Abandoned mines pose threats

OPINION

U.S. Sen. Dianne Feinstein
San Bernardino Sun

On Nov. 1, a 30-year-old woman was exploring an abandoned mine with family members in Kern County. The woman had entered a dark, underground tunnel when the ground gave way and she fell at least 50 feet to her death.

Dangerous abandoned mines like Tungsten Peak, where this tragedy occurred, litter the California landscape. There are 47,000 statewide and 500,000 across the western states. Many have ceased operations a century ago and the owners or responsible parties are long gone.

The Department of the Interior has published a list of recent fatalities related to abandoned mines. Victims range from a 13-year old girl who fell into a shaft while driving an all terrain vehicle to a Vietnam Veteran whose truck tipped into a mine pit. Throughout the United States, at least 37 deaths occurred between the years 1999 and 2007. In the past two years, eight accidents at abandoned mine sites were reported in California.

It's time for Congress to develop a comprehensive strategy to deal with the safety and public health problems of these abandoned mines.

Earlier this year, I introduced legislation to pay for the cleanup of abandoned mines, with fees and royalties paid by the hardrock mining industry. This consistent source of funding could help pay for basic safety measures, including the installation of warning signs, safety nets and fencing, as well as the cleanup of toxic chemicals that leech into waterways.

The scope of this abandoned mine problem is enormous and cleanup programs are underfunded. The California Department of Conservation estimates that California alone needs $4 billion.

The tunnels, shafts, and dilapidated structures of abandoned mines can be found in popular public recreation areas and near roads and highways. Historical mines attract exploration, which all too often produces deadly results.

In addition to these dangerous physical hazards, thousands of sites pose an environmental threat. Most historic mines operated before modern environmental laws were enacted and often contain harmful substances like mercury, chromium, cyanide and asbestos that can pollute drinking water, crops and fish.

To date, 17 watersheds in California have been impacted by toxic runoff.

In particular, California leads the nation in the number of abandoned mercury mines. A recent Associated Press article reported that there are as many as 550 old mercury mines, and only 10 have been cleaned up to date. Runoff from the mines continues to contaminate downstream environments and contributes to the problem of unsafe mercury levels in fish.

According to a UC Davis researcher, fish in the Sacramento-San Joaquin River Delta region contain mercury levels considered to be unsafe by the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency. At least 100,000 California anglers and their families are at risk of mercury contamination.

It's clear that these abandoned mines pose a threat to public health and safety - and they must be cleaned up.

Unlike the coal industry, however, the metal mining industry does not pay to clean up its legacy of abandoned mines.

The bill I've introduced would create a new limited reclamation fee (of 0.3 percent) on the gross value of all hardrock mineral mining on federal, state, tribal, local and private lands.

The legislation would also establish an 8 percent royalty on new mining operations located on federal lands, and a 4 percent royalty for existing operations.

The bill would set spending priorities for the cleanup fund based on the severity of risk to public health and safety and the impact on natural resources. This will ensure that the abandoned mines that pose the greatest risk will be addressed first.

Finally, the bill would direct the secretary of the Interior to create an inventory of abandoned mines on all federal, state, tribal, local and private land. Unless we have a clear picture of the scope of the problem, we can't fully address it.

A July 2008 report from the Interior Department's Inspector General found that public health and safety have been compromised. The study concluded that program mismanagement and perennial funding shortfalls at federal agencies has impeded cleanup efforts.

Congress must move swiftly to address this issue before more environmental harm, injuries or death occur - so I will be working closely with my colleagues to ensure that a cleanup fund for abandoned hardrock mines is included in any comprehensive mining reform legislation or otherwise legislatively established.

Sen. Dianne Feinstein represents California in the U.S. Senate.

Navy weapons unit produces a high-desert boomtown

The Naval Air Warfare Center Weapons Division at China Lake plans to add 1,000 civilian jobs by 2011, spurring construction projects in nearby Ridgecrest that are drawing workers from across the West.




By Alana Semuels
Los Angeles Times





Ridgecrest, Calif. -- While the rest of California struggles with joblessness and budget woes, this high desert city is proof of the power of government spending. Uncle Sam has helped turn it into a modern-day boomtown.

