Eco-Chaplain Sarah Vekasi: First Hand Report on Mountain Mobilization

Photo  from Facebook of Sarah Vekasi taken at the Mountain Justice 2012 Summer Activist Training Camp May 19-26 at the Appalachian South Folklife Center in Pipestem, WV. This guest post by Vekasi, first published on August 1, 2012 at 8:00 p.m. is adapted with her permission from the letter she wrote following her attendance at the Mountain Mobilization.

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Editor's Note

Sarah Vekasi (email, website) has a Masters of Divinity degree from Naropa University in Boulder, CO and lives in Swannanoa, NC, where she throws pottery and operates the Eco-chaplaincy Initiative. 

Vekasi coined the term"eco-chaplaincy" in 2005 for inter-religious and secular spiritual chaplaincy designed for people engaged in environmental and social justice work.  In a letter to her followers on August 1 before the RAMPS (Radical Action for Mountain People's Survival) Campaign announced that Dustin Steele had been released from jail, Vekasi explained that she returned home the previous night from attending the Mountain Mobilization. Before writing, she

had to sleep for about 30 hours first, which helps me know that the organizers need rest too. It is hard to rest though, because we know that at least one of our activists, [Dustin Steele] was hurt pretty bad by the law, and that is ...[he] is spending ...[his] 21st birthday today in jail...I know Dustin well, and love this person so much that it hurts to think about [it.]

She wrote that as the evening of July 31, 2012,

...[W]e were still not able to visit ...[him] or anyone else in the jail. There are twenty people incarcerated, all in the same jail, held on charges of misdemeanor trespass and obstruction, we think, yet held with a $25,000 surety bond each, which means we need $500,000 cash or WV property to get them out. They have not had a formal hearing yet, and we are affectionately calling them the Hobet 20. This is outrageous and we are working on reducing the bail, while also collecting money. There are names and addresses online if you are willing to write or need to know if your child or friend is one of the Hobet 20.

Vekasi describes the Mountain Mobilization

As of last night  I have just returned home from providing support at the Mountain Mobilization organized by the RAMPS Campaign at the request and guidance of locals in West Virginia.... It is a story our whole country needs to know about, and one that deserves our attention immediately since there are a lot of people currently in jail who need support, organizers who need sleep, activists in need of trauma relief, communities in need of reconciliation and safety, and a powerful story about continual resistance and courageous people to be lifted up.

This past Saturday, over a hundred activists were able to walk on to an active mine site at the Hobet Mine, the largest mountaintop removal site in West Virginia, and shut down mining at its source, while simultaneously holding a rally and trainings at a nearby park. Some activists physically locked down to the mining equipment until arrested and brought to jail, while everyone brought forward a message that it is time to end mountaintop removal coal mining and work for a just and sustainable Appalachia now. The demonstration was the first in a “Summer of Solidarity Against Extraction,” so along with RAMPS, Mountain Justice and Appalachian activists, we had people fighting to protect their homes from Fracking, from the Keystone XL Pipeline, from the Coal Export trains in the northwest, and from Occupy Wall Street and Occupy D.C. The reality of blowing up mountaintops to get to the coal underneath, filling in valleys with the overburden, hence polluting the water supply of all nearby communities and permanently destroying the mountains is so outrageous, so horrifying, that this invitation went out to the world to come to West Virginia at the invitation of local communities to directly witness the atrocity of surface mining, and shut down a mine site with our bodies.

The Mountain Mobilization was advertised as “the largest direct action yet” in the movement to end mountaintop removal by doing a “mass walk-on to an active surface mine” and by all accounts – it was. As our movement’s eco-chaplain, I live to tell the tale, and the story continues as we all pass it on. The primary version of the story for public consumption is that there is still an ongoing atrocity called mountaintop removal coal mining, and even as mining companies are going bankrupt there needs to be serious commitment by the companies and the states involved to restore the land and re-employ the people.

The inner story

The inner story is that we are using direct action techniques of public walk-ons and lock-downs to draw attention to the issue and that we were met with organized mobs of people using violence, intimidation, harassment, and hate speech to try to stop us, in collusion or at least without attempts to stop it by the state and local police.

As of Saturday night, all of our activists are accounted for, but the need for ongoing support is acute, particularly in terms of getting our friends out of jail, supporting one another through trauma recovery, and the ongoing efforts of ending mountaintop removal coal mining for a just and sustainable Appalachia. I personally would appreciate your support as I just went to the edge of my ability to hold the safety of our group with an awareness of the whole, and am now home recovering before offering support for our activists and their families in this intense time....


The idea of doing a massive direct action was, and is, to show the coal industry that we will not back down in light of harassment and attempts to silence local leaders, rather, we will invite more and more people from around the country to come and witness the situation first hand, and by doing direct action, continually grab the attention of the public to force the lawmakers who have been sitting on the fence not passing any of the legislation our movement has put forward, and shine a light into the shadowed halls of the decision makers throughout Appalachia who rubber-stamp permits for more valley fills and surface mines.

The back story

Here is the back-story: We gathered for three very full days of extensive trainings in nonviolence and non-violent direct action tactics, de-escalation trainings and mine safety, while having daily talks by local organizers about what life is like day to day in the mountain communities impacted by the coal industry. The trainings are significant because we will not allow anyone to join in these actions without committing to a full code of nonviolence and learning de-escalation techniques to follow through with them. This means carrying ourselves with the dignity one can possess with walking as a mountain, for mountains, with the knowing that the whole nation is impacted by mountaintop removal coal mining, and everyone, especially including the folks who are employed by the coal industry, have a stake in our collective survival, and that survival is put in immediate threat when we blow up mountains and fill in valleys.

We all commit to bringing no weapons of any kind, and not even engaging in debates or escalating dialogue during actions, since that doesn’t lead towards actual dialogue. Instead, we go into actions with our awareness wide open to the fact that we are marching and demonstrating for the good of the whole and out boundaries up to protect ourselves the best we can from violence. I lead people through trainings specifically oriented towards holding compassion particularly towards the folks whose jobs put the health of their whole hollows in jeopardy, since that is where a lot of the tension generally arises, and this time did in a large degree.


Our messaging to encompass the whole community

Even the messaging on the banners is written to encompass the whole rather than feed a “environmentalist” vs. “miner” divide the coal industry front groups like the Friends of Coal and the media like to perpetuate. Want to know what some of our banners said?

“Coal Leaves, Cancer Stays.”

“Re-employ our Miners, Restore our Mountains.”

“Stop Mountaintop Removal for all Appalachians”

“Repair, Reinvest, Retrain, Re-Employ”



This is all preface to say that on Saturday, nearly on hundred courageous people followed the call and did pull off the largest direct action protest in the movement to end mountaintop removal coal mining to date by simultaneously holding trainings and a rally in a state park while fifty people walked on to the Hobet mine in Lincoln County, WV, the largest mountaintop removal mine in West Virginia.

The counter-protest  with its threats and acts of violence

Both in the park and on the mine site, we were met with hoards of counter-protesters, most likely organized through the Friends of Coal, certainly organized somehow, whose intention seemed singularly to make us go home or never speak out again against mountaintop removal through threats and acts of violence – both physical and verbal. Did they succeed? I really hope not. It began in the morning leaving our campsite with an organized attempt to block us by felling trees over the road, and continued throughout the past few days. On Saturday, the day of action, the counter-protest was intense, to say the least.

I witnessed an incredibly well organized group of people I would call a mob, mainly dressed in mining stripes, some sadly dressed up with coal on their faces, lining up and doing everything in their power to seem menacing, cruel and mean by singling people out from the group and picking apart their identity – be it that they were an active marine, or a trans-gendered person, a recognizable local resident, a person of color, a hippy, a punk, a woman, a child, etc. The words that were hurled by these counter-protestors were so racist, so homophobic, so mean in general, that it was easy to recognize the fear underlying all of it. The fear in the mob was so thick that any hateful thought was hurled out toward our activists. Most of it was non-sequitor, just any old comment meant to be threatening, which helped show the hopelessness these folks feel about the situation – the mines going bankrupt, the water polluted, jobs scarce, etc., but hate speech all the same.

Our intention to take this stand for the sake of everyone is so strong, that the organized strategy of harassment, intimidation, violence and fear did not and does not work to take down our commitment to ending mountaintop removal, and through using nonviolent direct action to keep the conversation going.

The toll violence takes

That said, the hate hurled toward us these past few days, and for months and years for our local residents does take a real toll. Above all else, it make us feel sad. And traumatized too, because the things that were said, and way in which the mob behaved, was scary, and something we would all like to think ended a few generations ago. The intensity of the racism and homophobia was so thick it rings in our ears. Meanwhile, we all have a need for safety, and our very survival was at risk, so of course that leaves trauma. It was sad, and embarrassing, because I know from experience that this mob does not represent West Virginian’s very well.

I know that sometimes with direct action strategies, it is easy to say, “well – y'all shouldn’t have put your lives on the line like that.”

