Pinon Canyon base expansion - Colorado - Not One More Acre

[Kathy]

Here is a copy of the "Not One More Acre" newsletter, one of many groups in opposition to the expansion of the Pinon Canyon Military base in South East Colorado. If the Military gets there way - they intend on taking over the rest of the SE corner of Colorado. They may try taking it in small bites, but ultimately their goal is complete control of this area.

Not 1 More Acre!
PO Box 773
Trinidad, Colorado 81082

[email protected]

http://www.chieftain.com/metro/1204790799/1

Army hints at seller for Pinon expansion
By TAMMY ALHADEF and PETER ROPER
THE PUEBLO CHIEFTAIN

TRINIDAD - Like a grass fire, word spread quickly this week that the Army claims to have a willing seller to provide as much as 100,000 acres for the expansion of the Pinon Canyon Maneuver Site.

The only problem is that the largest landowner in the area, Craig Walker of Denver, repeated his refusal Wednesday to sell land to the Army and said he has never spoken to anyone from the Army about his two ranches in the area.

"I want to stop this talk as quickly as possible," Walker, who owns approximately 100,000 acres in two different parcels, said. "I'm not interested in selling to the Army. I'm trying to put my land into conservation easements as quickly as possible. I am opposed to the expansion of Pinon Canyon."

The discussion of a willing seller broke out Tuesday after Jim Montoya, Las Animas County commissioner, told area ranchers that the Army claims it has been approached by a willing seller who can offer as much as 100,000 acres for the planned expansion of Pinon Canyon. Montoya and the other county commissioners met with Army officials at the Pentagon last week as part of a trip to shore up congressional opposition to the proposed 414,000-acre expansion of the training area northeast of Trinidad.

When Army officials pointed out a general area to him on a map, Montoya said he couldn't disagree.

"There's a good possibility that there is a willing seller there," Montoya said.

Commissioner Gary Hill took a different view, saying the Army has been claiming for two years they have willing sellers to accomplish the expansion - only to acknowledge at other times that they don't. He dismissed the Army's claim last week as "blowing smoke."

"I took that with a grain of salt," he said. "They've been saying that since Day One."

At the Pentagon meeting, Army officials would not say who owns the land - but they did say the Army may be willing to scale back its expansion plans to just that initial 100,000 acres.

Neither Hill nor the ranchers who are opposed to the expansion, the Pinon Canyon Expansion Opposition Coalition, believed that either. "How long do you think they would settle for just 100,000 acres more?" said Lon Robertson, president of the coalition.

Pentagon officials did not respond Wednesday to queries about the meeting.

News that the Army was discussing a sale with a landowner triggered an angry statement from the Not 1 More Acre group, which is also opposed to the expansion. They pointed to the recently signed 2008 federal budget which has an amendment banning the Army from spending any money on the expansion project this year.

"We stand for no expansion and no money for expansion and we have every level of democracy - from our communities and county commissions, to the State Legislature and Congress - on our side," said Mack Louden, a board member and Branson-area rancher. "So where is the money for the purchase from this one willing seller? How can (the Army) negotiate when they have no money to spend? And whose land will they take to get the rest of the acreage?"

According to Montoya, Terry Laughlin, policy branch chief for the Army legislative liaison office, and Andrew Napoli, special assistant to the Assistant Secretary of the Army, told the visiting commissioners that the Army wasn't even looking to expand until the seller contacted officials with the offer.

The area would fill a 100,000-acre heavy artillery deficit the Army claims it has at the Pinon Canyon Maneuver Site.

They said that for now, the Army isn't interested in anything other than that piece of property.

Still, Montoya said the words left him feeling "muddy and foggy" about the situation.

"Whether that's true or not remains to be seen," Montoya said.

Even if the acreage is available for sale, Montoya said he doesn't want it taken off county tax roles.

"I asked them why they keep trying to take our land," Montoya said.

Hill said that meetings in Washington, D.C., with Sen. Ken Salazar, D-Colo., and Rep. Marilyn Musgrave, R-Colo., and others left him with hope that the no-funding amendment would be extended indefinitely - preventing the Army from spending any money on expanding Pinon Canyon, including planning funds.

"We are still opposed to expansion," Hill said.

He was also encouraged that all the lawmakers said they would not allow the use of eminent domain to take any ranchland.

"I came home feeling a little better than when I left," he said.

The fight over expanding Pinon Canyon spilled over into the National Association of Counties meeting in Washington, D.C., this week. Commissioners from Baca, Las Animas, Bent and Otero counties had offered several resolutions putting the national association on record in opposing the taking of ranchland around Pinon Canyon through condemnation.

According to news reports, El Paso County commissioners blocked the effort, saying the national organization of county officials had no role in what they called a "local dispute."

The Greater Colorado Springs Chamber of Commerce and El Paso County elected officials are pushing for the expansion of Pinon Canyon, arguing the Army may reconsider its decision to base an additional 12,000 troops at the Mountain Post unless the additional training land is provided at Pinon Canyon.

The Army claims it needs an additional 5 million acres for training nationally, and wants to nearly triple the size of the 238,000-acre Pinon Canyon area.

Not 1 More Acre! is a Colorado non-profit corporation formed to serve the public interest by substantially contributing to the public's understanding of the government's policies and activities concerning the proposed Pentagon expansion onto the largest remaining native grassland and generational family ranchlands in southern Colorado and northern New Mexico.

Not 1 More Acre!
PO Box 773
Trinidad, Colorado

[email protected]

Area residents wonder where the money is coming from. Well considering the USA Department of Defense is "on-record" (ie: Donald Rumsfeld, September 10, 2001) claiming they cannot "account for" or "trace" trillions of dollars in the military budget, money for this expansion may not be a problem.