A hospital, three hotels and a pizza restaurant are under construction on the main drag, where heavy equipment clears land once covered by sage and creosote bushes. Crooked "No Vacancy" signs are a familiar sight at local motels, whose parking lots are jammed most weeknights with contractors' oversized pickup trucks. Job recruitment billboards greet drivers heading toward Ridgecrest on California 14.

Once known as Crumville, this parched community of 28,000 about 150 miles northeast of Los Angeles has become the land of opportunity. At least for those who don't mind isolation, searing heat and little entertainment beyond Wednesday night karaoke at the local bar.

"We don't have Disneyland, we don't have an opera house," Mayor Steven Morgan said. "But California is having economic troubles, and we have jobs."

The source of those help-wanted billboards -- and the engine of Ridgecrest's economy -- is the U.S. Department of Defense. The Naval Air Warfare Center Weapons Division, situated on the 1.1-million-acre testing range known to many here simply as China Lake, expects to add 1,000 civilian jobs by 2011, many of them good-paying engineering and computer science posts.

About 4,300 civilians are currently employed on the base. The weapons division is also spending $200 million on research centers, labs and other buildings where it will continue to develop armaments for the Navy and Marines.

In response, the local hospital and school district are pouring millions into renovations to prepare for growth. And developers are building houses and hotels to accommodate base visitors, hiring contractors from across the West.

The result is that Ridgecrest has been largely insulated from the state's downward economic spiral.

The city's unemployment rate of 8.4% in June was well below the state's 11.6% average and is much lower than the 14.7% rate in surrounding Kern County. Home values are also holding up better than in many other areas. The median in Ridgecrest in May was $165,000, down 8.3% from May 2008. That compares with a 42% plunge in Kern County over the same period.

There's no question that Ridgecrest has felt some fallout from the larger economic downturn. A Mervyn's closed when the department store chain went out of business, and a car dealership was lost when its owner moved it to Los Angeles.

But despite a $250,000 decline in sales tax revenue, Ridgecrest will still end the fiscal year with a $1-million cushion.

That relative security has made Ridgecrest an oasis of jobs -- although not everybody's happy about it.

When a government commission recommended in 2005 that naval defense research be consolidated at China Lake, employees at the Navy weapons station in balmy, seaside Point Mugu in Ventura County were aghast. A poll of workers there showed that about 80% of those slated for transfer said they'd rather quit than move to the desert.

Finding enough skilled people "is a challenge," said Doris Lance, a spokeswoman for the China Lake facility. She recently left the base to work in Arizona. Last month, the weapons division added two additional recruiting billboards on the 101 Freeway in Ventura County in addition to its giant "Now Hiring" signs on California 14.

Building contractors, too, have long had a tough time coaxing laborers to commute to the desert for work, said Mark Crisci, executive vice president of K Partners Hospitality Group, which completed a 93-room SpringHill Suites in Ridgecrest last year and is currently building a Hampton Inn across the street.

Not anymore. With the construction industry hammered by the housing bust, hard hats are now grudgingly making the drive.

Jim Buford, a pipe-fitter from Buena Park who is working on the new hospital, said that a couple of years ago he could ignore requests to work out of town. But threatening to quit won't gain him much leverage with his employer now, not when Ridgecrest is one of the only places to find work.

Laborers fill the town's motels during the week. The Motel 6 is nicknamed the construction frat house because the men stand outside their teal green doors at night drinking beer.

Stephen Edstrom, a road grading superintendent, flies every week from his home near Ogden, Utah, to Las Vegas, then drives about 240 miles to Ridgecrest. He misses his family, he said. But he needs the paycheck.

"You've got to do what you've got to do," he said, dipping his feet in the pool at the town's Econo Lodge. "This is the only job I could find."

Several big projects are underway. The Sierra Sands Unified School District is investing $25 million to modernize its schools. Ridgecrest Regional Hospital is spending $70 million to add units to its 80-bed facility by 2010.

Others are in the pipeline. The planning commission recently approved a 223-lot housing development. And the city is negotiating to bring in a Wal-Mart Supercenter.

In May, 109 homes were sold in Ridgecrest, more than triple the number sold in May 2008, according to Zillow.com.

"It's a good economy here in Ridgecrest," said Stan Dye, an entrepreneur who is building a pizza parlor on the town's main thoroughfare, China Lake Boulevard.