Direct action pushes forward the conversation, just as in the Civil Rights movement

I guess. But then again, we know that mountaintop removal coal mining is literally killing this region through economic poverty and toxic waste which creates cancer, etc., and are simultaneously doing every other strategy for change without satisfactory result. As an eco-chaplain supporting this movement, I work with people in all spectrums of strategies, and will advocate for the inclusion of direct action and support of the folks going through it with all my heart. We have multiple national bills in the house and senate, extensive state and regional organizing, and way too many scientific studies proving how deadly this form of mining is to the land and people. So there is a real reason why we use direct action as one of the strategies to push the conversation forward and not let it get forgotten in bureaucracy and corruption.

If you are noticing yourself wondering why RAMPS and Mountain Justice would use direct action knowing the situation is volatile, I encourage you to take a moment to think back on what we remember now from the Civil Rights movement, and how far our nation has come, and how far we have to go. When we remember now about all the violence from police dogs and water hoses, guns, and mobs of scared white people perpetuating white supremacy hurling toward the activists fighting for civil rights, we honor those activists for their courage rather than explain why the mob had a right to assault the nonviolent Freedom Riders, etc. Please find space to do the same here, or at the very least, hold back judgment while we work to get all our friends out of jail and participants back into balance.

A call for solidarity and cohesion

This is one of those times that we need solidarity and cohesion. This whole summer has been such a big deal – climate chaos is no longer theoretical but right here, and all of us are feeling the tension from that, and right now is the time to really love up all of the courageous people who are in trauma from putting their lives on the line for the sake of Appalachia at the moment.

There were times throughout the past four days when I have witnessed the state police and local police step forward to protect us from hostility, and for those times, I commend them, but there were too many other times when they looked the other way, and overtly worked with the mob to put our lives at risk.

Witnessed police contribution to putting activists lives at risk 

Here is a small example... On Sunday morning, while we were waiting to hear from our friends in jail with the thought we could get them out soon, the neighbors of the Tawney Farm, where we were camping, drove up to the driveway to continue the harassment that had been going on all night. The previous evening there were gunshots and more trees down in the road, we found nail-spikes tire strips in the road meant to destroy our vehicles, and all the while the police had not arrived. James Tawney, the farmer and owner of the campground was nearly ran over by one of the trucks, so we made the decision to call 911 again. This is how the phone call went:

911 Dispatch: “What is the emergency?”

James Tawney: “I was just nearly ran over by a truck and there are more threats of violence over here at my campground.”

911 Dispatch: “Are those tree-huggers bothering you?”

James Tawney: “Excuse me?”

911 Dispatch: “Are those tree-huggers bothering you?”

James Tawney: “That is rude beyond belief, they are great people, and the folks you mean as tree-huggers are camping out on my campground legally, and the law isn’t protecting them. I was just nearly ran over by a truck, last night they were shooting at us, now I need protection over here now.”

And so on, and so on…. Eventually the local sheriff and state patrol arrived, but hours later when we had an armed mob sneaking through the field on our whole group that evening, they were nowhere to be seen. We did not panic and used all our skills to stay peaceful and alert and keeping one another safe. Now that I am home and in a safe place, I am able to think about all of this. You know what comes to mind – that it is horrifying what can happen when we de-humanize one another. The use of “tree-hugger” in this instance was jargon like many known to take away our humanity, our fullness. The fact that even 911 dispatch could use the term nonchalantly and assume we ‘tree-huggers’ were harassing our neighbors after hours of getting calls to the contrary shows how thick the fear and mis-information is.

How readers can help

If you or anyone you know have political ties that can be pulled to help reduce the bail and get these folks out of jail, we would appreciate it. Furthermore, if you are willing to donate to the legal fund, you can do so online at http://rampscampaign.org/ and if you are available to write letters to the folks in jail there is information on that site as well. There is also a big need for media and political pressure, so if you can write a letter to the editor of your local paper, and connect us with friendly reporters, and write letters to politicians asking for an end of mountaintop removal and differential treatment for activists than the mob, that will help too.

Rachel Anne Parsons: A Native West Virginian's Diary on the Mountain Mobilization

Photo of Rachel Parsons from Facebook. I first published this post on August 1, 2012 at 4:48 p.m. and last updated it that date at 5:34 p.m.

I interviewed Rachel Anne Parsons about the Mountain Mobilization here.  I've  republished with permission with slight reformatting her diary of her thoughts on the Mountain Mobilization from her blog post, "West Virginia: The Third World: If they hurt you, should you back down?"

Parsons, 22, graduated in May 2012  from East Tennessee State University with a B.A. in English and a minor in Japanese. She explains that her passion is writing "both fiction and nonfiction about her home" in Mercer County, West Virginia. Her goal is to "raise awareness about Appalachia and the issues faced by the region, and also to write about the unique culture" she grew up in.  She has been published in Now and Then: The Appalachian Magazine and has a novel she wrote in November 2011 during National Novel Writing Month (NaNoWriMo)

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“The earth is not dying, it is being killed. And the people who are killing it have names and addresses.” – Utah Phillips

July 28, 2012

It’s Saturday, July 28, and there’s something big happening. I’ve known about it for months. People are going to get arrested today, lots of people, to make a statement. Everything has been planned meticulously, most people in the movement – the movement to end mountaintop removal and strip mining in Appalachia – don’t even know where it’s all going to go down, but we know it’s going to happen. A lot of people sign up to go. The action is called “Mountain Mobilization,” and it is organized by RAMPS, or Radical Action for Mountain Peoples’ Survival, one of many groups protesting coal in the mountains of Appalachia.

Some people, myself included, don’t go. For me, it’s because I don’t want to get arrested right now, although I believe strongly in the importance of it. There are many personal things I’m dealing with that make me stay home. My mother and I go to an antique auction to take our minds off the action, worried about our friends who are going with the intent of getting arrested. We are miserable and cranky the whole time. When we get home, we make a beeline for our computers, hoping for good news.

Instead we get bad news. 20 people were arrested on Hobet Mine in southern West Virginia. That’s not the bad part. We had planned on getting lots of people arrested to make a statement and draw attention to West Virginia’s plight, all the poisoned water and polluted air and mountains reduced to rubble. The bad news is that the other 30 people who were on the mine were sent on a 15 mile walk by police officers who refused to let the shuttle cars meant to pick them up drive down the small road to the mine. However, the police did let pro-coal supporters down the road and the anti-coal protesters were forced to walk almost four hours through a gauntlet of hate until they reached the rest of their party and were picked up. The cars carrying our protesters were then harassed on the way home, with coal supporters in big trucks trying to run them off the road.

July 29, 2012

It’s Sunday, July 29, and we get news that at least one of the arrested protesters, Dustin Steele, has been severely beaten while in police custody and has been denied medical treatment. A cry of outrage goes out across the web. Dustin will be 21 on August 1, a year younger than myself. I know this guy. Someone I know has been beaten by the police and refused treatment. Any lingering delusions I might have had of living in the land of the free? Well, those are gone, if they were ever there. Home of the brave, on the other hand, well, maybe we can still claim that title. The next few days will show.

The bond for each of the 20 arrested protesters is set at $25,000 in West Virginia property. That adds up to $500,000 dollars with of property in exchange for the release of 20 people who were arrested on misdemeanor trespassing charges. Naturally, we all think this is outrageous.

A pro-coal group online has found several of our Facebook pages, including Ramps Campaign. The page where we have all been watching for news of our comrades is bombarded with comments from the other side. Our opposition tells us “dirty, tree-hugging hippies” to “go back where we came from.” A large number of protesters, including myself and Dustin Steele, the arrested protester who was beaten, are West Virginia natives. We say so. We regret engaging any of our assailants in conversation as we are swept away in a sea of hate. Someone says the arrested protesters should be hung from trees. Someone else tells the arrested protesters “not to drop the soap.” They think these comments are funny. Well, they’re not.

July 30, 2012

Monday, July 30, I drive to my grandparents’ house to spend a couple of days with them. My plan is to relax and distract myself by helping on their farm. Instead, the three of us compulsively check Facebook for news. We’re worried and outraged for Dustin. We have no idea how the movement could possibly post bond for Dustin and the others, and Dustin still has not seen a doctor. Fingers crossed, we share articles on Facebook, trying to spread the word if we can do nothing else. Donations for the legal defense fund for the arrested protesters are still asked for, in hopes that cash will eventually be accepted by police.

That night, I am stressed and have trouble going to sleep. My anxiety issues hit me full force. On Tuesday, July 31, I wake up tired. The news is dreary at best and so is the weather. It rains and all I can think about is Dustin and how I don’t even really know how hurt he is. It’s not like I’ve ever been close to Dustin, but I know this kid. He could have been me if I’d been a little bit braver. And he had a right to protest and to stand up for what he believes in. I’m so angry that the police, who are supposed to keep citizens safe, would do this to 21 year-old kid who had no way of defending himself.

