bvdownstreamalliance.org - Bluewater Valley Downstream Alliance

The Bluewater Valley Downstream Alliance is a group of citizens from neighboring communities near
Grants and north of Milan, New Mexico, whose underground water resources have been contaminated
by uranium mining and milling activities that began in the 1950s. As a result, our rural way of life has
been decimated and we have organized to fight against Homestake/Barrick Gold and the other rich
and powerful mining companies that polluted our community and left with their profits, but without
provisions for cleaning up the massive underground water contamination that was the legacy of their
uranium mining activities, particularly in the Ambrosia Lake area, and also at the Anaconda/Atlantic
Richfield Company mill site only a few miles away.

For over 25 years, and in spite of designation as a Superfund site, our community has battled with
Homestake/Barrick Gold, the New Mexico Environment Department (NMED), the Nuclear Regulatory
Commission (NRC), and the United States Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) to try to restore
our underground aquifers. Only lately has the NMED, under Governor Richardson’s leadership, begun
to take our concerns seriously. Senator Jeff Bingaman’s office has also come to our aid recently and
we look forward to more help from the Senator in the future.

Living next to Homestake/Barrick Gold’s uranium mill tailings Superfund site has taken a toll on our community.
In years past, we watched windblown tailings scatter across our horizon. Today we watch as mist from the
company’s evaporation ponds drifts out into the surrounding communities, and we often suffer from the stench
of the evaporation ponds. We do not know how our physical health has been impacted, but the strain from lost
water resources, lost property values, damaged homes, and the constant battle with corporate giants and
regulators has taken a toll on our mental health.

In short, we are a small organization of working class citizens fighting for environmental justice against the
Goliaths of the uranium industry and often against the very U.S. government regulators who should have
protected our health and environment in the first place.

Navajos appeal HRI case to Supreme Court. By Kathy Helms, Sept. 16, 2010. Click HERE

Court: Homestake didn't cause neighbors' disease. By Kathy Helms, Sept. 15, 2010. Click HERE

URI says company clears 'Indian Country' challenge. By Kathy Helms, Sept. 18, 2010. Click HERE

No benefits for Navajo uranium mill cleanup workers. By Kathy Helms, Sept. 21, 2010. Click HERE

EPA reaches settlement on Quivira, Tuba City Dump cleanup. By Kathy Helms, Sept. 14, 2010. Click HERE

Udall addresses Navajo uranium issues. By Kathy Helms, Sept. 12, 2010. Click HERE

URI begins drilling for uranium at Ambrosia Lake. By Kathy Helms, Sept. 14, 2010. Click HERE

Nearby residents oppose permit

By Donald Jaramillo
Beacon publisher/managing editor
Published Tuesday, January 19, 2010 10:15 AM MST

GRANTS - A public hearing was held last week on Jan. 12 and 13 in regard to Homestake Mining Company's discharge permit with modification at the Cibola County Complex. The hearing started on Tuesday morning and went through 8:30 p.m. the first day. On Wednesday, officials started at 8 a.m. and the hearing ended at approximately 3 p.m.

Attorney Jonathan Block of the NM Environmental Law Center and expert witness Chris Shuey of the Southwest Research Center question the success of the current Homestake Mining Company’s reclamation project’s success on Wednesday, Jan. 13, at the Cibola County Complex.BEACON / JARAMILLO

    The permit's site is just north of the Village of Milan on Highway 605 toward San Mateo. The Homestake reclamation project is a Superfund Site.

    According to Homestake Project Manager Al Cox, he has been waiting for re-approval of the existing permit for several years and is now requesting a third pond, EP3, to speed up the process of reclamation. If approved by the New Mexico Environmental Department, EP3 would be constructed on HMC property on Sections 22 and 23, approximately 1,800 feet north of County Road 63. A 50-foot wide access corridor will be constructed to access the proposed pond and to locate piping and associated infrastructure to the pond area.

Cox said that the pond can be constructed in 90 to 120 days and would cost approximately $2.5 million.

    “We've lost time [without the third pond],” said George Hoffman, a hydrologist witness for HMC. “We've been unable to maximize the process being used for cleanup.”

    The hearing, hosted by the Environmental Department, included detailed discussion from expert witnesses and attorneys from HMC and the Bluewater Valley Downstream Alliance. A hearing officer lead the meetings as the opposing organization, the BVDA, argued the success and questioned the process being used by HMC. BVDA is a grassroots community-based organization based in Milan and lead by Art Gebeau. BVDA is opposing the permit, in collaboration with the New Mexico Environmental Law Center and the Southwest Research Information Center. The three organzations are requesting NMED to disapprove the water permit until a report on the effectiveness of HMC reclamation plan is released next month by the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers. According to BVDA, residents in the area have already lost well-use access and are suffering from radon exposure coming from the tailings pile at four times greater than safe background levels.