IF the land owner, Craig Walker of Denver, wants to put his 100,000 acres into a conservation agreement - he better make damn sure that there are several clauses that guarantee that should this Conservatory group wish to sell the land - they cannot, and they must return it to him or his heirs if the Conservatory no longer wishes to maintain the land.

It is common practice in Canada for a Conservation Group to buy land, and sell it when it suits their agenda.

 

[Triangle Bar]

Kathy, great informative post. I've been trying to keep up with this ongoing story since it's in my area of the country and I know several folks in the expansion area. Everyone needs to know of the over reaching hands of the government. Since the Kilo decision by the Supreme Court any "compelling government interest" is just cause for the use of eminent domain.

There is no reason for this expansion other than this someone's pet project to take over the entire SE corner of Colorado. They've identified an area that is sparsely populated and think they can just run over the ranchers in this area. I've even heard the land not used by the army is going to be managed by the Nature Conservency. If true it proves they don't need all this land.

I'll close with the words of signs ranchers have put up on their land along the highways. "This land not for sale to the army"

Stick to your guns folks and use 'em if your forced to.

 

[Kathy]

Triangle Bar, and all you folks in Colorad, TAKE NOTE further uranium mining developments coming your way. In Situ Uranium mining, not open pit, but it is also very dangerous as it can seriously contaminat your aquifers.

Article: http://www.theflume.com/print.asp?ArticleID=4981&SectionID=1&SubSectionID=1

Friday, February 29, 2008

Questions arise over proposed uranium operation
'Gold rush' is on for uranium

Mike Potter
Staff Writer

Friday, February 29, 2008


Horizon Nevada Uranium Inc. President Bill Wilson has taken a number of calls regarding his company's proposed uranium mines in Park County, most of them planned for about seven miles northeast of Hartsel, and he suspects he will probably take many more.

A round of letters sent out by Horizon Nevada on Feb. 9 spurred a wave of calls inquiring about the proposed project. The second wave of letters, sent out on Feb. 22 will probably trigger even more, he said.

Shirley Riveram a Brighton resident and owner of land in the South Park Ranches subdivision, received a letter in the mail on Feb. 26 from Horizon and didn't know what to make of it at first.

"It's difficult to read," she said.

She thought it was a letter from the Bureau of Land Management, but only after looking at the envelope did she realize it was sent from Horizon.

Many of the affected property owners are in the South Park Ranches subdivision.

Wilson said that as of Feb. 22, all the notification letters were in the mail on the way to property owners.

Rivera said she would have liked it if a letter had been sent with the notice, explaining how it was going to affect her land and the area around it.

Her five acres of land is vacant and does not have a well on the property. Indeed, most of the parcels in South Park Ranches are vacant land, according to the Park County Assessor's Web site.

She said she intends to contact Wilson to figure out what would be happening with her property.

Most of the questions Wilson has received have been about the effect the in-situ mining would have on the aquifer.

In-situ mining is a process in which uranium is liquified and removed from the underground aquifers by adding chemicals and pumping the uranium solution to the surface.

An aquifer is an underground layer of water-bearing permeable rock from which water can be pumped.

The in-situ process creates minimal surface damage, but can destroy the aquifer.

"You can't clean it up to the point where it will ever be satisfactory," Wilson said.

That might not be a problem, though.

Because of the uranium and other minerals already present in the aquifer, Wilson said, that water probably wouldn't meet the Environmental Protection Agency's standard for drinkable water, making it something called an exempt aquifer.

The exempt aquifer is below an aquifer that is used to supply water.

Wilson said it was possible to drill through an existing aquifer, with clean, drinkable water, to the one below it without contaminating the upper level.

For an aquifer to receive the exempt status, pre-operation drilling must be done to establish where that aquifer is, and testing of the water must be conducted.

"Then the EPA decides if they want to exempt the well," said Wilson.

Howard Williams, member of the Coloradans Against Resource Destruction, said through the process of in-situ mining, contaminants could leak into other aquifers, contaminating well water that supplies homes.

CARD is currently fighting Powertech Uranium Corp. to keep an in-situ uranium mine from being drilled near Fort Collins.

Williams said the problem with in-situ mining an aquifer is that contaminants will spread through its entirety.

"Aquifer water is shared, not owned," he said, and problems arise when companies think about profit more than the environment.

"This is a gold rush, and like the last gold rush, it brings out the best and worst of people," Williams said.

CARD's argument is that there is too great of a possibility for the aquifer, which supplies over 40,000 wells near Fort Collins, to become contaminated. He was unsure what the situation was in Park County.

Powertech is proposing 300 to 400 wells and a processing plant to make yellow cake uranium in the area, he said.

The Park County mines would be similar, but smaller, according to Wilson. No processing facility would be built near the mines.

Safeguards would be in place to avoid any spilling over of the aquifer being mined.

Wilson said the mining process is monitored through a number of monitor wells.

Those wells would be set up around the exempt aquifer and would be able to detect if any contaminants are spreading.

The wells would be computerized and monitored by the Nuclear Regulatory Commission around the clock, he said.

"Once [contamination] reaches a monitoring well, a change in pressurization is used to stop the migration," Wilson said.

It would be very unlikely that contamination would reach beyond the monitoring well, he said.

The possibility of radon gas being emitted from the mine is highly unlikely because the entire system is a closed circuit, he said.

A $3,000 bond would be deposited for each well his company drills and that money would cover the price of reclaiming the site.

Wilson said he will meet with the Park County commissioners in April to discuss his plans for the site and to answer any questions the public might have.

"It's important that people know what we're doing," he said. "We are trying to be as transparent as possible."

Industry uses all kinds of really nasty chemicals, very caustic (melted the tire right off a truck in southern Alberta, when spilled), also using organophosphates to separate isotopes from caustic aqueous solution.