Ramps Campaign reports that the other arrested protesters witnessed the brutality against Dustin. More bad news, the Environmental Protection Agency loses a court case about water pollution restrictions in regards to coal mining. It’s not looking like a good day for the movement.

All the hate people are spewing everywhere is too much. It hurts to hear Governor Tomblin on the news say that the decision against the EPA is a “victory for West Virginia.” It’s not a victory. Coal is going to kill this state and I’m miserable and think that maybe I made a mistake by coming back here instead of staying in Tennessee after I graduated. More and more bad news. I have a negative confrontation with a supposed “friend” and it just blows everything sky high for me. I call my mom in tears and tell her I’m moving to Canada. She tells me I’m going to stay here and fight.

I call my Dad and explain everything that has happened over the last few days. I cry some more. He says, “Write about this. You are a great writer. Don’t be upset because the opposition has finally recognized that you are a force to be contended with. You should feel empowered by it. Congratulations.”

August 1, 2012

Wednesday, August 1, I wake up feeling better. It’s Dustin’s birthday, and it’s the birthday of Mother Jones, a historic figure in our movement. It’s also the anniversary of the death of Sid Hatfield. Such a day can’t be anything but powerful. News from Ramps says that they’ve finally convinced authorities to allow them to pay bond with cash, and I have high hopes that Dustin will soon be released.

There are two petitions circulating, one demanding justice for Dustin and the other demanding that the bail be reduced for the “Hobet 20″ as the arrested protesters are called. I sign them both and watch with high hopes as more and more signatures are added.

Word from Ramps that Dustin’s bail has been paid and he is finally safe with friends. The fight’s not over. There are still 19 more of the Hobet 20 to get released. Dustin’s abuse cannot be allowed to go unpunished. But I am feeling more empowered now. So I write about it, because writing is what I do and I will never be afraid to write about what’s important, no matter who threatens to hang me from a tree or put me through a wood chipper.

I am home and I am here to stay.

Dustin Steele: Arrested at Mountain Mobilization being Held on $25K Bail

Above is a video of Dustin Steele, being filmed during the training leading up to the Mountain Mobilization July 28,  To his left is Junior Walk, another native West Virginian who took part in the protest. According to the RAMPS media team he wanted his arrest made public.

 
Catherine V. Moore (email), reporter for the Register-Herald in Beckley, WV filed a report July 29, 2012, "Activists walk onto Lincoln County mine."

Here's how she described what happened in the Kanawha State Forest July 28:

 A midday gathering in Kanawha State Forest, before the action, was swarmed with State Police and protesting miners. At the back entrance of the state park near Marmet, about 75 miners parked their cars and walked miles into the bottom where they hoped to encounter the activists.

Many more units were on site at the activists’ camp in the state forest, where miners gathered to counter-protest. At least once, a lengthy, civil dialogue over the region’s economic future unfolded between the two sides.

Meanwhile, a caravan of about 15 vehicles had been deployed to the Lincoln County mine.

There was no police presence when the convoy arrived at the remote location on Mud River Road, but a guard at the mine entrance quickly called security.

The group activists proceeded past the guard house and into the working mine. Some unfurled banners reading “Restore Our Mountains, Reemploy our Miners,” “Coal Leaves, Cancer Stays,” and “STOP.”

Two others chained themselves to a rock truck, and one climbed a tree on the mine site.

Ryan Halas of Greensboro, N.C., was one of the protesters at Hobet who says he is committed to direct action as a tactic to fight strip mining.

“I think it’s worth me risking my body, arrest, and freedom because I feel these communities have been abused from the time of the broad form deed until now and it’s the duty of conscious people to come highlight injustice nationally,” he said.

“In conversations with people who don’t think I’m doing the right thing, even those folks acknowledge the risks, health costs, and dangers to the community. But they accept those risks bravely.”

Within half an hour, State Police arrived on the site, informed participants that they were trespassing and asked them to leave. Some did, and others stayed.

By 1:40 p.m., 10 State Police cars were on scene, with more following behind.

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RAMPS called off plans to deploy any additional protesters at 3:30 p.m.

She also interviewed RAMPS activist Junior Walk, who told her he participates in the direct action because he tired of Big Coal's power in his community.

Seeing all these people willing to put their freedom on the line to help people like me try and free ourselves from that kind of oppression is very inspiring. How could you not get involved in something like that?...


The people here in this state need to figure out who the real enemy is and realize their workers are getting poisoned and killed, just like members of their communities.


When the coal industry decides to pull up roots and take off, what are they going to be left with? Broken bones, black lung, and probably not even a pension. I’ve never seen a tree hugger lay anybody off.

Mountain Mobilzation Coverage Continued

Despite an extensive number of photographs available both on Facebook and Flickr and another short film of both the rally yesterday and the occupation, coverage of RAMPS mountain mobilization July 28 of the Hobet mountaintop removal mine remains sparse, with the exception of an Associated Press story with no byline dateline Charleston, WV.  It appears that the San Francisco Chronicle ran the whole story,  Other media outlets truncated it severely.

As you may recall, RAMPS indicated the first arrest had been made at 9:02 a.m.  I wrote the State Police spokesman Sergeant Michael M. T. Baylous (email) with a copy to Colonel Jay Smithers (email)  yesterday at 11:15 a.m. asking if there was  someplace where I could look online for the

police report (including complaining witness, arresting officers,  time of arrest, arrestee age, charge, place of incarceration, release time if any, bond set, conditions )   If not, could you  supply it or tell me who could.  Also could I have a statement from the Superintendent on the arrests.

I got back the surprising reply at 11:59 a.m. from Baylous that

We have no comment to make as I'm not aware of the event you mentioned. Anyone in the regional jail may be found at www.wvrja.com

Unfortunately, that's not exactly accurate, as the records are only up for the day and require that you know which jail.  After the day is over you need the name of the arrestee.  That's why I wrote Baylous back this afternoon:

Have you still no comment to make.  Unfortunately the link you gave me does not provide the full information and also provides no way to search by date; hence the arrests for July 28 were unavailable when I checked on July 29.

I'll let you know if he answers.

Ash-Lee Woodard Henderson of TN on Fighting MTR

Photo of Ash-Lee Woodard Henderson by Jared Story

Ash-Lee Woodard Henderson has been part of Appalachia Rising--serving on the steering committee-- as well as Mountain Justice. She lives in Chatanooga, TN and works for United Campus Workers, a union which organizes for social and economic justice for all Tennessee higher education employees.  I interviewed her via gchat. I first published this post on July 22,2012 at 6:58 p.m.
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I first learned about the struggle to end mtr at the Highlander Education and Research Center. Two folks, Sarah Webb-Haltom and Matt Noerpel, were there with me and shared stories of working in directly impacted communities. I learned about the issues and the next year was involved in Mountain Justice (MJ) in Harriman, TN after the TVA (Tennessee Valley Authority) ash disaster.

The MJ camp was hosted by UMD (United Mountain Defense). We stayed at a Boy Scout camp not far from the communities impacted by the ash disaster. We participated in workshops that taught us about what mtr is, how it impacts communities, how it destroys the environment, and what we could do about it (legislatively, through direct action and through community organizing)

I participated in the TVA March in March and was one of several folks who were detained by the police for staging a die-in in front of the TVA headquarters [on March 14, 2009].

I went to MJSpringBreak with my alternative spring break program at East Tennessee State University [in Johnson City where her husband is from.] Our leadership was targeted after that trip by TVA for taking pictures of the ash disaster after the die-in.

We fought back, met with Amy Goodman of DemocracyNow and started working with other leaders of the anti-mtr movement , and I've been working on the issue ever since.

I am from Chattanooga. Grew up in Summit and Ooltewah, TN as well...I grew up in an organizing family. My activism and organizing to end mtr has mostly been in TN and WV, but through MJ and Appalachia Rising I've met folks and worked with directly impacted community members in all the Central Appalachian states.

My mother is a member of the original black panther party, and my dad was a radio show host that focused on the issues affecting the black community in Hamilton County. My mother's parents always instilled in me the importance of community and that is was my responsibility to give back to the folks that developed me and gave me the resources to become who I am today. I grew up going to mass meetings and demonstrations, etc. I grew up around activism. They organized around many issues including racial justice and against environmental racism.

I believe in collective liberation, solidarity and intersectionality. By collective liberation I mean that I can't be fully human, the best Ash-Lee I can be, until all of my sisters and brothers everywhere can be fully human. So if my friends and family who are negatively impacted by the coal industry that also, indirectly, impacts me. I believe in solidarity, not charity, that it is my responsibility to work with directly impacted communities to end the oppression directly impacting their lives so that they can be fully human, and in turn, so can I. With intersectionality, I believe that all forms of oppression link together and benefit from one another. Racism, classism, homophobia, and environmental injustice are all connected.

The Mountain Mobilization is informed by the work of folks from mountain communities in Central Appalachia, activists and organizers from all over the country, grassroots community organizations, Mountain Justice and Appalachia Rising and so many others. Those of us involved in the movement to end mtr recognize that to win we have to build our people power and fight back to compete with a billion dollar coal industry.