    “Since you started this in 1972,” Gebeau confronted Hoffman while he was on the stand. “the goal was so that the contaminated water would not spread and some odd 30 years later many people around there are told not to drink the water, why? Why is it that the contamination has spread?”

Hoffman went on arguing that HMC is using the best process the company he represents knows of.

State Senator David Ulibarri and Representative Eliseo Alcon went on record on Tuesday evening in support of the HMC being renewed with modification.

    Alcon said, “If this third pond will help Homestake clean its site up more quickly, then, obviously, it is in Homestake's best interest to construct it . . . and sooner rather than later.”

    Ulibarri told the hearing officer that he and Representative Patricia Lundstrom had officially questioned as to why the HMC permit had not been renewed and why it was taking so long. “My interpretation of this letter is that the delay on NMED's part was due to the question of whether the evaporation ponds were causing radon exposure,” Ulibarri said. “NMED stated in their letter to me and Representative Lundstrom that they have now made a determination that the ponds are not causing radon exposure. Now it is time to move forward . . . the initial request for this pond was made more than three years ago.”

    Secretary Ron Curry of NMED will make a final determination approving, conditionally approving or disapproving the renewal and modification water permit.

    “Fundamentally, our principal concern is the restoration of our groundwater,” Gebeau said at the meeting. Gebeau concluded his statement by offering recommendations to HMC, one being that they move the cleanup site. “If the federal government can move tailings piles located in or near communities and rivers in Durango, Grand Junction, Gunnison and Rifle, Colo., and Moab, Utah, it can do so here in Milan.”

    The HMC cleanup site involves a 25-million ton uranium waste pile.

To comment or for more information on the hearing or water permit, you can reach NMED at 1-505-827-2002 or 1-505-827-2919.

Dear Mr. Jaramillo,

Your article on Bluewater Valley Downstream Alliance's participation in the recent hearing on Homestake Mining Company's state discharge permit contained two fundamental errors that we request your correct immediately ("Nearby Residents Oppose Permit", January 19, 2010).

First, neither BVDA nor its law firm (the New Mexico Environmental Law Center) and technical assistance organization (Southwest Research and Information Center) "opposed" the permit. We urged the Hearing Officer to defer making a decision to modify and renew the permit until the results of an independent assessment of the effectiveness of Homestake's groundwater remediation system is completed by the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers and reviewed by all parties. USACE is expected to issue a draft report of its findings on February 12. No BVDA member said, orally or in writing, that our group is opposing the permit.

Second, BVDA's expert witness was Mr. Paul Robinson, research director at SRIC in Albuquerque, not his colleague Chris Shuey, as indicated in the photo caption. Mr. Robinson did not testify in opposition to the permit, nor did he state in his pre-filed written testimony that he was opposing the permit. In fact, Mr. Robinson made several recommendations intended to improve waste management at the site and to help Homestake make progress toward cleaning up groundwater by 2017. His position was also clearly stated in his written testimony: "The overall goal of these recommendations is to substantially improve the processes and facilities permitted under Discharge Permit 725 by providing for the closure and removal of the existing waste management units located in the San Mateo Creek floodplain and consolidation of all waste storage and disposal functions in a state-of-the-art facility that is located outside of the floodplain."

BVDA urged deferring a decision on renewal of DP-725 because we are convinced that Homestake will not meet its self-imposed 2017 deadline using its current strategy of flushing the large tailings pile with clean water, and that the USACE evaluation will address that very concern. BVDA members have heard Homestake's repeated promises to clean up pollution groundwater since the mid-1970s. Since the past and current systems have failed each 10-year period since then, BVDA felt that the New Mexico Environment Department should have waited to receive and review the USACE report before holding a hearing on a permit that may have to be substantially changed.

Finally, BVDA notes that neither Senator Ulibarri nor Representative Alcon listened to any of the technical testimony at the two-day hearing, or stayed around on Tuesday evening to listen to BVDA members' statements about the hardships they have endured from 40 years of polluted groundwater, diminished property values, and ill health. Their willingness to ignore our community's concerns has become a pattern of behavior that belies their positions as representatives of all of the people of their districts.

Sincerely,