LETTER — Look to Malartic for what it’s like living next to a mine

LETTER — After reading the following comment by Mr. Randy Gallicano (May 27, 2015) — “Glad to see business leaders stepping up to the plate. Ajax will be held to the strictest environmental standards and the mine will be a much needed shot in the arm for the economy of Kamloops.” — I felt compelled to write.

In his 2011 report, the Auditor General of B.C. said that the “Environmental Assessment Office cannot assure British Columbians that mitigation efforts are having the intended effects because adequate monitoring is not occurring and follow-up evaluations are not being conducted.”

Click to access OAGBC-Environmental-Assessment-Office.pdf

Four years later, we continue to hear that Ministry of Environment employees are stretched thin over too many existing projects, so imagine how they’ll be doing when they need to monitor and evaluate even more. According to the Auditor General, we cannot sit back and count on the most stringent environmental standards being upheld.

Mines want to do things the right way, but they also have to run a business. If no one is there to monitor and evaluate best practices, and the mine is running behind schedule (due to unforeseen weather conditions, or something of the like), can we be sure that KGHM will take care of Kamloops, or is it going to “take care of business” and protect its shareholders?

To see how people are doing next to a mine this close to a community, we can look at the people of Malartic, Quebec. Dealing with 150 environmental infractions by the mining company was not what the community thought they would be facing after every promise and assurance was delivered via glossy publications and fully paid fancy fare cocktail parties (or breakfast/lunch meetings for that matter).

According to Mining Watch Canada, at one time, the people of Malartic (who were in support of the mine coming to their community) shared the same thinking of many Kamloops people: a project this close will be good for the economy and for business. Currently, however, many Malartic people who thought that they couldn’t possibly be bothered by noise and dust, are deeply unhappy, and the downtown? — it has been plagued with numerous closing storefronts, which isn‘t quite the picture of the thriving economy they were imagining.

Those who thought they would be “just fine” have found that they are not “just fine.” Their diminished quality of life has been documented in a March 2015 Quebec Public Health publication. When the people of Malartic approached the company for help, they were asked to “agree” to “tough it out“ for a year before asking anything more of the company. That year is up and the people want the company to pay to move them away — not just to another part of town, but OUT OF TOWN!

Below is a link for a film showing how some people were feeling as their town was changing in preparation for the mine. One should know that houses were being moved BEFORE government consultation of the public was finished. Does this point to fair process? This kind of thing would never happen in B.C. anyways, right?

http://www.lordesautres.com/en/multimedia/videos/

If we need proof — hard evidence — that mining close to communities does not work, I believe we have already got this. I suppose all we have to do is realize that once we go down the road of supporting an “experiment” on the community of Kamloops — an experiment on its economy, its future, its people — we cannot take back that path of action.

Mining is important — mining companies want to do good work — let our government realize that the impossible position in which their laws have put both mining companies and communities must be stopped.

GINA MORRIS