Mountain Madness

Negotiating with the police and clearly the mob's "spokesman," according to Hechler, Gibson, and Weekley, was Art Kirkendoll, president of the Logan County Commission. Last January Governor Robert Wise hired Kirkendoll to oversee economic development in the southern part of the state. "Wise's staff satisfied itself that Kirkendoll was not 'directly involved' in the pushing, shoving, bullying, and egg-throwing," wrote John McFerrin, West Virginia assistant attorney general, in The Charleston Gazette. "From this the governor concluded that while he might not want a thug on his staff, an assistant thug was acceptable." So it goes in coal country.

Still, it's astonishing what a few fearless mountain defenders can accomplish. Big John sits idle because in July 1998, Weekley, nine other citizens, and the West Virginia Highlands Conservancy sued the DEP and the Army Corps of Engineers on the grounds that filling streams that run for more than six months of the year is a violation of SMCRA and the Clean Water Act. In March 1999 the plaintiffs won a preliminary injunction against Arch Coal's proposed expansion near Pigeonroost Hollow. The company responded by laying off 30 workers and vowing to put 300 more out of work by shutting down the adjacent operation, a promise it kept. Fifteen hundred miners marched on Charleston. "It's a war!" brayed Kirkendoll. "It seems that the judge . . . is more interested in preserving a tadpole than he is in the people of Logan County." Most of the case was settled, including a provision that requires that topsoil be retained and sites replanted only with native vegetation.

Then, in October 1999, U.S. District Court Chief Judge Charles Haden found for the plaintiffs on the issue of burying streams. "Because there is no stream, there is no water quality," he wrote in his 49-page order. Later in the month, citing "a shrill atmosphere," he granted the defendants a stay pending their appeal, which at this writing is under way.

So mountain-range removal continues pretty much unchecked, and the future doesn't look bright for people who fancy Appalachia's original topography. If Haden's decision is overturned, they won't have many options. If it's upheld, they can look for a push led by Senator Robert Byrd (D-WV) to rewrite federal law so that valley fills are legal.

While trudging the perimeter of the eroding Stanley Heirs cemetery, I'd stopped to read the inscription on the grave of Earl Williams: "Earth has no sorrow that heaven cannot heal." Whether or not it has one now, his casket is about to follow the long shards of sod down the slope onto the mountain stumps. A mine cave-in killed Earl in 1909, when he was 14. Like the mountains that used to tower over him, like the mixed hardwood forest and the wildlife it sustained, like the valleys and the rich streams that carved them, he was a waste product of Big Coal. Now, apparently, his remains are, too.

Ted Williams reported on strip-mining violations in the November-December 1992 Audubon.

WHAT YOU CAN DO

Educate your legislators about mountain-range removal. For your representatives, log on to www.house.gov and click "member offices." For your senators, log onto www.senate.gov. You may download this column from the Audubon web site and attach it to your letters. For more information, call the Ohio Valley Environmental Coalition at 304-522-0246, the Coal River Mountain Watch at 304-854-2182, or the West Virginia Rivers Coalition at 304-637-7201.