To do that, folks are mobilizing and being mobilized to southern West Virginia on July 25th. My loved ones in RAMPS will be preparing folks to participate in nonviolent direct action to cut off the destruction at its source--a strip mine.

Native West Virginian Rachel Parsons on MTR

Photo montage (l to r) of Rachel Parsons, her mother Wendy Johnston and her grandfather Sid Moye.

This is the beginning of a post first published on July 21, 2012 at 6:59 p.m. It was last updated on August 1, 2012 at 4:49 p.m. to add the remainder of the interview and a link to my post about  Rachel's own diary on the Mountain Mobilization.

Native West Virginian Rachel Parsons part of three generations fighting mtr

One of many West Virginia natives who supports the mobilization is writer Rachel Parsons (blog).

Parsons lives in Mercer County outside of Athens.  There is no mining right where she lives, but there is a permit in her county for McComas, within 5 miles of where her grandparents, Sid and Dana Moye live.  Her  mother, Wendy Johnston, discovered the advertisement for the permit in 2009, while working at the Princeton Library.  Johnston wrote Mountain Justice for help and she and Sid Moye went door-to-door to tell people in that area who had heard nothing about the permit. Parsons wrote me last night about the Mobilization to say that they are

going to try to help out if we can.

Parson's grandfather has an eloquent essay about his opposition to Mountaintop removal up at Earth Justice's Mountain Heroes Project, as does Junior Walk, whom I wrote about yesterday. Parsons  is one of the speakers tomorrow, along with her mother, at the Stop the Kaboom fundraiser for RAMPS in Hedgesville, WV. Her brothers Matthew and Billy Parsons--who play together as the Missing Parsons Report--will be performing.

How Parsons got involved in fighting MTR

I asked Parsons if she could remember what started her off on her current path as an activist.  She answered,

Absolutely. Mom took me to Mountain Justice Camp for an evening because it was being held at the Appalachian South Folklife Center, which is right up the road from out house. I heard Judy Bonds speak on the issue, which I knew nothing about before hand, and met Larry Gibson for the first time as well. It was a very powerful experience and I knew after that evening that I needed to be involved.

Judy was a really powerful figure to me. There's a lot of talk about activists being out of state hippies, but that wasn't Judy. She lived with the effects of strip mining every day, and that she died of cancer before she could see this fight all the way through felt like a tragedy to me.

Judy Bonds continues to inspire Parsons

I never got to know her very well but I always admired her. She was and is one of my heroes...

I think Judy believed that everyone who could and would fight had their own gifts to bring to the table. She wanted everyone to speak up, even when we're afraid. So even though Judy was a speaker and I'm a writer, I feel I'm doing what she would have wanted me to do by writing about the issues she felt so strongly about. I do speak on occasion, when I'm asked, because I want to help the movement in any way I can. It's just that primarily I want to spread the word through my writing.

Mountain Mobe: Ending another war

Poster art from second annual Stop the Kaboom Music and Art Festival  in Hedgesville, WV which starts today to bring awareness and raise funds to fight fracking and mountaintop removal. I first published this post on July 20, 2012 at 8:00 p.m.  I last updated it July 26 at 10:00 a.m.


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The Mobe then

2012 marks the 50th anniversary of the Port Huron Statement written primarily by Tom Hayden, then the Field Secretary of SDS, and later a California legislator and founding director of the Peace and Justice Resource Center. Back in 1967, the  National Mobilization Committee to End the War in Vietnam or The Mobe, was formed to evaluate the antiwar demonstrations and to chart a future course for the antiwar movement. 

And now

In Appalachia, another war is going on, a war by Big Coal on our mountains and our culture.   As  Junior Walk, 22, who lives in Whiteville, has said, 

Now is when we decide if we let the coal industry strip it all before deserting Appalachia or if we send them packing while we still have mountains.

Mountain Mobilization starts July 25

Starting July 25, folks will converge in southern West Virginia for a mobilization RAMPS (Radical Action for Mountain People's Survival) is hosting to prepare for the nonviolent direct action July 28 to shut down a strip mine.

While public outcries against the abuses of the fossil fuel industry rise and scientific evidence mounts, environmental protections are under attack by politicians backed by corporate cash. The Occupy movement highlighted what communities fighting Big Coal, Big Oil and Big Gas have long known -- when corporate interests dominate the political system, citizens must be the ones to restore democracy. In sharp contrast to Washington inaction, ordinary citizens around the country are turning to American traditions of direct intervention and civil disobedience.  Here's a video by Jordan Freeman.

Escalating protests on fossil fuels

From the historic March on Blair Mountain to the longest tree sit in the eastern US to recent sit-ins in Washington and coal barge and trucks blockades right here in WV, protests have escalated.  Last summer, hundreds were arrested in DC protesting the Keystone XL tar sands pipeline, andTexas activists are planning a blockade to directly halt construction of the pipeline July 27-9. Madeline Fitch locked herself to barrels to block the use of a fracking well in Ohio, June 26. “Don’t Frack Ohio” brought together thousands to protest hydrofracking in Ohio Jun 14-17, and “Stop the Frack Attack” will mobilize thousands in DC July 28.   In August, thousands will converge on the statehouse in Montana to protest the continued expansion of western strip mines for exporting coal to China and elsewhere in Asia.

Mathew Louis-Rosenberg of RAMPS talks about Mountain Mobilization

Today I was "talking" via gchat with Mathew Louis-Rosenberg over in Sandstone, West Virginia, about the upcoming mountain mobilization. Since Peter Slavin wrote about him in 2010, Louis-Rosenbergin has moved on from Climate Ground Zero to volunteering at RAMPS.  He is still working with the Sludge Safety Project through Coal River Mountain Watch (CRMW).   His mission remains the same: to lend his skills to the fight to end mountaintop removal coal mining. He explains,

The fight against strip mining in Appalachia is connected to so many critical issues for our time. This struggle is about public health, human rights, environmental justice, national energy policy and the future of the planet. It's about corporate control of government, wealth inequality and Appalachia's right to a viable future. From every angle, strip mining and other extreme extraction is wrong.

The Mountain Mobilization is drawing attendees from withing Central Appalachia

Although Louis-Rosenberg is a native of West Saugerties, New York, he's been in WV since 2008.  Appalachian natives and those who have chosen to live in our region have joined together to supporting the mobilization.  I've already mentioned Junior Walk. 

• There are folks coming from 13 towns and cities in WV (Blair, Charleston,  Danville, Fayetteville, Greenville, Huntington, Hurricane, Lookout, Marlington, Morgantown,  Rock Creek, Sandstone, Summerville) two in KY (Lexington and Berea), four in OH (Cleveland, Columbus, London, Springfield), five in TN (Kingsport, Knoxville, Lebanon, Memphis, Sevierville), two in VA (Blacksburg, Floyd), and four in NC (Asheville, New Bern, Raleigh, Weaversville).

The Mobilization is attracting antendees from a wide geographic area as well

• DC will be well represented, as will MD (College Park, Frederick, Oxford, Upper Marlboro) and Northern and Central Virginia (Fredericksburg, Charlottesville.)
• New York is sending a large contingent (Brooktondale, Fayettesville, Ithaca, New York City, Redwood, Scarsdale, Warwick, Woodside), as is PA (Benton, Bryn Athyn, Daisytown, Erie, Fairview, Harrisburg, Philadelphia, Pittsvburgh, Revere, Swathmore).  RAMPS and MJ members recently took part in a fracking protest. NJ will also be represented (Oldwick).
• New England participants are coming from MA (Alston, Andover, Belmont, Boston, Somersville, Waltham), VT (Brattleboro, Burlington, East Calais) and CT (New Haven).                             
• There are folks traveling from  AZ (Tempe), CA (Berkeley and San Francisco), CO (Boulder)  IN (Bloomington) ,MO(St. Louis), MS (Starkville), MT (Missoula), , NJ , NM (Santa Fe),,  OR (Bandon), TX (Austin), UT (Castle Valley, Salt Lake City) and WA (Port Townsend).          
• There is even a registrant from China.

   
Native West Virginian Junior Walk on MTR

 I've already mentioned Junior Walk at the top of this post.  He wrote about mtr and the coal industry for  Aurora Lights's Journey Up Coal River map project when he was twenty.  Reading Walk's account of how he left his job working for Massey and then a security job at a mtr site  made me recall two TMK security guards who quit their jobs after being assigned to harass protesters engaged in a tree-sit in the Coal River Valley:

I had no idea how to go about applying for college, or scholarships, grants, or any of that stuff seeing as how I was the first person in my family that was even remotely interested in going to school, so I didn’t get to go. I did what a lot of folks do around here when they get out of high school and find themselves jobless. I went to work for Massey Energy, I worked at the Elk Run preparation plant in Sylvester for almost 6 months. I knew I couldn’t do that for long, and I had to quit.

