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West Va. Supreme Court Affirms Toxic Coal Silo as Wonderful Playground
While coal may now be the official rock of West Virginia, it might soon become the official school vegetable, too. Call it organic clean coal.
On the heels of being reprimanded by the US Supreme Court this week for allowing one of its Massey coal company-bankrolled justices to refuse to recuse himself on Massey coal-related court matters, the West Virginia Supreme Court upheld a lower court's decision to allow the construction of another controversial coal silo within yards of the Marsh Fork Elementary School in Sundial, West Virginia. The WV Supreme Court (this time without the recused justice) made their ruling on a very narrow technicality.
As always, Ken Ward has the full story at the Coal Tattoo blog.
According to Vernon Haltom of the Coal River Mountain Watch: "The West Virginia Supreme Court has once again proven that coal company profits outweigh law, science, justice, and basic human decency. The court has given Massey Energy the go-ahead to put more tons of fine coal dust in the air that children breathe every school day during their crucial development years. Placing a second coal silo within 300 feet of the school is a clear violation of the intent of the law, which is to protect the public. Now, more than ever, Governor Joe Manchin and the Raleigh County School Board must do everything in their extensive power and influence to get these kids a safe new school in their own community."
The Marsh Fork Elementary School might be the poster child for everything that is wrong about our failed mining policies: Only a few football fields downslope of a 2.8 billion gallon coal sludge impoundment, the school and its children are also subjected to the toxic coal dust within a football field of their playground.
An overview of the Marsh Fork Elementary situation can be seen here.
Three years ago, local resident and former coal miner Ed Wiley walked 445 miles to Washington, DC in a campaign to get a new school built for his granddaughter and other local kids.
To understand the concerns and despair of the local parents at Marsh Fork Elementary, here's a clip from Wiley:
Here's another clip on the impact of coal on Marsh Fork area residents:
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13 Comments so far
Show AllThe people of West Virginia are the Ogoni natives of the US, just something to be removed for corporate profit.
Watching corporate greed destroy the lives of so many people around the world, we begin to understand that socialism is not simply more desirable than what we have but even necessary for the survival of the human race.
q
We will only end corporate greed when we end the economic system that compels and rewards greed.
But environmental activists really need avoid the use of "toxic" for everything they oppose. Coal certainly damages the global environment because of the the huge quantities mined and burned, but the contents of coal silo are not "toxic" by any definition.
Coal silos can explode.
q
Capitalism survives ultimately as a police state.
Lenin observed "Fascism is Capitalism in decay"
>>Almost heaven, west virginia
Blue ridge mountains, shenandoah river
Life is old there, older than the trees
Younger than the mountains, blowing like a breeze
I wonder what people will think of those lyrics when they Visit West Virginia once the Coal companies finished feeding on her carcass.
JD must have never actually visited the area.
The Blue Ridge is in Virginia - running down through North Carolina, and only a little piece of the Shenandoah runs through West Virginia. Both are far from the Appalacian Plateau region, which is the part cursed by the presence of coal seams.
West Virginia still has plenty of beautiful non-mined parts - including Federal wilderness areas - but these are suffering under the scourge of the Wooly Adelgid, the gypsy moth, soon the emrald ash-boroer, and illegal but unstoppable redneck ATV use. And oh yes, for some, wind power projects are a scourge too.
OK - so you can use the Everly Brothers song "Kentucky" from the beautiful album "The Songs Our Daddy Taught Us". (I have no financial interest here - just love the album). It is tragic that that beautiful region is being destroyed - such a graphic example of greed's destruction.
My grandfather was a coal miner and I was proud of that. He worked underground, picking off coal bit by bit. He died in a mining accident, which was sad but also heroic to me. I used to say he died for his country. But I was wrong. He really died because of poor safety practices in the mine.
The words of the woman in the film were cutting and true. I have to change my feeling now that mining endangers not only the miners themselves, but all the children, all the families in the area. The danger is from accidents, from floods, from toxins and from pollution. Coal tars and chemicals used to "clean" coal are carcinogens and teratogens. This affects people, animals, plants. It taints water, air and soil.
MINERS NEED OTHER OPPORTUNITIES. If our universities science and engineering departments stop focusing on war research, stop being whores for oil and pharmaceuticals, we could be developing clean energy technology and putting these men and women to work doing something to help our communities and our environments.
The coal companies have to stop mountaintop removal. The people in the region need to elect people like the grandpa in the film to state and national legislatures - People who will represent the miners and their communities, not the mining industry.
Joe
My grandfather was also a coal miner.
He was really a cabinet maker but the only work available in West Virginia back then was in the coal mines. The New York banks made sure of that.
q
It has been the agenda of the right-wing since Reagan to stack the federal courts with neo-conservative corporate judges. This is how the right-wing gets around laws and even Congress. They define the law to suit their aganda. We need a whole new way of appointing and electing federal judges whether they are state supreme court judges, appellate court, or district judges. The system has become so corrupted and too many quid pro quos after these neo-cons take the bench.
Sioux Rose
JIMI JAZZ: So true!
At age 67,I've returned to my hometown of Wheeling,W.V. Though there,s no MTR going on in the immediate area,the anguish of those in the MTR regions is acutely felt here.
Massey and the other large operators are destroying vast areas of W.V.,Ky.and Tenn.,all for short term profits.The streams and forests being plundered are worth vastly more dollars in the long term than MTR,to say nothing of the terrible health problems.
The people of Appalachia never shirked risking their lives in underground mining,and until suficient replacement energy is developed,would do so again.MTR is so unnecessary on every level of humane thinking that it's truly difficult to understand how the US has sunk this low.
Time is running out for the rest of the nation to help.Isn't everyone deeply conerned about large swaths of the most beautiful land in the country vanishing?
Please help to make MONTANI SEMPER LIBERI more than a melancholic statement.Soon there will be no place for Mountaineers to live.
And for those few who think that "Hillbillies" have nothing to teach us,just review the Jessica Lynch matter-who displayed dignity at that hearing? Certainly not th political whores who put her in harms way then manipulated the events from day one.
Any suggestions how to stop Massey esp.from more MTR?
As long as the WV voters keep voting for raptor capitalist hired hands, they'll continue to have these outrages foisted on them. There's just too much jingoism, ignorance, racism, and fundimentalist Christianity in that state.