John Vaughan: Mr. Rogers’ neighborhood

While Mr. Rogers does not like Rise Gold’s advertising, he seems to believe that the science presented in the draft environmental impact report proves that reopening the Idaho Maryland Mine is as clear as Rise Gold’s advertising claims.

Mr. Rogers seems to support reopening the mine because the science claims it’s OK. Let’s take one example from the draft report: The “significant and unavoidable” scientific conclusions that traffic at “SR174/Brunswick” and “Brunswick Road/Sutton Way” cannot be mitigated.

Average injury accidents/year for the past three years in Nevada County was 405 (CHP Data), including 13 fatalities. With “significant and unavoidable” traffic issues, it is statistically likely that more accidents will occur at these intersections. Is one more fatality acceptable? How about just one more injury accident?

Maybe in Mr. Rogers’ neighborhood there are no accidents or fatalities attributable to “significant and unavoidable” traffic issues. Maybe in Mr. Rogers’ neighborhood only one well goes dry from dewatering the mine. Maybe only a few families’ property values go down.

The negative impacts from the Rise Gold mine may be acceptable in Mr. Rogers’ neighborhood, but they are not acceptable in ours and should not be in yours.

John Vaughan

Grass Valley

This opinion piece was originally published in The Union.

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