After a year or so of going from minimum wage job to minimum wage job a family friend offered me a job as a security guard at a mountaintop removal site. While working there I felt like a horrible person for being even the smallest part in the machine that was tearing down that mountain and poisoning the community at the bottom. So I contacted Coal River Mountain Watch and started volunteering with them, I would write articles for their newsletter anonymously while I was on the job as a security guard. I’d take my desktop computer, load it into the passenger seat of my car and run an extension cord to the power box. They then offered me a job as the office manager at Coal River Mountain Watch, so that’s where I am today.

Walk grew up right in the Coal River Valley and went to Marsh Fork Elementary School:

...[Y]es the same Marsh Fork that’s situated beside of a coal preparation plant and in the looming shadow of a 2.8 billion gallon coal sludge impoundment. I went to Marsh Fork High School the last year that it was open, they closed it down and it promptly burned to the ground like a lot of abandoned buildings in this area do.  I then had to ride a bus for an hour to and from school every day, but that’s all too common in poor communities where school consolidation is business as usual.

He explains why he works for Coal River Mountain Watch and opposes the coal industry:

I think the Coal River Valley is one of the most amazing places on this earth, and I’d never want to move away from here. Sadly though it’s also poverty stricken and highly exploited by outside extractive industries.  I think if the Coal River Valley were prosperous it wouldn’t look all that different, but it would certainly have a better feel to it, a better climate if you will. Folks would be self sufficient and not have to rely on outside corporations to use them just so they could feed their families. I’m working with Coal River Mountain Watch now to do my part in ending the tyranny of the coal industry by speaking out and trying to educate the general public about what’s going on here.  The coal industry is the main barrier to accomplishing what I would like to accomplish in making this community sustainable, and making sure folks around here educate themselves so they don’t get exploited again.

                                                   

FEMA WV Derecho Emergency Feeding Plan: @ Perimeter (Near PGA Tourney)

My illustration shows the  location of FEMA's possible perimeter emergency feeding  centers in relation to Oak Hill, WV in Fayette County.  This post was originally published on 7/3/12 at 12:41 p.m. and last updated at 4:40 p.m.  At 9:00 a.m. July 4 via a friend I received an update from John David, that the National Guard is helping, so read the latest on what is needed here on how you can help one group.  I need to check with other sources before I finish this post regarding FEMA.

Please continue to spread the word via emails, twitter, Facebook and  aggregators.  I've revised the sample tweets:

Pl RT #Appalachia #WV #Derecho #FEMA site near PGA resort on disaster perimeter? http://bit.ly/LNBfkC

Here's a  shortened link for the public facebook post to share: 
http://on.fb.me/N67yat

(https://www.facebook.com/photo.php?fbid=10151896743010637&l=4fa59989f2)

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Jim Justice II made a lot of his income from selling his coal mines in West Virginia and then turned around and bought (hey, maybe even rescued) The Greenbrier Resort in White Sulpher Springs in 2009. He managed to recruit Tiger Woods to play in the PGA tournament taking place there starting July 5.  Since many of Justice's mines were involved mtr mining and selenium pollution suits, Press Action came up with a campaign to urge Tiger Woods and others competing in the tourney to

take advantage of the opportunity and urge Justice to clean up his act....

Well, Tiger's at the Greenbrier but the immediate issue appears to be whether the resort will

share the spoils of the PGA and rescue local residents....

So wrote John David (email) from the non-profit Southern Appalachian Labor School, this morning at 6:30 am. in an email about effects of the Derecho in his vicinity.

Southern Appalachian Labor School

 In a call with FEMA yesterday with another individual from the school and the President of the Fayette County Commission, he

pleaded with the Red Cross and related folks for an emergency feeding station in Oak Hill. We were rebuffed because "the plan" is to set one up in Summersville and Lewisburg [9 miles from the Greenbrier]  ...on the perimeter of the hard-hit area. In regard to the latter, ... one can certainly question how feeding decisions are being made.

He explains how dire things are

Fayette is one of the 5 most distressed with over 90% of the residents without water, food, phone/communication, or money to buy anything even if out of the area. ATMs and banks cannot function.....people have no cash. It is a disaster area with power not scheduled now until Sunday.

He adds how his organization lacks the capacity to provide a solution by itself.

Our efforts...are a drop in the bucket for 45,000 people, many of whom are trapped up hollows. The only place with internet service is at [WVU] Tech. The SALS problem is made worse because we have 400 volunteers arriving on Sunday at our Oak Hill facility for the planned next week of home repairs.....with no food nor water.

The school is asking for direct help with donation of items delivered to Oak Hill, WV (SALS Historic Oak Hill School, 140 School Street, Oak Hill, WV 25901) because there is

chaos, disorganization, and fighting...

You sure wouldn't know that from reading the story in the Beckley paper. Until I contact sources in Oak Hill and interview other organizations I don't know what to say.  But David wasn't interviewed by the paper, which seems incomplete, if not odd, given that apparently thePresident of the Fayette County Commission included David in the call to FEMA.  I'll list some of those I'll try to contact at the bottom of this post.

Here's a list of what SALS could use.  If you've got questions, you can contact David at 304.640.1772 or his colleague Vickie at 304.640.3792.

• Shower Trailers 
•  Tankers of water
•  Food
•  Portable Kitchens
•  Radio
•  Phones with Service
• Fuel cans 
• Batteries 
• Lanterns

According to its webpage, the mission of  SALS is to:

provide education, research, and linkages for working class and disenfranchised peoples in order to promote understanding, empowerment, and change. The Southern Appalachian Labor School is committed to developing a real comprehension of the social, economic, and legal structures which affect the lives of the Appalachian People.

The SALS homepage hasn't been updated with the request for Fayette County and instead offers to loan a copy of Jacques Arcelin's 1983 documentary  Bitter Cane, if  folks want to raise funds for Haitian relief.

 It's a good cause, but so is relief for the folks of Fayette County.

And while FEMA may have improved from Bush's debacle, Davis's allegation of  "perimeter" emergency feeding stations have raised questions in my mind.  And while I'm sure that the Red Cross, the United Way and other moneyed charities will be soliciting help, just as in the case of Katrina, I'd urge my readers to support, instead, those on the ground in the hardest hit areas. SALS, founded in 1977, is on the ground in Fayette County.

Information Available from FEMA

According its webpage,

FEMA’s mission is to support our citizens and first responders to ensure that as a nation we work together to build, sustain, and improve our capability to prepare for, protect against, respond to, recover from, and mitigate all hazards.

So, I wondered, what information was available for the citizens of West Virginia. Since I was doing my research on July 4, a federal holiday, I decided to start with what I could find online, although, of course, not everyone has computer access, especially not due to the after-effects of the Drecho. I figured the most up-to-date information would be on twitter, so I first turned to @fema.

The most recent tweet was at 4:54 on July 3 and referred folks to a webpage to learn Other Organizations Aiding Fayette County Derecho Sufferers

Oak Hill United Methodist Church's Lewis Community Foundation Christian Community Center (the "Oak Hill National Guard Building until 2005), which is the shelter for the area (cooling stations are only available days, according to the Governor's listing updated July 2),

HANDS OFF APPALACHIA!: Occupy MTR Investor UBS

Illustration via William Isom, II

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The Historical Roots of May Day

May Day  originally commemorated Chicago's 1886 the Haymarket Massacre, when, during a general strike for the eight hour workday, an unknown person threw a dynamite bomb at police as they dispersed a public meeting, and police fired on workers, killing several demonstrators and resulting in the deaths of several police officers, largely from friendly fire.

 "Mayday," was also used as a distress signal for aviators because it approximates the French term "m'aider", meaning "come help me!"

 May Day 2012:  Occupy Movement Calls for a National Strike

This past winter, police aggression against even peaceful demonstrators, recalling Haymarket.  Occupy Oakland especially  brought this to light during  during the attack on Iraqi war veteran Scot Olsen.   Now Janet Weil, a San Francisco activist with Code Pink has written a manifesto. "Why I Strike"   in support of Occupy Wall Street's call for a general strike May 1.

Occupy Appalachia Joins Strike, Protests USB's Role in Destroying Our Mountains

Closer to home, Occupy Appalachia has called for May Day actions against Swiss-owned wealth management services company Swiss Banking giant UBS  which funds and provides investment support and advisory services for ALL companies engaged in mountaintop removal coal mining:  Arch Coal Inc, Alpha Natural Resources, Patriot Coal and James River Coal Company.

UBS  Fails to Live Up to Its Own Guidelines

  In UBS' 2011 Annual Report [p 62] it states:

"we decided to further strengthen our environmental and social risk management (including human rights) by identifying controversial activities where we will not do business, or only do business under stringent pre-established guidelines. Therefore we will not knowingly provide financial services to corporate clients, nor will we purchase goods or services from suppliers, where the use of proceeds, primary business activity, or acquisition target involves the following environmental and social risks: Extractive industries, heavy infrastructure, forestry and plantations operations that risk severe environmental damage."

