be implemented
through the approval of Plans of Operations." Plans of operations are normally
formally approved simultaneously with the issuance of records of decisions.
However, the Crown Jewel Plan of Operations was not contemporaneously given
final formal approval because "Proponent will be required to revise their Plan
of Operations to match the requirements documented in the Record of Decision ".
Based on the January 1997 Record of Decision, the state permitting effort went
forward. Between January 1997 and February 1999, Battle Mountain spent $16
million on the Project. By February of 1999, we had received over fifty state
and local pen- nits and posted over $50 million in security based upon the
configuration of the Project as selected in the Record of Decision. One of the
most important permits was the 401 Water Quality Certification. Upon its
issuance, the Director of the Washington Department of Ecology stated "Battle
Mountain Gold Company has demonstrated that its proposed project will meet state
water-quality standards during the life of the mine and after the mine is
closed. . . ". Some of the permit approvals were challenged in court, but the
agencies and Battle Mountain have prevailed in every substantive ruling. The
Environmental Impact Statement and Record of Decision were successfully defended
by the Forest Service in the United States District Court. The Court explicitly
found that the rights of the Colville Confederated Tribes would not be adversely
impacted by the mine. The issue of the millsite-to-mining claim
ratio was never raised. Until very late January of 1999, there was never any
suggestion whatsoever from the Bureau of Land Management or United States Forest
Service that the final formal approval of the Plan of Operations was not solely
conditioned upon incorporating the requirements of the Record of Decision into
the Plan of Operations. Almost one full year after we received our Record of
Decision, Solicitor Leshy issued his opinion regarding limitations on patenting
millsites. We discussed the Opinion with representatives of the
Forest Service and BLM. We did not believe, and no one in the agencies ever
suggested, that the Opinion had any retroactive applicability to our Project,
which had already received its Record of Decision. Furthermore, the August 1998
BLM Instruction Memorandum removed any doubt that any party could possibly have
had as to whether the Solicitor's Opinion could adversely impact the Crown Jewel
Project. The Instruction Memorandum, which was totally ignored when our Plan of
Operations was denied, sets out a four step procedure which must be used before
a plan of operations can be denied due to a failure to comply with the
Solicitor's Opinion. It is clear that the Crown Jewel Project was approvable
pursuant to the Instruction Memorandum because the area in question is not
subject to a withdrawal and, as demonstrated in the EIS, the Project will have
no unacceptable conflicts with significant resources. On February 4, 1999, 1 was
contacted by United States Forest Service personnel and requested to come to
their office on February 5th at 10:00 AM pick up the signature- ready Plan of
Operations approval documents. Early on the morning of February 5th, they called
back and told me not to come to their office because the Plan of Operations had
been pulled to Washington, D.C. After February 5th , I inquired from time to
time with the local Forest Service and BLM personnel, but was always told that
they knew nothing, that the matter was being handled in Washington, D.C. I was
informed by our corporate headquarters that Senators Gorton and Reid had
requested to meet with Solicitor Leshy to determine what was holding up the Plan
of Operations, but that their request had not been granted. March 26, 1999 was
the worst day of my career. I got a phone call from Corporate and I was told
that we had received an undated letter signed by John Leshy and others. I was
told that the airbill for the letter said it had been sent on March 23rd, but
that it had actually been sent on March 25th. I was told that, solely based on
the November 1997 Solicitor's Opinion, the letter revoked our Record of
Decision, denied our Plan of Operations and took my Project from me. After the
Company issued its press release announcing the denial, I called the Forest
Service Supervisor and the BLM Area Manager. They told me that Washington, D.C.
had not informed them about the denial. The Forest Super-visor later told me
that the local Forest Service felt "gut shot" by the denial. It was my job to
inform a lot of local people about the denial. I informed the local community,
the people that were counting on jobs and tax revenues. I also had to call a
meeting of all the people that work for me, people that had spent years of their
lives working towards permitting an environmentally responsible operation. The
atmosphere in the room was like a funeral, not the funeral of an elderly uncle
that had lived a full life, but like the funeral of a young child whose life has
been senselessly taken. More than one of my employees asked if they should sell
their home. The Leshy denial also had broader ramifications. When the markets
opened after the denial letter was received, the stock of our joint venture
partner, Crown Resources, fell forty-six percent in one day, and continued to
free fall thereafter. On the same day, Battle Mountain lost over $100 million in
market cap and its share price sank to an all time low. It was the common
shareholders of Crown Resources and Battle Mountain that were hurt by this
plunge in stock price; shareholders like the Ohio State Teachers' Retirement
System, the California State Teachers' Retirement System, the New York Common
Retirement System and the Wisconsin Investment Board. Fortunately, Congress saw
fit to take emergency action to rectify the grave injustice that befell my
Project. I would like to personally give my thanks and the thanks of Battle
Mountain Gold Company to the Senators and Representatives, particularly Senator
Gorton, who had the courage to address the issue in the face of a massive
misinformation campaign. The local media has reported that opponents of mining
have tried to spin Congress' action as an anti-environmental rider tacked onto
an appropriations bill in the dark of night. As you can see, this had nothing to
do with the environment. After years of environmental study, obtaining dozens of
permits and having all challenged permits upheld on appeal, the Crown Jewel Mine
will be an environmental showcase. Given the grievous and unprecedented nature
of the denial, emergency action to put things night was not only appropriate,
but necessary. In light of the emergency which they faced, the people in the
Okanogan area are overwhelmingly supportive of Congress' action. The Board of
Okanogan County Commissioners has stated that: "We believe that had the Leshy
decision been allowed to stand, it would have dealt a significant blow to the
mining industry in the United States. It certainly would have been detrimental
to the economic livelihood of Okanogan County, where unemployment continues to
be significantly higher, and per capita income significantly lower than the
statewide average." In accordance with the Congressional mandate, our Record of
Decision was reinstated on May 28, 1999. When I called the Forest Service Forest
Supervisor and BLM Area Manager, I learned that they had not been informed of
the reinstatement by Washington, D.C. The Plan of Operations approvals were
quickly granted by the local Forest Service and BLM the week of May 31st and we
are now moving the Project forward again. Thank you for allowing me to speak to
this matter from the point of view of a mine manager in Okanogan County.
LOAD-DATE: June 17, 1999 
