"Special Interest" in Local Uranium Issue is Financial

Perhaps Mr. Crider should have mentioned in his letter that he is an investor in Virginia Uranium, Inc. (part of the local uranium ore is on his property) and that he stands to make a huge amount of money should Coles Hill be mined. Perhaps that would help explain his disappointment in the information he heard presented, the hard cold facts about the dangers of mining uranium (I was there too).

Published by The Editorial Board, Danville Register & Bee

Published: September 11, 2008

To the editor:

As a native of Pittsylvania County who has lived near the Coles Hill uranium site most of my life, I have a special interest in learning as much as I can about the effects of mining. That’s why I attended the recent “educational seminar” held in Chatham by Southside Concerned Citizens.

Instead of finding anything “educational,” I sat through two hours of one-sided, unsubstantiated claims that we all are about to be wiped out. The folks holding the meeting seemed to think we should believe it just because they said it.

They used pictures of places far removed from Southside Virginia showing open-pit mines that had not been reclaimed, creating the false impression of what it would look like here.

Three people were running this “seminar,” including Shireen Parsons of Christiansburg. Odd as this may seem, Parsons, who was promoting something she called a “chemical trespass ordinance,” saw fit to say to the audience: “I am not a communist.”

She said that some people think she is a communist, and she simply wanted the audience to be reassured that she was not.

Among the very extreme claims, these folks said that if we ever allow uranium mining, all of Eastern Virginia will be destroyed and Gretna, Chatham and Danville will be uninhabitable. They claimed that no state or federal laws would protect us against such destruction.

Here’s how I see it: If environmental laws can stop a man from timbering because he might disturb a hoot-owl, I believe some of those same laws would take exception to destroying all of Eastern Virginia.

They also claimed that if the Coles Hill deposit is mined, blasting would go on 24 hours a day, seven days a week, 365 days a year for 35 or 40 years. Then Parsons said that residents all over Pittsylvania County (almost 1,000 square miles) would be able to hear this constant blasting.

To me, that doesn’t make any sense.

On the other hand, I know some of the local people involved in Virginia Uranium, and I know them to be honest as well as long-time friends and good neighbors. I have attended several of their “educational” briefings and asked hard questions about radiation, dust, tailings and water. They have provided reasonable and carefully documented responses and have never hesitated to point out areas where more study is needed.

ROY CRIDER, Chatham

http://www.godanriver.com/gdr/news/opinion/letters_to_the_editor/danville_letters/article/uranium_mccain_and_perriello/6111/