"HANDS OFF APPALACHIA!" points out  that the company should bring its actions in line with its own annual report, and stop funding mountaintop removal coal mining.

Coal's Assault on Dissent

While Atlantic Magazine is asking if coal is doomed:  the companies have actually continued their assault on protest, "hoping to combine the results of several recent court cases to significantly narrow the ability of citizen groups to block new mountaintop-removal mining permits in federal court,"as Ken Ward, Jr. noted.

Lawyers for Alpha Natural Resources outlined their strategy last week during a hearing before U.S. District Judge Robert C. Chambers, who is considering citizen group challenges to at least two permits issued by the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers.

Targets for Occupy UBS:

Targets for Occupy UBS include East TM (Chattanooga, Cookeville, Johnson City, Kingsport, Knoxville, Oak Ridge); Southwest Virginia (10 South Jefferson Street, Suite 1050, Roanoke VA 24011; Western North Carolina (Ashville) and Kentucky (Lexington).
138 Charlotte Street, Asheville NC 28801

Invitation for Others to Suppport Hands Off Appalachia

If you cannot attend an action, Occupy Appalachia organizers are asking that you call or email the UBS branches and the headquarters and ask that they change their official policy on MTR:

Knoxville, TN
865-329-1239
Steven L. Meadows, Executive Director
steven.meadows@ubs.com


Johnson City and Kingsport, TN
423-928-7144 (Johnson City)
423-246 7111 (Kingsport)
David B. Arnold, Vice President - Investments, Johnson City & Kingsport Branches david.arnold@ubs.com


Oak Ridge, TN
865-522-5183
Bryan Mayo, Vice President - Investments, Oak Ridge Branch
bryan.mayo@ubs.com


Chattanooga, TN
423-267-1813
Jefferson B. Cronan CFP, Executive Director, Chattanooga Branch
jeff.cronan@ubs.com


Cookeville, TN
931-528-5426
John Stephen Boots, Account Vice President, Cookeville Branch
steve.boots@ubs.com


Roanoke, VA
540-344 5571
Paul Higgins, Branch Manager
paul.higgins@ubs.com
www.ubs.com/branch/roanokeah

Lexington, KY
859-269 6900
888-390-6900
859-335-8100 (fax)
Matthew Fresca, Branch Manager
matt.fresca@ubs.com
www.ubs.com/branch/lexingtonlc

Asheville, NC
828-258 9860
Jerome Hornowski, Branch Manager
erry.hornowski@ubs.com
http://financialservicesinc.ubs.com/branch/ashevillea8/

Right now haven't received the email contacts for the following. I'll add them, if I hear back from the organizers...

Washington, DC Branch
202-638-7090

Headquarters NYC
212-713-2000

Headquarters New Jersey
201-352-3000

Other Banks Are Complicit Both in Mining and Funding Coal-Fired Power Plants

The latest report on the reputational and financial risks of coal just released by RAN and Sierra Club omits USB, but ranks large banks as follows:

	Mountaintop Removal Grade	Coal Fired Power Plant Grade
Bank of America	C-	D
Citi	C-	D
GE Capital	D	D
Goldman Sachs	F	D (Cogentrix) / F (Other)
JP Morgan Chase	D+	D
Morgan Stanley	C-	D
PNC	C-	F
Wells Fargo	D	D

EPA Has Failed to Protect Public

 April 4, more than three years after the TVA ash spill,   EJ, filed  against the EPA on behalf of 11 environmental and public health groups  (Appalachian Voices, Chesapeake Climate Action  Network, Environmental Integrity Project)  "to undertake long overdue action to address the serious and widespread risks that unsafe disposal of coal combustion waste or "coal ash" poses to human health and the environment."

Some in Congress Would Like to Prevent the EPA from Protecting Public Health

Meanwhile, David McKinley’s (R-WV)  successfully attached a clause to the House transportation bill which would bar the EPA from setting enforceable safeguards for toxic coal ash.  It's another case of  favoring  power plants and other big polluters.  Supporters for the amendment included US Chamber of Commerce, the American Coal Council, the United Mine Workers, utility companies like Duke Energy, and the American Road & Transportation Builders Association. Transportation Secretary Ray  LaHood--a Republican member of the House before he was appointed by Obama in 2009-- called the bill, H.R. 4348, a "big Christmas tree..."Look what they've loaded it up with... Keystone, coal ash — none of it has anything to do with transportation."


Currently industry dumps toxic waste into unlined and unmonitored ponds and landfills that can poison our waters and our health.   EJ states that "At least 185 coal ash dump sites have contaminated water supplies, and the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency admits that 54 dumps, a major spill will likely cause loss of human life."  [504  was a typo according to EJ's Lisa Evans].

In fact in nearby Giles County, the ash the unlined ash dump is on the banks of the scenic New River upstream from public drinking  and the Concerned Citizens of Giles County are in the process of suing the developer Giles Partnership for Excellence.

May Day is the Time for the Public to Take a Stand

In this this of increasing partisan divide and economic disparity, maybe it's time to return to both of the latter meanings. As Nancy L. Mancias, co-founder of Code Pink wrote on April 26, "Many people have suffered and died over the past decade of economic injustice and wars. Let's remember the words of labor organizer Mary 'Mother' Jones, who lived in Chicago in 1886: "Pray for the dead, and work like hell for the living!'"

Die Zeit (Germany) Covers MTR protests!

Illustration by Arnd Wiegmann from "So macht man Kohle: Was die Großbank UBS dafür kann, dass in Nordamerika ganze Berge verschwinden." Ralph Pöhner. Die Zeit, April 26, 2012. Or, "That’s the way to make 'Kohle': UBS's role in making whole mountains disappear in North America" (the German word “Kohle” has two meanings: Money and also Coal)

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UPDATE: Translation posted by my friend artist, activist and farmer William Isom, II on April 30:

That’s the way to make 'Kohle': UBS's role in making whole mountains disappear in North America

It began with a mountain of letters and red hearts made out of paper: unknown people had placed them in front of the entrance of a UBS Branche in Knoxville, Tennessee.

“We love our mountains” was written on these letters, or “Your greed brought us here”. 3 Weeks later, on the 8thof March 2012 the next campaign took place in front of the UBS Building of Johnson City, Tennessee. It was a small campaign, a Reporter of Johnson City Press counted 40 People. Protesters knocked on the glas door holding signs saying “Better Invest in our Future” or “UBS finances Destruction” or “no coal”. An approaching Policeman send people away from private parking zones.

In Chattanooga and Oak Ridge, in Asheville or Lexington more campaigns against UBS are scheduled for the next days, rather small campaigns. It appears to be a regional conflict, it’s about protecting the environment, Mountains, Coal, something like that.

Looking at it from this side of the Atlantic Ocean, for instance from the UBS Headquarter at Zürcher Paradeplatz, only one fact seems to be gob smacking: There are UBS Branches in Places like Chattanooga, Johnson City, Asheville or Oak Ridge, who would have guessed? A universal bank , a global player. This corporate group a main financer of American mining, according to those letters and protest signs. And Swiss bankers seem to have become part of politics in Kentucky, West Virginia or Tennessee, somehow. In these mountains mining companies started to use brute mining methods. To get to the coal they simply blow off the mountain top, the cheapest method. Huge Komatsu-Trucks collect the boulder and cover the surrounding valleys with it. The rest of the mountain including the coal is ablated.

“UBS would never finance this kind of method in the Alps” says William Isom, Member of the NGO Mountain Justice in Kentucky. “Never, unthinkable something like that would be approved in Europe.

But the US are a big country, there are many remote places in these mountains, economically drained, with little job opportunities. But right here the major coal sources of the US are to be found. Since the eighties mining companies ablated 5500 square kilometers of hilly landscape in the Appalachian mountains, almost the size of Kanton Bern, and according to calculations by the US Government a 1000 kilometer of river disappeared. Groups trying to protect the environment came up with data stating that the explosive power used on one day equals the power of the Hiroshima bomb. Dozens of different species of animals and plants our threatened by extinction. The ground water around the mines shows too high levels of Arsenic, Lead, Barium and Manganese. The People in the neighborhood have to keep living in a place that quakes on the bottom, is covered by ash clouds and soon reminds of the landscape of the moon. Most people decide to leave their homes.

The business heavily relies on funds and here lies the weakness of mining companies:

They depend on banks that offer huge credit limits, like Citigroup, Morgan Stanley, the Bank of America and UBS. So young protesters in Tennessee, Kentucky or Wets Virginia rather gather in front of Banks than in front of the iron gates of mining companies. “ By putting pressure on the creditors we slow down the mining companies” says Ricki Draper, member of Mountain Justice in Knoxville. And as a matter of fact several banks have already pulled out. Credit Suisse announced in September 2010, to quit financing and counseling those companies which do business in mountain top mining. The spotlight is on UBS now, being one of the few remaining banks with branches overseas. “Foreign Banks have no ties with our community”, “But we have to watch whole communities being turned into solitude” says Ricki Draper in Tennessee. It sounds like the echo of manager wisdom: each business is local, despite globalization.

