May 20, 2015 2 min read

VENETIA – More than 1,900 letters of opposition were given Wednesday to the state Department of Environmental Protection concerning the permit application of a Kentucky coal operator to develop a new deep mine in Nottingham Township.

The letters demanded the DEP deny the permit application it received Feb. 25 from the Lexington-based Ramaco, which wants to open the mine along Little Mingo Road, said Patrick Grenter, executive director of the Center for Coalfield Justice in Washington.

“For the last two years, community members have been organizing and expressing concerns about this mine,” Grenter said during a public DEP conference on the permit application in Peters Township.

Many local residents testified before the DEP over such concerns as dust, the loss of water wells and vehicle traffic on the narrow road competing with large trucks that would be hauling the coal to market.

“I thought we found a nice piece of heaven,” said Ron Ramsey, whose house is about 10,000 yards away from where Ramaco wants to develop a portal and bath house for what would be named Ram No. 1 Mine.

“It’s already affected our property values,” Ramsey testified at the hearing at the Peters Township Community Recreation Center.

Ramaco was formed in 2011 by Yorktown Partners in New York, and it went on to purchase 8 million tons of the former Mathies Mine coal reserves in Nottingham and Peters for this proposal. The mine would have a lifespan of 8 to 12 years, said Joel Koricich, the DEP’s district mining manager in California Borough.

“It’s somewhat small by standards,” he said.

Koricich said the DEP was still reviewing the permit application, and would issue findings at some point, information that would be mailed to the nearly 60 people who signed in at the meeting.

Many people wore identical white T-shirts bearing the phrase “Protectors of Mingo,” the name of the opposition group formed by local residents who have also been concerned about nearby Mingo Creek County Park.

“Our health and the health of our animals are of utmost importance to me,” said Sue Ryaby, who lives across the street from the Ramaco site and operates a horse rescue and retirement farm on her property.

“Please step up and do the right thing. Deny this permit,” Ramsey added.

No one was available to answer calls Wednesday at Ramaco’s offices in Lexington, as the telephone voicemail greeting there indicated.