Watercolors by Frasure Creek. State inspector's photos show a variety of colors of water at Frasure Creek mines.

Yesterday, Appalachian Voices and our partner organizations filed a “petition for review”, essentially an appeal of a settlement between Frasure Creek Mining and the Kentucky Energy and Environment Cabinet. This settlement lets Frasure Creek off the hook for thousands of water quality violations over the past two years, while doing little to ensure that the company fixes its water quality problems.

Our challenge of this settlement focuses on the way in which it came about. But first, a bit of background.

We have a separate case that is ongoing against Frasure Creek for submitting false water monitoring data (entire reports were duplicated and only the dates were changed). After we uncovered this problem the company began turning in more accurate reports, which for the first time showed lots of pollution problems. We then filed a second suit against Frasure Creek for thousands of these pollution problems (which had been hidden by reporting problems before our first suit). Then the cabinet also filed a complaint for these pollution violations and more like them in state administrative court (a court run by the cabinet itself). We intervened in that case and became full parties to it, but were then shut out of it completely. In fact the settlement was entered despite our previous objections, and there is no evidence that our objections were even considered. The cabinet and Frasure Creek negotiated a settlement completely without us. The law and common sense both dictate that an agreement is not valid unless all the parties involved agree to it, and that is the basis for our challenge of this settlement yesterday.

This case is complicated by the fact that Frasure Creek is now in bankruptcy. The settlement reached between the cabinet and Frasure seems to make many exceptions for Frasure Creek based on their supposed inability to pay, which would be understandable if the company truly didn’t have any money. However, in 2010 Frasure was bought by Essar Group a giant multinational conglomerate based in India and owned by billionaire brothers Ravi and Shashi Ruia.

One of Frasure Creek's many valley fills viewed through a neighbor's swingset

While the children of the Ruias get named “India’s most eligible billionaire bachelor” and have one of Mumbai’s biggest weddings (with 4,000 guests), Appalchia’s children are left with toxic water, valleys filled with mine waste, more frequent floods, polluted air, and barren wastelands in place of productive forests

Our partners in this litigation are Kentuckians For the Commonwealth, Kentucky Riverkeeper and Waterkeeper Alliance represented by Lauren Waterworth, Mary Cromer of Appalachian Citizens’ Law Center, and the Pace University Environmental Litigation Clinic.

>>Click here to see the legal filing
>>Click here to see the press release about this filing
>>Click here to read more about the back-story of this case

Resources

• Citizen’s petition for review (May 2013)
• Citizens’ Objection Letter (Jan 2013)
• Cabinet and Frasure’s Agreed Order

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE

Appalachian Voices * Kentuckians For The Commonwealth * Kentucky Riverkeeper * Waterkeeper Alliance

CONTACTS:
• Eric Chance, Appalachian Voices, 828-262-1500, eric@appvoices.org
• Pat Banks, Kentucky Riverkeeper, 859-200-7442, kyriverkeeper@eku.edu
• Peter Harrison, Waterkeeper Alliance, 828-582-0422, pharrison@waterkeeper.org
• Ted Withrow, Kentuckians For The Commonwealth, 606-784-6885 or 606-782-0998, tfwithrow@windstream.net

Frankfort Kentucky-Continuing their campaign to make sure Kentucky’s water is safe for everyone, several groups have challenged plans by the Beshear administration to let Frasure Creek Mining “off the hook” for repeated violations of the Clean Water Act.

Appalachian Voices, Waterkeeper Alliance, Kentuckians For The Commonwealth, Kentucky Riverkeeper and several individuals (the petitioners) asked the Franklin Circuit Court Thursday to vacate an Agreed Order signed in April by Environment and Energy Cabinet Secretary Len Peters that claims to resolve all recent water quality violations by the company.

They point out that the settlement “is inadequate to address Frasure Creek’s pollution problems and prevent such harms from occurring in the future.” They called the administration’s action “arbitrary and capricious, an abuse of discretion, contrary to law, and not supported by substantial evidence.”

“This settlement lets Frasure Creek off the hook for thousands of water quality violations,” explained Eric Chance, a water quality specialist with Appalachian Voices. “For years Frasure Creek had been submitting false monitoring reports. During that time they never reported any water quality problems. After we exposed these false reports, they began using more reputable labs and started showing hundreds of water quality violations every month.

“Over the past few years Frasure Creek’s water discharges haven’t really improved and I don’t expect there to be any improvements in the water coming off Frasure’s mines from this settlement,” Chance added.

