Luján stood staunchly against the bill in his proposal.“You have heard my colleagues on the other side of the aisle that their bill offers protection for the sacred, traditional, and cultural sites in the proposed area to be exchanged, but I don’t believe that to be true,” he said. “If it were true, then why is every major tribal organization in the country opposing this bill?”

Luján cited the National Congress of American Indians, the All-Indian Pueblo Council of New Mexico, the San Carlos Apache Tribe (whose 2,400 acres of land on the Tonto National Forest is most affected by the Act), and the Jicarilla and Mescalero Apache tribes of New Mexico, among many other U.S. tribes as having spoken out against the land swap. “We have a Trust responsibility to our tribal brothers and sisters, and those who oppose this responsibility will dismantle it piece by piece with a scalpel and not all at once with an axe,” he said.

Among those who voted against Luján’s proposed amendment were fellow New Mexico Representative Steve Pearce, who, according to MapLight, a website that tracks the voting records and campaign contributions of U.S. Congressmen, received $9,600 from mining interests. Similarly, Representatives Jeff Flake and Ben Quayle of Arizona also voted down the amendment, and received, respectively, $5,000 and $2,500 each from the mining industry.

Rep. Luján sent the New Mexico Independent this statement:

“It was unfortunate that my amendment to protect Native American sacred and cultural sites was not adopted.  Adoption of this simple amendment would have shown respect for the religious and cultural sites that are important to the many tribes in the region, in addition to recognizing that we have a responsibility to work with our tribal brothers and sisters on issues that impact their communities.  Opponents of my amendment will say that tribal consultation is part of the exchange, but frankly what is outlined in the bill is not sufficient to ensure protection of sacred sites.”

In a 235-186 vote this week, the House passed the Southeast Arizona Land Exchange and Conservation Act of 2011, which approves the trade of 2,400 acres of federal land for 5,000 acres controlled by the mining company.

A Rio Tinto subsidiary, Resolution Copper Mining, is seeking the land swap in order to better access what it claims may be the largest copper ore body in the world near Superior, Arizona.

The mining company claims that the project will create jobs but the swap is opposed by numerous groups in Arizona.

In testimony to the U.S. Senate Senate Energy and Natural Resources Committee Subcommittee on Public Lands and Forests in June 2009, Sandy Bahr of the Sierra Club’s Grand Canyon (Arizona) Chapter argued that the land swap will diminish recreational opportunities and threaten rare and endangered plants and animals including the black-chinned sparrow, Costa’s hummingbird, Lewis’ woodpecker, and the endangered Arizona hedgehog cactus.

The land sought by the mining company includes the Tonto National Forest’s Oak Flat Campground, which was recognized as an important natural resource and placed off limits to mining activity by President Dwight Eisenhower in 1955.

Bahr also warned that the mine will deplete the area’s already scarce water supply.

According to Resolution Copper Company (RCC), this mine will need as much as 20,000 acre-feet of water per year. An acre-foot of water is roughly the amount of water a family of four uses in one year, so 20,000 acre-feet is enough water for 20,000 families or 80,000 people for one year. … What will the impact of this be? Considering how important as water is in Arizona, the continued long-term droughts we experience, and the predictions of scientists that we are going to get hotter and drier due to the impacts of climate change, it would be irresponsible to move this bill without a thorough analysis and some strong assurances that the water will be there and will not risk riparian areas or drinking water supplies.

The Arizona Mining Reform Coalition points out that the Oak Flat Campground is used by birders, campers, canyoneers, bikers and hikers and includes areas used by Native Americans for cultural and spiritual purposes.

“The land exchange would include Apache Leap,” the coalition writes, “a cliff where more than 80 Apache warriors chose to leap to their deaths rather than surrender to the US calvary.”

In 2009 the National Congress of American Indians passed a resolution that asked the U.S. federal government to recognize and protect the area’s cultural and spiritual value and to protect it from mining.

The Congress said that mining this area will “break the relationships between tribes and all the elements of the natural world in this region,… result in the diminishment of the power and effectiveness of tribal ceremonies, songs, prayers, and traditional life … and add to physical and mental illnesses, and social problems.”

This is not the first time the company has run afoul of both Native Americans or environmentalists. Another Rio Tinto subsidiary, Kennecott Eagle, is developing a nickel and copper mine in the Upper Peninsula on land that is considered sacred by local tribes.

They are also facing a lawsuit in Wisconsin over the leaching of toxic chemicals from a mine there and another suit by citizens of Papua New Guinea accusing them of engaging in genocide and human rights violations for another mine in that country.

