Uranium speaker: Organize now

by TOM McLAUGHLIN News & Record staff
Mining uranium in Pittsylvania County: Cause for concern or done deal? Southside Concerned Citizens heard arguments on all sides Monday as citizens and advocacy groups gird for battle against lifting the state's moratorium on uranium mining.
SCC members, in a hastily-called meeting at St. John's Episcopal Church in Halifax, welcomed representatives with the Southern Environmental Law Center in Charlottesville who were visiting the area to meet with Virginia Uranium, Inc., based in Chatham. The SELC lawyers met with Virginia Uranium officials including Walter Coles, a fifth-generation Chatham resident on whose land a large share of the uranium ore deposit, worth an estimated $10 billion, sits.
Rick Parrish, a SELC senior attorney, told the handful of SCC members that the General Assembly is almost certain to enact legislation authorizing a study of uranium mining's feasibility in Virginia. The question will be what kind of study will be done.
"They (Virginia Uranium) don't want Virginia Tech to manage the study. They don't think it would be viewed as objective," said Parrish, noting the university's longstanding ties to mining and resource extraction industries in the state. "They're very aware of the perception that if the company pays for the study, it's bought and paid for, not a neutral, objective study."
Parrish said he expects pro-mining interests will be up front about their intentions and careful not to be seen as influencing the outcome of such a study. But he also said the political landscape is tilting toward nuclear power, and that will have an impact on the Chatham study.
The Kaine Administration is officially neutral on lifting the moratorium, but "I think if you saw the governor's energy plan you saw some not-so-subtle references to building up the nuclear power industry" in Virginia, Parrish said.
Opponents of uranium mining should insist that the study is adequately funded and draws on expertise outside the nuclear power industry, and that the process is open and transparent, Parrish and other SELC representatives said.
But another speaker at the meeting, Shireen Parsons, Virginia organizer with the Community Environmental Legal Defense Fund, said it would be a mistake for the SCC to pin its hopes on a review process she argued is rigged in favor of corporate interests.
"The system is set up for us to fail. The system is set up to protect corporations ... You all are in a sacrifice zone. That's what the industry calls it," Parsons said.
"I believe this is a done deal. I believe this it's a done deal all the way up to the governor. It's up to you to stop it," said Parsons.
Rather than waiting for a sure-to-be-flawed study, Parsons said, the SCC should begin now on what she called "rights-based organizing." Pointing to efforts elsewhere in the U.S. — including in Pennsylvania and New Hampshire — to hold corporate polluters to account, Parsons said local governments can and should pass ordinances stripping corporations of their personhood rights to conduct mining operations in the area.
"These are people who are trying to tell you what to do with your community. Does it [a study] really matter?" asked Parsons. "This is a regulated industry. Coal miners are killed all the time. This is a regulated industry [also]. Do we really trust DMME [the Virginia Department of Mines, Minerals and Energy] to regulate uranium mining?"
Parsons said Halifax County by itself could potentially stop a uranium mine in Pittsylvania by enacting a "chemical trespass" ordinance banning any corporation from spreading dangerous substances into the human body. Similar ordinances have been adopted in Pennsylvania and are just now coming under court challenge, she said.
"You can't ban mining but you can regulate corporate behavior in your community," said Parsons.
Parsons conceded that the local ordinances have not been fully tested in court — "these folks will tell you it won't work," she said, motioning across the table to the staff attorneys with SELC — but suggested that even if the approach does fail, it signals clearly to the public that government has abandoned any pretense of serving a protective role.
And once that message hits home, said Parsons, people will demand a new government.
"You do need to tell people about the abject failure of the regulatory system to protect us from anything. You do need to do that," said Parsons.
"Of all the corporate assaults I've worked with," she added, "this is the one with the greatest potential to get an army behind you. Once people learn the risks of uranium mining in general and this project specifically, I think you've got the potential to get an army behind you."
Forget about the legislature, Parsons advised. She said SCC members should instead work on convincing local elected of the need to pass ordinances restraining Virginia Uranium Inc. "You have to make absolutely clear that if they do not do the will of the majority," Parsons said, "you will take them out and replace them with people who will do the will of the majority."
The SELC's Parrish suggested that the course of action recommended by Parsons "is a long shot in Virginia but I think your chances are a long shot in general."
Asked whether the SELC has taken an official position on nuclear power, Parrish conceded that the group has not.
The organization is divided about coming out strongly against nuclear power, especially since nuclear energy does not contribute to global warming, a growing concern of the environmental community, said Parrish. However, Parrish said his organization strongly favors energy conservation and efficiency as the solution to America's energy problems. He called conservation "the cheapest and cleanest and easiest source of energy out there."
Part of SELC's reluctance to fight nuclear power stems from the recognition that coal-based energy also poses a major threat to the environment and public health.
"Coal-fired power plants are one of the worst killers in terms of the environment," said Cat McCue, communications manager for the SELC Charlottesville branch.
Concerning Virginia Uranium, Parrish said he appreciated the group's oft-stated intent to proceed with mining only if it can be shown to be done safely. But Parrish also said "they're well on their way to filling in some of the blanks" in their efforts to mine the site.
Parrish said the General Assembly should be encouraged to create an impartial panel of experts to gauge the feasibility of uranium mining in Virginia's relatively wet climate — suggesting one option would be to get the National Academy of Sciences to do the study.
Jack Dunavant, president of Southside Concerned Citizens, said the organization has considered Virginia Uranium's plans for the Coles Hill ore deposit, located between Chatham and Gretna. But Dunavant said "it looks more and more like Yogi [Berra]'s statement that it's deja vu all over again. They don't have anything substantially new they can bring to the table."