You can't swing a dead cat in Ridgecrest without hitting a Ph.D

Twentysomethings who wouldn't have given Ridgecrest a second glance in better times are finding it preferable to the unemployment line. Currently, about 75% of the young professionals offered jobs at China Lake accept them, said Betty Miller, head of the professional recruitment office at the Naval Air Warfare Center Weapons Division. That's higher than in previous years.

Andrew Gray, a 28-year-old UC San Diego graduate, wasn't impressed by Ridgecrest when he first visited the base to interview for a job as a test manager. "The job looked cool, but the town didn't," he said.

He accepted the position and has adapted fairly well, though he visits L.A. every other weekend to attend business school part time. Because of the base's research center, his boss likes to say that you can't swing a dead cat in Ridgecrest without hitting a Ph.D.

Settling in Ridgecrest is a matter of perspective, said Billy D. Williams, a 30-year-old computer scientist who moved from Lompoc, Calif., last year.

He can walk into the local sports bar, Tommy T's, and know everybody, he said. He's gotten involved in a pool league in town, and he officiates at town baseball and football games.

It's a far cry from New York, where he lived for years, he said, but he's willing to make sacrifices to work to support the military mission.

"You have to take this place for what it's worth," he said. "If you compare the rest of the world to New York, you'll be disappointed."

Lancaster sees solar as salvation

The city and surrounding Antelope Valley have been hard hit by poverty, unemployment and foreclosures. The nearly complete eSolar facility could create jobs and restore a sense of pride.

Workers install mirrors at an eSolar demonstration plant in Lancaster. The city hopes the company will provide jobs for Antelope Valley residents.Brian Vander Brug / Los Angeles Times

By Scott Gold, Los Angeles Times
By Cassandra Sweet, Dow Jones Newswires

SAN FRANCISCO -(Dow Jones)- Plans to develop a large solar-thermal power plant in California moved a step closer Thursday after state regulators approved a contract between Edison International (EIX) unit Southern California Edison and plant developer eSolar.

In June, Edison signed a 20-year contract with eSolar Inc. to take the output from a series of concentrating solar power plants eSolar plans to build that would produce up to 245 megawatts of electricity. Approval by the California Public Utilities Commission allows Edison to recover the costs of the contract from its customers.

The solar facility, to be built in Kern County, Calif., will use concentrating solar power technology developed by eSolar. The technology has yet to generate electricity at a commercial scale, although eSolar is building a demonstration project. ESolar, a startup based in Pasadena, Calif., has secured the land needed for the project and lined up financing from Google.org, Idealab and Oak Investment Partners, according to the CPUC.

The price of the power from eSolar's facility is considered above-market, and Edison received commission approval to use special funds collected from utility customers to cover the extra amount.

The solar plant will interconnect with the Southern California grid at a new substation that Edison plans to build as part of the Tehachapi renewable transmission project.

Rand Mountain off-road trails re-open Nov. 1

The Western Rand Mountains ACEC (green) is located immediately northeast of the Desert Tortoise Natural Area (yellow). The Western Rand Mountains ACEC expansion area (blue) was proposed under the 1993 Rand Mountains Fremont Valley Management Plan. The Rand Mountains Fremont Valley Management Area is outlined in red.
Tina Forde
Tehachapi News

Two off-road trails in the Rand Mountain Management Area that have been closed while the Bureau of Land Management worked on a court-ordered environmental protection program will re-open Nov. 1.

A judge ordered closure of the trails four or five years ago, Davis said, so management could prepare an education plan to protect the environment. Phase one of new plan requires off-roaders to obtain a no-cost permit and an ID card before using the trails.

“In the future you are going to have to register,” Davis said.

According to the Sheriff's office and the BLM, Phase II of the environmental enforcement “will begin at the termination of Phase I, in approximately one year, and expand to a permit program and fee to cover the administrative costs of the program, including law enforcement, monitoring, maintenance and the implementation of the permit program. Phase II will include a mandatory online educational program and written test before purchasing a permit to operate motor vehicles in the Rand Mountain Management Area.”

Bureau of Land Management Enforcement Rangers and Kern County Sheriff’s Office Off-Road Vehicle Team will be working jointly to patrol the Rand Mountains Management Area.

“Law enforcement will be directing enforcement efforts toward riders who are riding outside the designated areas and riders who are on closed trails,” the press release said.