The land swap bill is supported by business groups including the American Supply Association, the Associated General Contractors of America, the National Association of Manufacturers, the National Mining Association, Rio Tinto, the U.S. Chamber of Commerce, the National Federation of Independent Business, and Americans for Prosperity, according to Maplight, a nonpartisan organization that researches money in politics.

Maplight found that supporters of the bill spent 14 times as much as those opposing it.

The group found that metal mining and processing groups gave on average 22 times as much to House Republicans that voted “yes” as they gave to House Republicans that voted “no”.

Amendments to exempt Native American heritage sites from the land transfer, charge royalties on the minerals extracted from the transfered land and require that the company hire local workers were all rejected in the House.

A 2000 Government Accountability Office review of 2,600 transactions involving swaps of federal land between 1989 and 1999 found that government agencies “did not ensure that the land being exchanged was appropriately valued or that exchanges served the public interest”.

Earthjustice attorney Jim Angell told the Colorado Independent that last week’s decision by the Tenth Circuit Court of Appeals rejecting a 2008 Wyoming federal court decision and backing the Clinton rule undermines Colorado’s contention that it needs its own rule because of legal uncertainty.

“Really, for all intents and purposes this is the certainty we’re going to get in this region, and what’s really going on is the state [of Colorado] wants its rule and is using alleged legal uncertainty as an excuse for its continued support for it,” Angell said.

The proposed Colorado Roadless Rule, first floated in 2005 when the Bush administration set aside the Clinton rule and later allowed individual state rules for the management of roadless federal lands, contains too many road-building exemptions for logging, coal mining and oil and gas development, conservation groups contend. But Colorado has stayed the course because of various legal challenges to the 2001 Clinton rule.

“This ruling does not preclude further litigation, which could continue to create uncertainty,” Colorado Department of Natural Resources Executive Director Mike King said after last week’s appeals court decision. “As a result, we will continue working to finalize the Colorado rule so we can provide clear and appropriate direction on the management and protection of national forest roadless areas in Colorado.”

But Angell said very few legal options remain open.

“I suppose the other side can ask the entire court to take the case en banc or they can seek [U.S.} Supreme Court review, but given this opinion and the fact that it aligns perfectly with the Ninth Circuit review [in 2009], both of those are extreme long-shots,” Angell said. “But if that is really the certainty they wanted, then it would only be a short wait to resolve that process.”

There are 4.2 million acres of roadless federal lands in Colorado, and King says the Colorado rule is based in large part on the 2001 rule – with some key differences.

“Starting in 2005, Colorado has been engaged in an extensive public involvement process to develop consensus on a rule that makes sense for the various needs and uses of our forests while also finding ways to provide strong protection of these lands,” King said.

“That process has benefitted from updated backcountry inventories for true roadless characteristics, the identification of high-value fish and wildlife habitat, and developing narrowly-tailored accommodation of activities critical to local economies that also includes wildfire protection for mountain communities.”

The only other state to petition the federal government for a state-specific rulemaking process was Idaho. The Idaho rule has been finalized and put into place for management purposes but is being challenged on appeal in the Ninth Circuit Court.

The Northern Arizona Mining Continuity Act of 2011 (pdf) seeks to block the ban proposed by Interior Secretary Ken Salazar within a 1-million-acre buffer zone around the nation’s most iconic national park. Conservation groups say the move is needed to protect the Colorado River watershed and to prevent industrialization of an area heavily reliant on outdoor recreation and tourism.

“We are disappointed in this jobs-killing legislation,” said Roger Clark, air and energy program director at Grand Canyon Trust. “Uranium mining threatens thousands of tourism-related jobs in northern Arizona. Salazar has found the right balance between protecting Grand Canyon and the $700 million tourism industry while leaving promising mining areas further from the national park open to exploration and mining.”

McCain countered that Salazar’s move would be a job-killer.

“The Department’s proposed mining withdrawal would kill hundreds of potential jobs to ‘save’ the Grand Canyon from the same form of uranium mining that conservation groups once supported,” McCain said. “It also threatens to unravel the spirit of the Arizona Wilderness Act and will raise significant questions for future Wilderness bills if agreements to accommodate responsible land uses are neither genuine nor enduring.”

House sponsors of the bill include Arizona Republicans Jeff Flake and Trent Franks.

“It is unconscionable that Senator McCain and Representatives Flake and Franks are seeking to undermine protections for Grand Canyon and its watershed and showing so little regard for the people of Arizona, including all of those who expressed strong support for protecting these lands from uranium mining and the pollution it produces,” said Sandy Bahr, director of the Sierra Club’s Grand Canyon Chapter.

The Grand Canyon has been under growing pressure from surrounding mining and power-generating activities, including haze from coal-fired power plants.