“Clean water is not just a good idea. Clean water is critical to our health and well being,” said Pat Banks with Kentucky Riverkeeper. “We have learned that we cannot be complacent. The Clean Water Act enforces the notion that if companies are out of compliance and enforcement by the state fails, then citizens can and must step in to protect our waters. That’s what we are doing here.”

The petitioners also point out that they were granted full party status in the administrative enforcement case but were shut out of negotiations between the Cabinet and Frasure Creek that resulted in the final Agreed Order.

“The Cabinet has once again systematically excluded Kentucky citizens who are fighting to protect the water they use. After bringing Frasure Creek’s false reporting and pollution to the Cabinet’s attention, the Cabinet has tried, at every step, to sweep this matter under the rug and quickly settle with the company and exclude citizens from the process,” said Mary Cromer, with the Appalachian Citizens Law Center and one of the attorneys representing the petitioners. “We bring suit against the Cabinet for failing to do what’s necessary to ensure that Frasure Creek’s pollution is cleaned up and for excluding the citizens from their rightful roles as co-enforcers of the Clean Water Act.”

“We as citizens have the right to intervene and see and participate in this process,” explained Ted Withrow with Kentuckians For The Commonwealth. “Yet the Cabinet continues to ignore the law and shield another coal company from any meaningful enforcement. This Agreed Order was done behind closed doors shutting citizens out, even though we had full rights to be part of the process.”

BACKGROUND

In June 2011, the petitioners filed a 60-day Notice of Intent to Sue, documenting more than 2,800 violations of the Clean Water Act by Frasure Creek in the first three months of 2011. After conducting its own investigation, the Cabinet filed an internal administrative enforcement action alleging many of these same violations.

In November 2011, the petitioners were granted full intervention status.

However, the Cabinet conducted negotiations with Frasure Creek without notice to and participation by the intervenors, resulting in the Agreed Order signed by Peters. Kentucky law prohibits the entry of an Agreed Order without the consent of each and every full party to the Administrative Proceeding.

The violations in this case are similar to those in a 2010 lawsuit pending in Franklin Circuit Court, in that older case false reporting made it impossible to identify pollution problems like the ones at issue in this case. In the original lawsuit, the Cabinet filed an enforcement action against Frasure Creek in Franklin Circuit Court after the same petitioners made public thousands of Clean Water Act violations. In that case, the court granted the petitioners full intervention status. So in the 2011 case, the Cabinet took a different enforcement route to avoid public intervention. However, the administrative judge also granted full intervention status.

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Dear [[First_Name]],

Fighting the bad stuff isn’t enough. As Appalachia begins to transition away from destructive sources of energy like mountaintop removal coal, we need to work toward a future where our energy comes from clean sources and Appalachian communities prosper with jobs that respect our natural heritage.

We waste an astonishing amount of electricity in this country. The Southeast has the largest untapped energy-efficiency resource of any region, with 29 percent of the nation’s total potential. With homes and businesses that are less energy-efficient than average, the largely rural area of Appalachia holds an abundance of wasted energy.

Consider some of the benefits of energy efficiency. A recent report from the Appalachian Regional Commission found that energy savings programs could create more than 77,000 jobs throughout Appalachia, including energy auditors and weatherization experts. Energy efficiency also saves money for consumers, keeps more money at the local level creating a ripple effect in the economy, and reduces the tremendous environmental harm associated with fossil fuels — including mountaintop removal.  

I am pleased to announce Appalachian Voices’ new program, Energy Savings for Appalachia, which aims to tap into this rich potential for improving the quality of life for citizens in the region. To head up the program, we’re delighted to welcome Rory McIlmoil, who brings a wealth of experience, insight, and good vibes to this exciting endeavor.  

For the mountains,  

Tom Cormons
Executive Director

Helping Appalachia Save Energy

Appalachians living in areas served by electric cooperatives generally pay higher electric bills than people served by investor-owned utilities — as much as 26 percent more. Appalachian Voices has launched a new program to help homeowners save hundreds of dollars a year, create local jobs, and reduce the harmful impacts of fossil fuels. [ Meet our new energy policy director and read more about Energy Savings in Appalachia ]

Good News for Virginia’s Ison
Rock Ridge

In an important step for Appalachia, state regulators denied a permit for a massive mountaintop removal mine on Ison Rock Ridge in Wise County, Va. The devastation would have covered 1,200 acres and buried more than 2.5 miles of streams. While the coal company has appealed the decision, local residents and their allies are ready to fight on. [ Read the full story ]