For the 10 a.m. inaugural ceremony, Kern County Supervisors Don Maben and John McQuiston will join BLM employees, the Kern County Sheriff’s Office Off-Road Vehicle Team, off-road vehicle recreational users and the public at the southern end of the Rand Mountain Management Area on Trail R5 near Camp C.

According to directions by Sgt. Tyson Davis, supervisor of the Sheriff’s Off-Road Vehicle Team, take California City Boulevard east to the Randsburg-Mojave Road, turn onto the dirt road where the sign says “To Camp C,” following it to the R-5 and R-50 trails.

Actions Renew Tensions Over Use of Desert Land

Release of the west Mojave plan and a judge's rejection of a proposal for the Algodones Dunes reignite debate.

By Janet Wilson, Staff Writer
Los Angeles Times

A pair of decisions in the last two days governing recreation, conservation and development across several million acres of California desert are reigniting tensions over endangered species and motorized access in the fast-growing region.

Late Tuesday, U.S. Bureau of Land Management officials signed the west Mojave management plan, designed to streamline construction and map areas for motorized recreation and wildlife protection on 9.3 million acres of public land in five counties and 11 cities. Parts of Los Angeles, San Bernardino, Riverside, Kern and Inyo counties are included in the plan, which took 12 years to craft.

"You have tremendous, growing populations in … the west Mojave, and then you try to balance that with conservation of species, and it becomes a very, very delicate balancing act, and that's what we think this plan achieved," said Jan Bedrosian, spokeswoman for the bureau's California office. The plan identifies vital areas for the threatened desert tortoise, Mohave squirrel and 98 other species, pinpoints off-road trails, and lays out areas that could be developed.

But the plan was promptly lambasted by environmentalists and off-road vehicle groups, who said that thousands of miles of riding trails had been improperly mapped, that there were no funds for enforcement or implementation, and that lawsuits were inevitable.

"They don't have a nickel — not a nickel — to implement any of it," said Roy Denner, president of the Off-Road Business Assn., who was appointed by Interior Secretary Gale Norton to serve on the BLM's Desert District Advisory Council and who has monitored the plan closely.

"It wasn't done well," he said. "What they were trying to do — and it's pretty naive — is they were trying to provide for every kind of environmental concern they could with the idea that it would prevent lawsuits, and it's just the other way around. They're going to get sued by the environmental extremists … and off-road access is going to be cut off. It's a joke."

Tom Egan, a former bureau biologist who worked on the early stages of the plan before leaving the agency, called the final version "egregious," and said it would lead to the disappearance of the tortoise in many areas and leave other species "on hospital beds." He noted that the plan included measures for placing signs indicating trails were open to off-roading, but none to say which areas were closed.

A spokesman for the Center for Biological Diversity — an environmental group that has long opposed the expansion of off-road driving in the desert — said that the plan would harm the desert tortoise in particular, and that the organization probably would sue to stop it.

On Wednesday, U.S. District Court Judge Susan Illston threw out another bureau plan and a U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service biological report for the Algodones Dunes to the south that would have greatly expanded off-roading, saying that the plan would harm the federally protected Pierson's milk vetch wildflower and the desert tortoise, and that the agencies had wrongly interpreted the Endangered Species Act.

The judge "basically shredded their plan," said Daniel Patterson, an ecologist with the Center for Biological Diversity. Noting that about half of the most popular parts of the dunes remain open to riders, he said: "It's time for them to compromise and recognize that 50% is enough."

Bedrosian said bureau officials had not seen the decision and could not comment immediately. She said officials thought they had adequately protected species by calling for tightly controlled riding on designated routes with heavy monitoring.

Vince Brunasso of the American Sand Assn., which intervened on the side of the government to have 49,000 acres of the popular dunes reopened to riding, said: "I agree. Let's compromise. Let's have 50% of the dunes in North America reopened then, because if you do the math and add up all the acres we have access to, it falls far short of 50%."

Brunasso said the Algodones Dunes "are different, and they're beautiful, and we can't go to the deep center section. The American people are being robbed of the ability to enjoy that beauty … we're not done fighting."

He said his group would try to have the Pierson's milk vetch delisted as an endangered species.

