“I drove through farm ground getting here today
— I fall in love with the soybeans, corn, and hay,” Richard
Fuller told the small crowd that assembled last week at the Illinois
Department of Natural Resources building for round two of the Banner Mine
administrative hearing.
Fuller, who described himself as a
“75-plus-year-old” farmer, suggested that Capital Resources
Development Co.’s plan to strip-mine a 430.6-acre tract near Banner
— a village 25 miles southwest of Peoria in Fulton County —
would destroy the area’s topsoil and make future planting nearly
impossible.
The proposed mine’s effect on agriculture was
just one of the topics that surfaced during the hearing, where Fuller and
11 other concerned petitioners testified in an attempt to prove that the
IDNR’s Office of Mines and Minerals erred in granting Capital a
mining permit last November.
Fuller, former owner of a duck-hunting club,
mentioned that the noise from the mine could disturb the area’s
already declining population of wood ducks and mallards, as well as its
osprey. He also said he was concerned about displaced water flooding his
85-acre farm, which is north of the permit area.
“When it rains 2 or 3 inches, we have a lot of
water run off the hillsides,” Fuller said. “[The Illinois
River] can’t handle the water that runs into it and backs up in the
proposed mine area.”
When he was about 15 years old, Fuller continued, he
helped build a fence on his property. When he dug down into the ground to
install the posts, he discovered water after 3 feet. Virginia Yang, chief
legal counsel for the IDNR, asked during cross-examination whether the
water halted the project.
“It didn’t hurry it up,” Fuller
replied, eliciting chuckles from the audience.
Hearing officer Michael O’Hara interjected,
demanding to know the relevancy of discussing a fence that was built 55
years ago or longer. Tom Davis, chief of the environmental bureau for
Illinois Attorney General Lisa Madigan, said that Fuller’s example
demonstrated that the water table has always been high in that area. Even
though there was water, Yang argued, the project was still completed.
Several more Banner residents and representatives
from area environmental groups signed up to testify, but because of a power
outage in the building and limited time the administrative hearing was once
again postponed. It will reconvene at the IDNR on Aug. 21.
After the hearing, Yang said she’s not
surprised that things are moving slowly. Because it’s a legal
proceeding, she explains, it takes time to move the facts forward.
“We want everyone to have their say, because it
does affect their area,” Yang says. “We also want the mining
company to have their say. You really can’t take any
shortcuts.”
Joyce Blumenshine, a representative from the Heart of
Illinois Sierra Club and one of the main organizers of the
petitioners’ efforts, says that the Banner citizens are committed to
overturning the IDNR’s decision. Many have taken off work and have
paid for food, gas, and hotels during both sets of meetings.
“I am impressed by the determination of the
Banner citizens and the people working with them to bring attention to the
problems with the permit,” Blumenshine says.
She says there are several topics left to discuss in
August, including the archeological loss to the Illinois River area, the
adverse impact on the short-eared owl and the river otter, and the need to
protect Banner Marsh and Rice Lake — two state fish and wildlife
areas that are publicly owned by Illinois residents.
Capital and Banner residents have disagreed over the
proposed mine project since 2002, when the coal company first requested a
mining permit from the IDNR [see Amanda Robert, “The price of
coal,” June 26].
Contact Amanda Robert at arobert@illinoistimes.com.
This article appears in Jul 24-30, 2008.
