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By The Sierra Fund February 11, 2020 The Sierra Nevada foothills are geologically interesting and rich in minerals, including gold. Grass Valley is a historic hard rock gold mining town built on top of legacy, abandoned mines. Idaho-Maryland Mine was the second most productive hard rock gold mine in the Sierra Nevada. Between 1867 and 1957, the mine went through five periods of activity that extracted a total of 2.4 million ounces from the gold-bearing quartz veins located underneath Grass Valley. Read the full article at The Sierra Fund here.

By Ray Bryars December 11, 2020 The last few Nevada County supervisors meetings have seen an outpouring of concern about the possibility of Ben Mossman, CEO of Rise Gold, re-opening the Idaho Maryland Mine. It is apparent that Nevada County has moved a long way since the last ounce of gold was removed from local mines. The community no longer wants to be impacted by risky mining projects that have a history of leaving behind toxic legacies. Those who personally attended, called in or emailed comments, spoke about their concerns with noise, dewatering wells, traffic, air quality impacts due to toxic asbestos dust and the abysmal environmental track record of Ben Mossman ,CEO of Rise Gold... Read Ray's full opinion piece in The Union.

VANCOUVER, BRITISH COLUMBIA–(Marketwired – Jan. 25, 2017) – Rise Resources Inc. (CSE:UPP)(CSE.UPP.CN)(OTC PINK:RYES) (“Rise” or the “Company“) is pleased to announce that it has purchased the Idaho-Maryland Gold Mine (the “I-M Mine“) located near Grass Valley, California, USA. The I-M Mine is a major past producing high grade gold mine. The acquisition represents the exercise of the Company’s option to purchase the I-M Mine first referenced in the Company’s news release dated October 6, 2016. Read full copy of Rise news release at Yubanet, here.

QUICK FACT Local advocates from Wolf Creek Community Alliance (WCCA) and CEA noticed grading work to create a road and pad on a parcel between Bennett St and South Fork Wolf Creek. The work was done clearly without adequate storm water management protections. Complaints were lodged with Nevada County Building Dept. This property is on the western portion of the Idaho-Maryland Mine (IMM) New Brunswick site. A county permit had been taken out to build a pad. Unfortunately, the new owner of IMM, RISE Gold Corp, failed to comply with the county grading guidelines.

QUICK FACT (as per CCR 1103.1 Conversion of Timberland). Two citations were issued: Violation of Section 4581 (PRC) – to the landowner Violation of Section 4571 (PRC) – to the logger, who was not a licensed timber operator

Vancouver, British Columbia, November 21, 2019 – Rise Gold Corp. (CSE: RISE) (OTCQB: RYES) (the “Company”) is pleased to announce that it has submitted an application for a Use Permit to Nevada County to allow the re-opening of the Idaho-Maryland Gold Mine (the “IM Mine”). The Company is fully financed to complete the County permitting process. Read full Rise Gold Corp. press release on Yubanet, here:

by Community Environmental Advocates Foundation January 14, 2020 – A Canadian company, Rise Gold Corporation, aka Rise Grass Valley, has filed an application for a permit to reopen the Idaho Maryland mine. These are some key points from the initial application: • The operation will remove 1000 tons of ore and 500 tons of non-gold bearing rock a day with mining continuous 24 hours a day, 7 days a week. • The headframe, rock conveyors, ore crushers/grinders, water treatment plant, paste backfill plant, and truck loading area will all be located at the Brunswick Industrial Site at the corner of East Bennet and Brunswick Road. 122,000 square feet of industrial buildings will be constructed at this site. • Haul trucks—50 to 100 round trips per day, running from 6 AM to 10 PM, 7 days a week—will dump a mixture of barren rock and processed tailing sand at two sites: the southern end of the Brunswick site, near to and behind homes on Mink Court, Elk Lane, Brunswick Drive, and Cedar Ridge Drive; and at the Centennial site, off Idaho Maryland Rd, along the edge of Wolf Creek. • The trucks will be loaded with rock with a front-end loader from 7 AM until 7 PM, 7 days a week. After the rock is dumped, it will be compacted beginning at 7 AM using bulldozers, graders, and rolling compactors. This operation will create a large amount of noise and dust. Dust from these operations is likely to contain asbestos as well as lead and arsenic from massive tailings that must be remediated first. • In addition to four industrial-size backup diesel generators, the exhaust from the daily use of diesel trucks, bulldozers, graders, and compactors, will greatly increase greenhouse gas emissions. • The paste backfill plant will create 500 tons of backfill every day, 7 days a week. The production of the cement used to make the backfill paste will release an estimated 55,000 pounds of CO2 daily. Thus, the CO2 generated in one day—just by the backfill plant—will be roughly equivalent to the CO2 generated by over 1600 cars. The project description, noise study, and other documents related to Rise Gold’s application can be obtained at https://www.mynevadacounty.com/2882/Application-Documents. If you object to having an industrial-scale gold mine in our community, voice your objections to Matt Kelley, who is the Project Planner for the County, and your Nevada County District Supervisor. Mr. Kelley can be reached by phone at 530-265-1423 or by email at matt.kelley@co.nevada.ca.us. Your district supervisor can be found at https://www.mynevadacounty.com/731/Board-of-Supervisors. Demand an open, public process, full disclosure of the current physical and chemical hazards on the properties in question, and the negative impacts the mine will have on our community.

