 |
 |
 |
|
March For Marsh Fork
Elementary Ed Wiley walks to
D.C. and puts polluted school in spotlight
WASHINGTON D.C. -- Tonight something very strange and wonderful is happening here on this warm fall evening. The sidewalk in the front of the Harry’s Bar at the aging and slightly dilapidated Hotel Harrington is alive with the sounds of mountain music. It is so loud the sound is drowning out even the noise of the downtown traffic. The banjo player is wailing and the guitar player is picking, strumming and belting out ancient hillbilly ballads. A small crowd is gathering around the musicians, their curiosity getting the better of them. These are not your normal buskers or your normal Washington street musicians. Rather than facing the audience, the musicians are ignoring them, facing each other, staring at each others fingers in order to detect the next chord change. They are reaching for that high and lonesome harmony that is as much a part of the Appalachians as the rivers and mountains themselves. You can hear them hollerin’ over two blocks away. As we listen, a slew of young activists circulate through the audience and pass out literature and campaign buttons to the passers-by explaining to them the dangers of strip mining in the Appalachians and why we they had come here to Warshington, as the denizens of Appalachia pronounce the name of our Nation’s Capitol. We are all here for Mountaintop Removal Week with over 60 citizen lobbyist from 13 states who have traveled here to work for passage of H.R. 2719, the Clean Water Protection Act, a bill sponsored by Rep. Frank Pallone that would prevent the dumping of mine waste into streams and curtail mountaintop removal. Most of these folks came to town on their own dime and by this evening had held over 50 meetings with members of congress. This
morning,
Floyd and I, along with Ed Wiley West, a West Virginia grandfather and
former
coal miner, and over one hundred supporters marched the final mile of
Ed’s epic
455-mile walk from Marsh Fork Elementary School in Sundial, West
Virginia to
the steps of the Senate Office Building. Ed left Charleston on Aug. 2
to raise
awareness about the school’s location next door to a coal refuse pond
and
preparation plant; and to build public support for the construction of
a new
school in a different location. Marsh
Fork
Elementary School is on the front lines of the controversial practice
known as
mountaintop removal coal mining. It’s students are becoming the
casualties. An active
1,849-acre
mountaintop removal coalmine surrounds the school area. Marsh Fork
Elementary
sits just 225 feet from a Massey Energy coal-loading silo that releases
high
levels of coal dust and saturates the air in the school. Independent
tests have
shown that coal dust is hazardous to the health of school children. And
a leaking
earthen dam holding back 2.8 billion gallons of toxic coal-sludge is
also located
above the school site. What’s more, Massey Energy wants to build
another silo.
Much to the chagrin of people like Ed Wiley. One
of the more
exciting developments in the fight for Marsh Fork School came last
month, when
the West Virginia Department of Environmental Protection denied a
permit from
Massey Energy to build the second coal silo beside the school. For the
residents of the West Virginia coalfields, this was a big victory for
the
community, the kids, and the larger fight against mountaintop removal.
The West
Virginia DEP has twice denied the application to build another coal
silo next
to the elementary school. The existing silo has been found to be even
closer to
the school than company maps had indicated. Suddenly Massy no longer
seems
invincible. To
help pay for a
new school, Ed Wiley began a local fundraising campaign called Pennies
of
Promise in an attempt to raise $5 million. He now has a vanload of
pennies in
jars and plastic jugs. Ed will find the five million even if he has to
ask
five-hundred million people one at a time. Because of Ed’s campaign,
and the
support he got from folks in West Virginia and along the way, he has
become
something of a symbol, even a hero of the struggle. No one is more
qualified
than Ed Wiley to talk about the effects of mountaintop removal or to
represent
the people of Appalachia. At the press conference,
which was well
attended by members of the Washington media. Wiley was joined by U.S.
Rep. Pallone
(D-NJ); Lois Gibbs, the Love Canal housewife who alerted the nation to
the
dangers of toxic communities, now known as the mother of Superfund;
Teri
Blanton of Kentuckians for the Commonwealth; and Mary Anne Hitt of
Appalachian
Voices. The press conference was featured on news broadcast across the
state of
West Virginia, where over two-thirds of the residents are opposed to
Mountain
Top Removal. Eariler
this
morning Ed had hoped to meet with West Virginia Sen. Robert C. Byrd.
One of the
purposes of the walk was to seek help from the powerful Senator.
Outside his
office Ed announced to the media, “Senator Byrd is an honorable man and
a true
Appalachian who cares about the people of West Virginia,” Wiley said.
“I hope
he will stand with us to help the children at Marsh Fork Elementary
School,
because our children have been sacrificed long enough.” Ed
had an
appointment to meet with Byrd’s staff, but not with the Senator
himself. But
after a few minutes meeting with the staffers, he was summoned into the
inner
sanctum of Byrd’s spacious office. The two spent nearly forty-five
minutes
talking about the school, mountaintop removal and other issues. Before
the
meeting was over, both of the West Virginia natives were on their knees
in
prayer. Senator Byrd promised to do what he could to help move the
school. He
also issued a press release in which he stated, "I admire the
determination and dedication that Ed and Debbie Wiley have shown, the
Bible
teaches that if we have faith of a mustard seed, we can move mountains.
I
believe that the Wileys have that faith." Ed
Wiley didn’t
talk to any consultants. He didn’t even hold a meeting. He just got up
one
morning and told his wife Debbie that he was going to walk to
Warshington even
if he had to eat grass and drink out of a ditch. Along the way, he
rallied
thousands of supporters, garnered media attention in each town, and
received
the support he needed to continue his journey. Now Ed and Debbie are
sitting in
downtown Warshington and tapping their feet to some rauckus mountain
music and
having a well-deserved beer. I think I’ll have one with him. To
learn more
about how you can help out, check out the best web site and activist
tool ever
created for the Internet; www.iLoveMountains.org. The site features the
National Memorial for the Mountains, an interactive, online memorial
that uses
Google Earth technology to show the locations and tell the stories of
the over
450 mountains that have been destroyed to date. The Memorial is the
first
comprehensive source for penetrating the secrecy of these city-sized
operations, according to Mary Anne Hitt, executive director of
Appalachian
Voices, the nonprofit organization that developed the site. It features
overlays that bring home the enormous scope of these mining operations:
just
one, for example, is comparable to the size of the entire Washington
metro
area. Visitors
can watch
a video of entire mountains being blown to pieces. It also has an
interview
with actor Woody Harrelson and a download of a new acoustic version of
Bob
Dylan’s “Blowin in the Wind,” performed by music legend Willie Nelson.
Harrelson and fellow actor Edward Norton are among the many supporters
of
Wiley’s walk to Washington. Lenny
Kolm, my
good friend and someone who has organized over thirty lobby weeks on
issues
ranging from the Arctic Refuge to logging Old Growth forests confided
in me
that of all the events that he has organized or attended, Mountain Top
Removal
weekend topped them all when it came to the dedication and enthusiasm
of this
group of people. I had to agree. It seems to me, with just a few
thousand
dollars, Ed and his friends have accomplished more in a few months than
anyone
has been able to in the years that Coal Valley residents have demanded
action
on this issue. Ed is also working to build the kind of movement
necessary to address
not only mountaintop removal, but the
damage that mining and burning coal does to our planet. Log
on to iLoveMountains.org and
see how you can get involved. Mike Roselle is on the road. Email him at roselle@lowbagger.org. |
   |