Colorado is increasingly in the crosshairs of uranium mining and milling controversy, including a legacy of contamination from the state’s uranium heyday in the 1950s, 60s and 70s.

According to his press release, Ross’ conversation with Jackson centered mostly on the federally mandated numeric nutrient criteria and the future of radiation flyovers.

The nutrient criteria were mandated by the EPA after a lawsuit brought by several environmental groups, including the Sierra Club and the St. Johns Riverkeeper, due to Florida’s failure to meet requirements of the Clean Water Act. Ross said the implementation of the criteria was akin to “bowing to a lawsuit by a radical environmental group” and was “unacceptable.”

Ross also lashed out at the agency for conducting radiation monitoring at mining sites in Central Florida. “I made clear that decades of study, from industry to University, show that radiation levels at mining sites in central Florida contain less radiation than living in the suburbs of Denver, and that any radiation monitoring must be done with agreed upon benchmarks based on accepted scientific standards,” Ross said.

“EPAs commitment to conduct no future radiation flyovers was a giant step in the right direction,” Ross said about commitments made by Jackson at the meeting. ”The commitment to transparency with all parties when it comes to the data collected will also benefit all the parties involved. In addition, EPAs commitment to work with industry, from Agriculture to Phosphate, as well as with the Florida DEP, is something I believe will alleviate many of EPAs concerns.”

Lillis writes in The Hill:

“We believe there are still units missing,” Joe Main, the head of the Mine Safety and Health Administration (MSHA), told reporters during a phone call. “No conclusions have been reached at this time.”

The statement flies directly in the face of claims made earlier in the week by Massey Energy, the Virginia-based coal giant that owns the UBB. The company said Monday that a “thorough examination of the methane monitors from the UBB mine longwall face area conclusively confirms that the equipment was not tampered with or disabled.”

Rescue crews were in the mine on Thursday morning, said Ricki Gardenhire, a spokeswoman for the Kentucky Office of Mine Safety and Licensing. Mine operators told a news conference that they are holding out hope of finding the miners alive.

Gardenhire said a section of roof gave way some 24,000 feet underground in the Webster County Coal Dotiki (doh-TEE’-kee) Mine about 10 p.m. Wednesday.

The mine owner, Oklahoma-based Alliance Resource Partners, says the Dotiki project harvests about 1,300 tons of raw coal each hour.

Kentucky, the AP notes, led the country in mining deaths in 2009. But don’t go asking the state’s congressional delegation to do anything about it. Indeed, in the wake of the Upper Big Branch disaster that killed 29 miners in West Virginia earlier this month, there were only prayers coming from Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.). And other coal-country lawmakers, representing both parties, didn’t even go that far.

Will be interesting to see if this blast, a bit closer to Frankfort, stirs a stronger reaction.

But there’s only so much one can cover from Washington. So Mike’s on his way down to West Virginia, where he’ll be speaking with miners and mine regulators, environmental activists, government officials and the locals who have felt the effects of mining on their communities. He’ll be there for the next three days, filing frequent reports; be sure to follow his coverage here.

West Virginia is in mourning today. Twenty-five of its hard-working, courageous miners have been lost and we are bound together with their families, friends, neighbors, and coworkers in grief, while we continue to hope and pray for survivors. I want to know why this tragedy happened; there will be a thorough investigation. We will seek answers about the cause of this disaster. We will look for inadequacies in the law and enforcement practices, and I will work to fix any we find. We will scrutinize the health and safety violations at this mine to see whether the law was circumvented and miners precious lives were willfully put at risk, and there will be accountability.

Sen. Jay Rockefeller (D-W.Va.) also issued a statement of support for the victims and their families, and for the rescue workers.

“The administration pledged earlier this year to improve review of mining projects that risked harming water quality. Release of this preliminary list is the first step in a process to assure that the environmental concerns raised by the 79 permit applications are addressed and that permits issued are protective of water quality and affected ecosystems,” said EPA Administrator Lisa P. Jackson. “We look forward to working closely with the Army Corps of Engineers, with the involvement of the mining companies, to achieve a resolution of EPA’s concerns that avoids harmful environmental impacts and meets our energy and economic needs.”

The EPA is also planning to review a longer list of proposed projects over the next 15 days. There will be a 60-day review process for each permit.

Activists organizing against surface mining projects like mountain-top removal, a method that blasts mountains to extract coal reserves, were pleased by the development. “By recommending these permits not be approved, the EPA and the Army Corps has demonstrated their intention to fulfill a promise to provide science-based oversight which will limit the devastating environmental impacts of mountaintop removal mining,” said Willa Mays, executive director for Appalachian Voices, in a statement.

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