ACE Project Helps Citizens
Protect Their Water

Appalachian Voices and The Alliance for Appalachia are expanding our joint efforts to hold big coal companies accountable for polluting Appalachian waterways. The launch of a new website, ACE-Project.org, will provide citizens with a more efficient way to monitor and report pollution in the region. [ Visit the website and learn how to become a citizen water tester ]

Clean Water Protection Act
Introduced in Congress

Last week, a bi-partisan bill was introduced into Congress that would sharply reduce mountaintop removal coal mining by making it illegal to dump mining waste into valleys and streams. The Clean Water Protection Act (H.R. 1837), started the 113th session with 45 original cosponsors. [ TAKE ACTION: Tell your representative to support this important legislation ]

May 18, 2013 ~ Vol. 5, No. 5

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Lyn Hartman, inspired by the people and environment of the region, is a social worker in six counties in Eastern Tennessee.

Mooresburg sits nestled in a valley of the Clinch Mountain Range in Hawkins County, Tennessee. Here Lyn Hartman lives near her hometown, a place and region she has grown close to over the years.

“I’ve had a spiritual connection to the mountains as long as I can remember,” she says. “There is a sense of renewal and sustenance here.”

In her thirty-five years of social work in East Tennessee, Lyn has seen the healing properties of her natural surroundings first hand. Following in the footsteps of her mother — a well-respected social worker in her own time — Lyn visits families with children who have disabilities in order to help parents better understand their child’s medical and developmental issues and to help address their concerns and priorities.

“It’s a very meaningful job, but it is sometimes emotionally difficult,” she says. Now Lyn serves a six-county area in her practice and says she is very thankful to have such rewarding work in such a beautiful geographical area. She says she learns something new from the families she meets and that each day is different and interesting.

“There is just a generosity of spirit here,” she says, pointing to the region’s mountains and people as Appalachia’s greatest representation. “There are so many here who embrace their identity with pride and courage, despite sometimes having to deal with negative stereotypes and outside derision.”

Lyn found Appalachian Voices in 2008 and became a member in order to try to help protect the region she loves. “Appalachian Voices is an inspiration as an organization. We all have to do our part with our time on this earth. Appalachian Voices does a great job of showing what you can do.”

Protecting the region is more on Lyn’s mind than ever these days. The tallest mountain in Mooresburg, known as Short Mountain, is being aggressively mined for silica. “A very large area has been removed, and the destruction can be seen from parts of Morristown, Rutledge, and Thorn Hill,” she says. Numerous eighteen-wheelers can be seen every day exporting the extracted silica, which Lyn fears may be used for fracking.

“Seeing the damage to the mountain just breaks my heart. Several years ago, a very wise woman from this community said, ‘Home isn’t home anymore.’ I now know what those words really mean.”

While aspects of her natural home are being irrevocably altered, Lyn also sees ways in which the region and its treasures will endure,

In addition to the mountains themselves and their people, she has a great interest in the rich literature and music from or inspired by the area, as well as nature writing.

One of her favorite lines comes from Walt Whitman, a man who often celebrated the everyday wonders of the natural world. In the preface of Leaves of Grass, Whitman says, “Love the earth and sun and the animals.” In everything she does, Lyn says, she tries to keep those words in mind.

Her deep love for animals has led her to work as a volunteer for animal rescue groups and to write grant applications in order to fund spay and neuter clinics. She has also written articles for Critter magazine. In her spare time Lyn enjoys visiting the mountains, reading, spending time with friends, and going on walks with her dogs.

Republicans on the committee have vowed to continue to oppose her confirmation until she sufficiently responds to a list of questions and demands. John Walke from the Natural Resources Defense Council has an interesting take on those demands which you can read about here.

Next up for McCarthy is a vote on the Senate floor, where she will need support from both Democrats and Republicans to be confirmed. Appalachian Voices continues to urge the Senate to swiftly approve Gina McCarthy for the position.

Visit www.ace-project.org to learn more about the Appalachian Citizens Enforcement Project and how you can help protect clean water rights.

The Appalachian Citizens Enforcement Project (ACE Project) is a new citizen water monitoring program being launched by The Alliance for Appalachia this summer. Appalachian Voices’ own Appalachian Water Watch team has been working with several Alliance partner organizations over the last two years to recruit and train volunteers to monitor and report water quality data in their area. Now our program is joining this greater water monitoring effort through partnerships in the ACE Project.

