All of John Stoos fussing about the gold mine on this blog prompted me to go look at the Emgold website. And sure enough, Tom McClintock and Dan Logue get a mention for supporting it.
“The I-M Project will clean up a legacy mine site that has set idle for over 50 years. The Project is supported by Dan Logue, State Assemblyman, and Tom McClintock (United States Congressman) because of the benefits it will bring to Grass Valley, Nevada County, and the state of California,” the website reads.
This is something voters would no doubt want to consider when they go to the polls. The next two years are shaping up to be a “battle royale” around here.
Jeff Pelline's Sierra Foothills Report 
Well, somebody could go to THEUNION.com and get the word out about Logue and McClintock’s support of the mine so folks get, at least those with internet that goes to The Union, but they likely LUV anything. I bet the subscribers that still get the paper are pretty right headed; but putting it there and back to your site is “GOLDEN.”
A cleaner mine through mining?! When did Dow Chemical take over the PR campaign?
Lovely, when your congressman and assemblyman not only don’t work for your interests, but actively work against them.
The mine threatens more pollution and threatens water supplies. The promise of jobs is tenuous. They not only don’t get it, but are ignorant of the real human costs to this community. The costs are not worth a few temporary jobs that realistically would not be filled by this community, but rather would go to experienced miners and support personel who follow this kind of work.
I think it’s important that people know Logue’s and McClintock’s position on the mine. I wasn’t aware it was being promoted on the Emgold site like this.
You know I think it is totally inappropriate for either of them to take a position before the EIR is done and the community has had an opportunity to review the project and make decisions. What part of local control don’t these guys get? What part of making decisions based on information don;t these guys get?
The appropriate thing to do would be for Congressman McClintock or Assemblyman Logue to say. “In principle I am not opposed to mining as a land use or economic activity. Mining activities on private lands are regulated by local authorities and decided through the CEQA process. I will reserve judgement until that process is nearly complete and all of the pertinent data is on the table for review.”
Ahh, these Two! No money for our community, promoting prop. 23 to make us sick with bad air, and now they want us to poison us with mining. Nice!
I agree with the criticisms of McClintock and Logue here.
Quite apart from those criticisms, though, opponents of the mine can take heart from several facts: (1) The DEIR will need to be revised and recirculated (the city has already said that it is requiring that) (2) No DEIR is ever likely to satisfy the CEQA review (3) Emgold appears to be barely hanging on financially (that’s probably why they seem to be trying to spin their way around the DEIR requirement) (4) Since Emgold has never mined an ounce of gold in 20 years of operation (but only mined for investors), and is unable to attract a purchase offer from a major mining company (even while other juniors are being snatched up, even in these tough times), it will probably continue to twist here in the wind until it can’t even do that any longer, or until the city puts an end to it, which it should now do ASAP.
The city now needs to require a revised economic viability report, and set a time limit for Emgold to complete the revised DEIR or get off the pot.
Emgold already represents an opportunity cost (for stimulus funds for that site), just by protracting the process to an absurd degree.
This would all be quite tragic if the IMM Project really represented a chance for jobs, but that promise has been shown to be a chimera, as Gail pointed out above.
The only tragedy now would be to continue to let Emgold waste our time and resources.
Don,
•I’m glad you brought up the financial woes of the mine and corporate citizenship.
Perhaps you have time to check this out:
Click to access AB_DELQ_WEB.pdf
This is a list of “Owners of Real Property with Prior Year Delinquent Taxes” of 10/1, according to a public document on the county website.
I notice that IMM is on the list. It would interesting to check out those records as a “citizen journalist” and see what that’s about.
•I also agree that it’s very premature for Logue or McClintock to be supporting the mine (Emgold is promoting it). I raised this same issue when the editor/publisher of The Union supported the mine in editorials. I mean the EIR isn’t approved yet. In fact, the draft was highly criticized, as reported here and elsewhere. I haven’t heard of any local officials publicly voicing their support like this.
I wonder what the county Treasurer would say about the possible tax issue. Ex-Treasurer Chris Dabis was a real stickler about “electeds” and corporate citizens paying their taxes on time. I distinctly remember some issues we covered at the paper on just that issue. Why isn’t it being covered now?
-Jeff
Everybody relax…Over on KNCO’s website, Tom says the economy is not that bad in comparison to the last years of the Carter Administration.
Well, I was here during those years myself. I’d say one big difference between then and now is that back then, all the jobs came back. (You can attribute it to the Reagan tax cuts or the normal cycle of business, maybe both.) Today, we’re looking at entire professions being wiped out, never to return. There really is no comparison.
“Today, we’re looking at entire professions being wiped out, never to return. There really is no comparison.”
Yet the Prop 23 people are saying there’s no need to innovate.
“Over on KNCO’s website, Tom says the economy is not that bad in comparison to the last years of the Carter Administration.”
Unless, of course, you are a person who was employed in the last years of the Carter Administration and unemployed now!
Aside from those individual cases, it is generally true that the economy is “better” for the wealthy top 10% now than it was in the 1970s, and “worse” for the non-wealthy bottom 90% than it was in the 1970s.
This is due to rising inequality in the last 30 years.
A Congressman supporting JOBS in one of his local communities: That is really BAD!
John
John, the Congressman is supporting IMM-Emgold’s sham promise of jobs. The Congressman would be wise to get all the facts before supporting this.