The corporate management in Zurich took note of these circumstances. For 2 years the notion “Mountain Top Removal” found its way into the annual report in which UBS keeps promising an improved process in regards to examining diligence and the grants. According to an official statement on the 9th November 2010 the Bank intends “to engage to more watchfulness, reviewing to what extend companies build their business on MTR-mining and if they tend to reduce this method of mining over time.” It sounded like a promise”. Just the day before, on the 8th November, UBS granted a 200 million dollar credit to Massey Coal in Virginia, the leading MTR-Company in the Appalachian mountains. In the 151 pages long credit contract the notion MTR appears not even once.

Soon after, in January 2011, UBS Investment Bankers from Stamford and New York flew to Virginia, to handle and advise the Merger between Massey and Alpha Natural Resources, giving birth to a Mining giant owning a quarter of the US MT-mines.

Seven weeks later, beginning of march, UBS together with Deutsche Bank helped the mining corporation James River Coal with an acquisition granting a 375 million dollars credit. The passed year James River increased the production of MT coal to 986 000 tons, 350 000 tons more than 2010, 50 per cent plus. These numbers were researched by Rainforest Action Network; James River doesn’t want to comment on it. The UBS statement seems rather misleading. The SEC and Bloomberg numbers state clearly that in the passed year UBS was business partner with 4 of the nine biggest MT-corporations. Only a few weeks ago UBS renewed a credit for a big player in MT-mining, Patriot Coal in Saint Louis.

“UBS destroys our mountains” protesters say, “UBS go home”, you can hear in front of UBS branches. By the way the banks dilemma is that its employees perceive hostility from private customers due to the banks business deals. They face different and partly odd interest groups, amongst them groups such as the green Christians or a priest who founded a church against consumption. These groups use Facebook and other websites, pointing out, that UBS is the third biggest financier for the environment sacrilege in the Appalachian mountains, UBS also made number one.

Amanda Starbuck, observing the Energy and Finance Business for Rainforest Action Network, says that UBS doesn’t stick out anymore, today it is the Bank of America, Citi, Morgan Stanley and PNC that stick out, when it comes to financing MTR.

But: Like UBS these banks have recently announced the same promises. The Bank of America announced to not prolong contracts with MTR-corporations. Citi, PNC and Morgan Stanley promised a stricter reviewing process. PNC and Morgan Stanley even announced to no longer finance corporations which do mainly business with MTR.

After all one can imagine that the citizenship and responsibility Reports of these banks in reality are rather meaningless. Where does responsibility begin in a global investment bank? When making deals with a corporation whose subsidiary company produces cluster bombs, deals with a resources corporation, whose copper mines release yellow acid into the Congolese river?

A Banker said: “ You always need to consider the regulatory circumstances in those matters”. In other words: It is about politics. It is no coincidence that the notion MTR appeared in the banks annual reports in the last 3 years. In Summer 2009 the Obama government started to tackle the problem MTmining. With the existing water protection laws they are trying to limit mining projects, new mountain blistering are examined more strictly. It is an ongoing struggle. The concerned states have no interest in putting a halt on the black of income. 3 Weeks ago the parliament of Tennessee put off a new law, forbidding the MTR technique.

National, regional or local: Which side should a global player take?

To come to a conclusion, the department of responsibility at UBS had several talks with environment organizations. From UBS point of view: No, we don’t destroy mountains. “UBS cooperates with mining companies world wide” says Christian Leitz, head of the department for responsibility.” But we have not financed any MTR project directly. In fact in Northern America you will find no mining company which exclusively does business with MTR. These companies have usually many divisions and locations, often on different continents. On the other side UBS has an investment bank , which acts globally; aiming to be under the top ten in regards to company transactions; the energy and mining business, from a global point of view, is one of the most important business sectors. And coal is a material with a future.

It is hard to believe, when listening to politicians or believing the media, rather talking about renewable energy; the facts show: Coal consumption will increase by a fifth within the next years, this is the estimation of the international Energy Agency. The number of Coal power plants in the USA increased since the year 2000 from 1000 to 1400.

Until 2020 Europe will have 80 more new built coal power plants, 3 times more then in the last decade.

The USA is, thanks to the big resources of coal, something like the Saudi Arabia of Coal. Who doesn’t want to take part?

Maria Gunnoe: We're Sick of Dying for Your Bottom Line

September 26, House Republicans stages its Subcommittee on Energy and Mineral Resources Oversight Field Hearing on "Jobs at Risk: Community Impacts of the Obama Administration’s Effort to Rewrite the Stream Buffer Zone Rule" 

Say what?  It was the Bush administration which tried to eliminate the Stream Buffer rule.  You can listen to the whole hearing and read the testimony here, with Bo Webb and Maria Gunnoe start their testimony at 99:22. and 106:27 respectively.

As Bo Webb wrote in the comments he submitted:
  

The very title of this hearing indicates a bias against those of us who are living (and dying) in mountaintop removal mining communities. The title suggests that jobs are at risk if the SBZ rule is corrected. The SBZ rule must be corrected in order to protect The People’s health. It’s been broken and it needs fixed.

Let us not forget, President Ronald Reagan, your president, my president, in 1983 created the Stream Buffer Zone Rule because he realized the responsibility he had to protect America’s water supply in the face of an industry that was moving more rapidly toward a method of mining that would turn entire mountains into ruin and destroy head water source streams that carry drinking water to millions of American citizens. This committee now shares that responsibility because President George W. Bush, with the stroke of a pen, trashed the Reagan SBZ rule just before leaving office as a present to a coal industry that wills itself to increase profit at all cost, even at the cost of human health. 

Or as Maria Gunnoe told Gene Kitts of Alpha as he was leaving the hearing, "We're sick of dying for your bottom line.

What Would Hal Willard Say About the North Anna Earthquake?

Illustration is an adaptation of the Google satellite view of the North Anna plant, 11 miles as the crow flies from the August 23 5.8 earthquake's epicenter. (H/T to Sue Sturgis at the ISS whose post  alerted me to the 1970's WaPo coverage).

Interesting that the The The Washington Post (WaPo)  writers didn't look in their own archives when writing about the August 23 earthquake, whose epicenter was 11 miles as the crow flies from Dominion Energy's North Anna nuclear power plant. As a result, no articles there about the 5.8 quake mention that officials of VEPCO  knew it was building on a fault line and got in trouble for concealing that from the NRC during the 70s. The paper started reporting on the story in 1973 when the Atomic Energy Commission began its investigation of  VEPCO. Hal Willard, the principle reporter on the story during that time, died in 2009. At the end of this post, you'll find a timeline compiled from the articles. More later when I can access the WaPo articles--anything before 1987 is not available for free online and the Roanoke County library doesn't have the the WaPo on microfilm.


The North Anna Environmental Coalition,  with the late June Allen as president (d. 2010), fought construction and operating licenses for the plant  during that time. By 2005, the Blue Ridge Environmental Defense League, fighting a third and fourth reactor at the North Anna site, issued a report from report on an earlier scandal regarding how the plant came to be constructed above a geological fault, which might be prone to earthquakes:

The story begins in 1967, the year Vepco [Virginia Electric Power--Dominion Energy's former name for a portion of the current corporation] awarded the initial contract of $446 million for the North Anna Nuclear Station on the banks of the Pamunkey River in Louisa County. Vepco hired Dames & Moore, an environmental consulting firm, to do geology studies in support of the license application. Within a year evidence of seismic faults were found but Vepco resisted the findings. The truth would not remain hidden for long.

 I found this is the court documents (see paragraph 10).  Of course we know in hindsight that the conclusion was not accurate, but I'm wondering if it was even scientifically accurate at the time:

the site was as stable as one without a fault and therefore it was determined that the presence of the fault did not require changes in design specifications for units one and two and also that the fault had no bearing on approval of the construction permits for units three and four.

Renee Parsons (email) writes of June Allen:

...Allen’s investigative talents and ability to cut-through utility and NRC double-speak were apparent as she became an eloquent, hard-nosed intervener in 1972 pointing out what she saw as collusion between the NRC and Virginia Electric Power Company.  A classical pianist who wore pearls, Allen testified before Congress identifying the “nuclear-industrial complex” as an inherently unsafe technology and frequently attended VEPCO stockholder meetings. On one occasion, when spied in the audience, VEPCO’s Chairman stopped the meeting, extended an arm,  pointed a finger directly at June and announced with great indignation, “There is Mrs. Allen.”

