|
|
Coal quandaryDestroying mountains
- Article from:
-
Charleston Gazette
- Article date:
-
June 27, 1998
- Author:
-
|
Copyright informationCopyright 1998 Charleston Gazette. Provided by ProQuest LLC. (Hide copyright information)
|
AFTER West Virginia's largest church challenged mountaintop
removal mining, the Daily Mail scoffed that United Methodists offer
no alternative "economic development plan for Southern West
Virginia."
It's true that a big decapitation mine can provide more than 200
high-paying jobs - until the coal is gone. But the final result
won't be economic development for Southern West Virginia. Coal
regions always are poor, looted, polluted and eventually discarded.
Giant profits from West Virginia mines go to out-of-state
corporations that own the coal fields. The firms pay only a pittance
in property taxes, and their millionaire executives don't pay this
state's income tax. Their trucks destroy West ...