Scroll through a quick slide show to understand the basics of what's at stake with the Idaho-Maryland Mine.

Residents have less than two weeks to submit comments and concerns to help direct the scope of the draft environmental impact report for Rise Gold’s proposed gold mining project at the historic Idaho-Maryland mine. People can submit their comments by emailing Senior Planner Matt Kelley at matt.kelley@co.nevada.ca.us or by calling 530-265-1423 before 5 p.m. Aug. 17. Read the full Union article here.

Did you know that the Idaho-Maryland Mine is one of the oldest mines in our region, and previous companies have attempted to re-start operations before? The mine known as “Idaho-Maryland Mine” is an old consolidated gold mine that has not operated since 1956, located in Grass Valley. In the last 20 years, three different companies have attempted to make the mine operational again. This most recent attempt is by Rise Gold Corporation, who bought the mineral rights in 2018 from EmGold Mining and began exploratory drilling shortly thereafter. For a more detailed history of mine operations, check out Ralph Silberstein’s Union Op Ed and Rise Gold Corp’s History of Idaho-Maryland Mine website. Read the full article on the SYRCL website, here.

Gold mining relies heavily on the use of toxic chemicals and produces so much waste that it is hard to grasp. View staggering statistics on the negative effects of gold mining. https://www.theworldcounts.com/challenges/planet-earth/mining/environmental-effects-of-gold-mining

The Nevada County website hosts all the Rise Gold application documents here. https://www.mynevadacounty.com/2882/Application-Documents---Rise-Grass-Valle

By Mike Shea - Cedar Ridge June 8, 2020 Read the article on Yubanet As you may have heard, a Canadian company, Rise Gold Corporation, and its subsidiary Rise Grass Valley, Inc. (Rise GV), have filed an application with Nevada County for a permit to reopen the Idaho Maryland gold mine. I wanted to know as much as possible about the proposed operation, so have been going through the documents Rise GV submitted to the County to support their application. After reviewing the Project Description, the Groundwater Hydrology and Water Quality Analysis, the Noise and Vibration Analysis, and the Greenhouse Gas Analysis, I am against reopening the mine. Here’s why. Living next door to the proposed mine site, I have some selfish reasons for opposing it. For one thing, my wife and I will have to move, because the noise from the mine will be unbearable. We will no doubt lose money when and if we can sell our house, since the mine will lower the value of our property. After all, who wants to live next door to a gold mine? If you do, I have a house to sell you! The noise study Rise GV paid for tries to assure us all the nonstop noise will be “less than significant,” but I find that self-serving, rather than reassuring. The mine will run 24 hours a day, every day of the year. Each day, 1,500 tons of rock will be hoisted to the surface, dropped into a silo, and then transported over a conveyor system. 1,000 tons of rock will be ground down to facilitate extracting the gold. From 6:00 AM until 10:00 PM, 1,000 tons of rock will be dumped into metal trailers and then hauled away. Noise from the mine will be nonstop. Right now, all I hear is occasional traffic noise, or a dog barking. In the summer, I like to open my windows and sliding door. I won’t be able to do that anymore. I also have some unselfish reasons for opposing the mine. First, the Greenhouse Gas Analysis that Rise GV commissioned, says at a minimum the mine will emit close to 9,000 metric tons of carbon dioxide a year. Gold isn’t a strategic metal vital to modern technology or industry. According to the World Gold Council, 9% of the gold supply is used in electronics, 52% in jewelry, and 27% in bar and coin. That means 79% of the carbon belched into our air would be for jewelry or investments for the wealthy. Not mentioned in the Greenhouse Gas Analysis is the contaminated air that will be exhausted from the mine shaft, 24 hours a day, every day. The mine expects to use close to a ton of ammonia nitrate fuel oil and 257 blast detonators every day. The fumes and dust (which contains asbestos and silica) from this blasting will be vented into our air, along with other chemical and physical contaminants found in gold mines. The documents submitted by Rise did not specify where the wind would carry the exhaust, where it might come down, or what it would contain. The Groundwater Hydrology study Rise Grass Valley paid for used analytical, conceptual, and numerical models to assure us that wells won’t go dry and that “the project would not have any significant impact on groundwater supplies.” Yet after the mine shaft is dewatered, they will still suck out over a million gallons of groundwater a day. In spite of their models I wonder how removing all that water might affect our forests. Will it further dry out our trees and increase the fire danger in our community, which is already rated as a “Very High” Fire Hazard Severity zone? Another concern is the truck traffic. Trucks will be carrying tons of explosives through our town; and every day trucks will be making between 50 and 100 round trips hauling fill rock (containing asbestos and silica). For the first eleven years they will travel to Rise GV’s Centennial site next to DeMartini RV and within the Brunswick property. After that they will travel down Brunswick Road to Highway 49 and on to unspecified locations. Every day. If it’s the possible new jobs that make you support reopening the mine, “possible” is a key word. And keep in mind that gold mines aren’t a sure-fire thing. What happened to the jobs created by the following gold mines: San Juan Ridge Mine, Sutter Gold Mine, Zortman-Landusky Mine, Buckhorn Mountain Mine, Mineral Ridge Mine, and Pimenton Mine? Gone.