The Washington Post (35 articles):

• August 28, 1973:  The Atomic Energy Commission (AEC) begins its investigation of whether the Virginia Electric and Power Co. (VEPCO) withheld information about a geological fault beneath its nuclear power plant under construction on the North Anna River in Louisa County, VA.((North Anna) "AEC Probes Vepco on Site Data, Hal Willard, August 29, 1973, B1)
• September 21, 1973:  VEPCO ordered to try immediately to find out if the lake itself could cause an earthquake. (" Quake Check Ordered At Nuclear Plant Site," Hal Willard, September,  22, 1973, C2)
• September, 1973: WaPo reports on the geology and North Anna  in a 2,000+ word story ("A Geologic Fault Bedevils Reactor: The 'Devil' and the Reactor -- A Haunting Question,  Hal Willard, September 27, 1973, G1)
• AEC Officials testify there will be a tightening up of plant requiremenets and inspection procedures to avoid "surprises" like discovery of a geologic fault beneath North Anna. ("AEC Acts to Avoid 'Surprises,'"Hal Willard Washington Post Staff Writer, October 4, 1973, H1)
• October 17, 1973:  AEC orders VEPCO to show why it should be allowed to continue construction of North Anna. ("Vepco Told To Defend A-Plant Site, Hal Willard, October 18, 1973, C1)
• November, 1973: VEPCO tells AEC that North Anna construction should continue because of "probability that the site will ultimately be found perfectly safe" -- and it would cost $127 million to stop work for six months .("Continue A-Plant, Firm Asks," Hal Willard, November 12, 1973, C1)
• March 2, 1974: AEC's regulatory staff reports regarding geological faults, that North Anna site is safe, ("AEC Staff Finds Site Of Va. A-Plant Is Safe," March 3, 1974; D4)
• March 20, 1974: Citizens fighting construction of the North Anna charge that the federal government is withholding geological evidence in the case. "Secrecy Charged on Vepco A-Plant Plan Study" Hal Willard, March 21, 1974, C8)
• April, 1974: AEC panel concludes that the partially North Anna plant is not on an active earthquake site and that work on it should continue.("AEC Finds In Favor of Va. A-Plant, April 17, 1974, B4)
• August, 1974:  Environmentalists have been unable to block construction of North Anna, but economic and labor problems bring work there to a virtual standstill. ("Work Halts At Nuclear Power Unit, Hal Willard, August 3, 1974, A7)
• February 5, 1975:   A piece on Dr. John W. Funkhouser, who discovered the geologic fault beneath North Anna ("Legalities Swirl Over Nuclear Plant:  What Was in Deleted Deposition?" Hal Willard, February 6, 1975,  F1)
• November 7, 1974: Earthquake recorded about 30 miles southwest of North Anna.  Both AEC and VEPCO say such a tremor would have no impact on a completed plant. (" Quake Felt in Va. In A-Plant Vicinity," Ron Shaffer, November 16, 1974, E3)
• February, 1975: The drinking habits of  the murdered Funkhouser brought up in hearing to determine whether VEPCO officials made false or misleading statements to the NRC. ("Geologist's Drinking Habits Unearthed," Hal Willard,  February 20, 1975, F1)
• March, 1975: Post prints piece on rising electric rates (" Electric Companies Stub Toes in the Dark," Hal Willard,  March 20, 1975,  D1)
• May 28, 1975:  NRC staff recommends that VEPCO pay the largest fine in the history of the peacetime atom for making false statements about the geologic fault beneath North Anna. ("Nuclear Panel Urged To Fine Vepco Heavily, Hal Willard,  May 29, 1975, B3)May 29, 1975:  A VEPCO VP testifies that customers, not stockholders, should have to pay any fines levied for the company managements accused errors in judgement. ("Vepco: Let Users Pay," Hal Willard May 30, 1975, C1)
• June, 1975: Justice Department asks Atomic Safety and Licensing Board to say whether criminal action should be taken against VEPCO because of "material false statements" the utility allegedly made concerning the geologic fault underlying North Anna. (no byline, "Vepco Criminal Action Is Left to Atomic Unit,"  June 21, 1975, B7)
• June, 1975:  NRC informs Justice Department that it has found no evidence of criminal intent on the part of VEPCO executives responsible for material false statements about the geological fault beneath North Anna ("No Criminal Intent Seen in Vepco Reply," June 24, 1975, C3)
• September 11, 1975:  The $60,000 penalties levied against VEPCO for North Anna are the "strongest ever imposed on the industry" ("Vepco Fined $60,000 for A-Plant Fault, Hal Willard, September 12, 1975,  A1)
• January, 1976: According to new findings by NRC staff, the $60,000 fine levied the previous September against VEPCO by the Atomic Safety and Licensing Board, should be raised to $90,000("Vepco's Fine Said Too Low, William H. Jones, January 25, 1976, B1)
• January 1976: Justice Department investigates  VEPCO's alleged material false statements in the early 1970s ("North Anna Statements Are Probed," January 30, 1976, C7)
• June, 1976:  NRC stays an appeals board ruling that reduced a record $60,000 fine against VEPCO for making "material false statements" about a geologic fault beneath North Anna. ("Nuclear Unit Alters Vepco Fine," Hal Willard, June 5, 1976, D5)
• November 12, 1976: The NRC fines VEPCO $32,500 for making seven "material false statements" about the presence of a geologic fault beneath North Anna. ("Nuclear Agency Fines Vepco," Hal Willard,  November 13, 1976, D4)
• February 23,1977: VEPCO pays $31,900 fine imposed by NRC for 30 violations discovered in an investigation of construction practices at North Anna. ("Vepco Pays $31,900 Fine For A-Faults," Hal Willard,  February 24, 1977, B4)
• September 30, 1977:  Justice Department says high-level NRC officials covered up for almost three months knowledge that a geologic fault existed under North Anna"U.S. Cover-Up Seen on Fault At Vepco Site," Joanne Omang, October 1, 1977, A1)
• October 3, 1977, It is disclosed that NRC reprimanded its staff last November for covering up knowledge of the geological fault underneath North Anna, but only in a footnote in its ruling.("Nuclear Agency Staff Criticized in Footnote," Joanne Omang, October 4, 1977, C4)
• October 6, 1977: Federal Energy Administration chief John O'Leary dismissed categorically any implication that he or NRC were involved in concealing the existence of a geological fault under North Anna in 1973. ("O'Leary Denies Concealing Fault," Joanne Omang,  October 7, 1977, B2)
• February 1978: VEPCO, saying costs are rising faster than revenues, requests a 12.2 percent rate increase plus another 8 percent later in the year."Vepco Asks Rate Rise Of 12.2 Pct.,"Thomas Grubisich,  February 16, 1978, A1)
• March 1, 1978:   4th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals upholds $32,500 fine on VEPCO for making false statements. ("Appeals Court Upholds $32,500 Fine on Vepco," Mar 2, 1978, C6)
• June 1978: NRC investigates why staff gave contradictory dates on when it discovered that North Anna was being built on a geologic fault. ("Nuclear Agency Probes Vepco Plant Date Conflict," Thomas Grubisich,  June 15, 1978, C14)
• September 7, 1978:  A witness charges that workers building North Anna are making up to $20,000 a month in unmonitored personal phone calls on VEPCO company phones. ("Witness Charges Waste at Vepco Plant," Phil McCombs,  September 8, 1978, B1)
• October, 1978:  A thousand gallons of radioactive water accidentally flows out of a pipe on to a basement floor at North Anna, "slightly" contaminating 13 employes and causing a 12-hour  shutdown.(" Radioactive Water Spills At Va. Plant," Phil McCombs, October 28, 1978, C1)
• March 1979:  In the wake of Three Mile Island Disaster, the Louisa County Board of Supervisors looks into construction of fallout shelters for county residents due to the location there of North Anna. ("Fallout Shelters Eyed For Residents in Louisa,"  March 22, 1979, C3)
• May 1, 1979:  Critics talk about North Anna in wake of Three Mile Island ("Nuclear Critics Decry Vepco Safety Conditions, Karlyn Barker, May 1, 1979,C1)
• September 25, 1979: A  series of malfunctions triggered a shutdown of  North Anna and a "small amount" of radio active gas is released. ("Radioactive Gas Emitted By Va. Plant: Malfunctions Shut Vepco North Anna Nuclear Facility Plant Emits Radioactive Gas," Stephen J. Lynton and Thomas Grubisich,  September 26, 1979, C1)
• April 10, 1980:  NRC votes to let VEPCO begin trial operations of its second nuclear unit at North Anna.("NRC Lets Vepco Start Trial of 2nd North Anna Unit," Stephen J. Lynton,  Apr 11, 1980, A1)

See also one article in The New York Times

• October,  1977: The Justice Department charges that high-ranking officials at the NRC covered up information the geological fault under North Anna. ("U.S. Panel Accused Of Secrecy on Fault Under Nuclear Unit," David Burnham, October 2, 1977)

UPDATES:

Peter Galuszka (email, bio) has a great piece for September 2 in Bacon's Rebellion, "The Ghost of June Allen."
Tammy Purcell, correspondent for The Fluvanna Review had a detailed piece including history of the opposition on October 26, 2011, "Shake up: Quake sparks concerns over North Anna’s past and future."