"The BLM counted 1.8 million milk vetch last year. I don't know how many you have to have before an official person would say its not endangered or threatened" and off-highway vehicle use can coexist with it, he said.

Patterson and others have said the wildflower is doing better for now because of good rains last year and because off-roading has been banned in key areas.

Federal Plans Aim to Control Use of the Desert

Development and off-road use in the Mojave and Algodones Dunes would increase. Critics threaten to sue.

By Janet Wilson and Julie Cart, Staff Writers
Los Angeles Times

Federal officials on Thursday released a pair of desert management plans to accommodate recreation, development and wildlife in the booming western Mojave and in the Algodones Dunes, a popular destination for off-road vehicles in far southeastern California.

The U.S. Bureau of Land Management said its design for 9.3 million acres of the western Mojave Desert is the largest habitat conservation plan in the United States, encompassing parts of four counties and numerous towns.

The plan, one of nearly 500 around the country, is aimed at expediting development in western San Bernardino, Kern, Los Angeles and Inyo counties while seeking to preserve more than 100 rare plant and animal species, including the threatened desert tortoise and Mohave ground squirrel.

Such plans allow home builders, miners, water and sewage companies, and others to destroy endangered and threatened species in exchange for setting aside or paying to preserve wildlife habitat elsewhere.

"Everybody out there in this tremendously large, 9-million-acre area will know which areas are targeted for conservation and which areas would be allowed for development," said Jan Bedrosian, spokeswoman for the Bureau of Land Management's California office, which began developing the plan a decade ago.

Larry Lapre, the BLM staffer overseeing final development of the plan, said the fast-growing area covered under the plan stretches from the San Gabriel Mountains east to Baker, and from Olancha in the Owens Valley south to Joshua Tree National Park. It takes in Morongo Valley, Yucca Valley, Apple Valley, Lancaster, Palmdale and Ridgecrest.

"It's an hour away from 15 million people," he said.

"Lancaster and Palmdale in particular are experiencing very rapid growth, and Victorville is too…. It's suburban sprawl."

"Every time you do a subdivision in Victorville, you have to do a tortoise survey and a ground squirrel survey and a burrowing owl survey, and usually you find one of each," Lapre said. "Then you have to go get permits, and there's hundreds of those pending. Hundreds of housing projects are being delayed."

Under the new plan, developers could pay fees or set aside land, then acquire one "take" permit covering all the species.

Lapre, a biologist who has worked on such plans for years, said the large swaths of land that would be set aside for the tortoise and other wildlife would help preserve them.

But environmental groups disagreed sharply. Daniel Patterson said the Center for Biological Diversity would sue if necessary to block the plan, which, he said, would ignore an existing recovery plan for the tortoise.

The BLM plan for the Algodones Dunes, long a mecca for off-road vehicle enthusiasts, calls for opening all of the areas that were placed off-limits as a result of a temporary court settlement five years ago.

However, Bedrosian of the BLM said the closures on slightly less than one-third of the area — 49,300 acres — would remain in place until at least Oct. 15 while a federal judge considers competing lawsuits from off-roaders and environmentalists.

Most of the currently restricted area — about 33,000 acres — will be opened to limited motorized use. The BLM said it would issue up to 525 permits per day for that part of the dunes, prohibit overnight camping, and close the area from April to mid-October.

For the time being, the BLM proposes instituting a zoning system that divides the entire 160,000-acre dune system into eight management areas. The 26,000-acre North Algodones Dunes Wilderness area would be closed to any motorized travel, for example, and the 21,000-acre Gecko area would be open to unlimited off-road use.

Altogether, more than 85% of the dunes would be open to off-road vehicles.

Daniel Patterson, a desert ecologist with the Center for Biological Diversity, assailed the plan as a reversal of the 2000 court agreement and said it fails to provide protection for a threatened plant.

"The worst part is that the plan fails to deal with the crowds," Patterson said. "They totally failed to consider the carrying capacity of the dunes. The caps are only for a small area. It's a paper plan that will have no on-the-ground enforceability."

On holiday weekends, as many as 250,000 people roar over the dunes in sand rails, trucks and dune buggies. Four years ago, three people were killed and dozens injured, including a park ranger who was run over during the Thanksgiving weekend.

Bedrosian said the agency considers the 33,000 acres of limited use a "laboratory," adding that vehicle limits could be adjusted if necessary.