In 2011, Appalachian Water Watch launched community-based water testing in eastern Kentucky and southwestern Virginia. Through partnerships with Southern Appalachian Mountain Stewards and Kentuckians for the Commonwealth, we recruited over 50 water monitoring volunteers. Now, the ACE Project will expand water monitoring even farther, into Tennessee and West Virginia. Coal River Mountain Watch and United Mountain Defense have already submitted additional data from West Virginia and Tennessee, more than doubling the amount of data collected.

From the beginning, Appalachian Water Watch made data publicly available through an online map-based system. Making data publicly available allows interested citizens, organizations and agencies to easily review and analyze the data. Through this program, data is actually used to advocate for the enforcement of existing laws, and to enact local, state, and national policies to better protect our waterways. Just last week, local residents were able to take findings from citizen water monitors to their representatives in Washington, D.C., during the annual Week in Washington. The online reporting system developed through Appalachian Water Watch will now be used by all partners on the ACE Project site.

Iron discharge from a coal loading facility.

Citizen water monitoring augments government enforcement of clean water laws by developing a broad view of water contamination across the entire Central Appalachian region. Often, coal companies are the only entities responsible for monitoring pollution discharge below mining sites. By providing additional monitoring downstream of mined areas, local people can help hold companies responsible for any unlawful pollution discharges. Just last summer, a volunteer water monitor outside Whitesburg, Ky., identified an unpermitted discharge of high levels of iron near a coal processing facility. This discharge had gone unnoticed by the state and unreported by the company. Now, the company and the state are working together to identify the source of the iron and treat the discharge appropriately.

The ACE Project gives local people a chance to explore water quality issues throughout their region. The program also provides citizens with high-quality monitoring equipment and training in water monitoring. Most importantly, the program connects people with neighbors who share similar concerns about the effects of coal mining on water quality and human health. By fostering a community with shared interests in environmental health, we can better assure that residents’ rights to clean water in Central Appalachia are protected.

A new report shows the EPA's rules, especially on air pollution, are saving money and lives.

During their push to abolish, obstruct and stymie the Environmental Protection Agency over the past few years, House Republicans have beleaguered the agency for regulatory measures they consider “job-killing” or “anti-industry,” hoping to revert federal environmental regulation to state control or make protections obsolete altogether.

Those in favor of federal rules have argued that national standards allow for the most effective and consistent protections and, as a result, will lead to reduced costs in health care directly associated with air and water pollution.

A new report from the White House’s Office of Management and Budget makes a clear case for why the country needs the EPA. The report includes an analysis of the costs and benefits of a number of federal regulations over the past decade and shows EPA rules, especially those pertaining to air protection, to be the most costly among all the rules evaluated but also the most beneficial.

The budget office estimates that the EPA’s rules account for 58 to 80 percent of the monetized benefits of all federal rules, but 44 to 54 percent of the total costs. Out of these benefits, close to 99 percent come from rules that seek to improve air quality. The report claims that the large estimated benefits of the EPA rules following the arrival of the Clean Air Act stem mostly from the reduction of a single air pollutant: fine particulate matter.

The mixture of small particles and liquid droplets that comprise fine particulate matter can be the most worrisome air pollutant since these fragments are small enough to pass through the human nose and throat and into the lungs. Particles as small as 2.5 micrometers found in smoke and haze, for example, can form when emissions from power plants react in the atmosphere.

The budget office reported the EPA’s rules were beneficial while keeping a few study-based assumptions in mind. These included that the inhaling of fine particles is “causally associated with premature death at concentrations near those experienced by most Americans on a daily basis” and that no matter the chemical makeup of fine particles, they “are equally potent in causing premature mortality.”

The most beneficial air rules outlined by the report include the Clean Air Fine Particle Implementation Rule of 2007, the Clean Air Interstate Rule of 2005, and the Utility MACT (also known as the Mercury and Air Toxics Standards, or MATS) rule of 2011. While these are some of the costliest federal environmental protections for the U.S. economy, their benefits far outweigh the cost. The Utility MACT rule, for instance, currently costs the most of any EPA rule at $8.1 billion, but is also estimated to contribute up to $77 billion in benefits.

It’s evident too that the EPA’s rules are not just about their cost-efficiency. According to a 2011 report by the Economic Policy Institute, the Utility MACT rule alone is projected to prevent 6,800 to 17,000 premature deaths, prevent 11,000 heart attacks, lead to 12,200 fewer hospital and emergency room visits and 225,000 fewer cases of respiratory symptoms. The savings in health costs due to these benefits would be around $55 billion to $146 billion per year (in 2010 dollars).

Not only will Americans be healthier due to cleaner air policies like the MATS rule from the EPA, but contrary to the messages of House Republicans, the implementation of air and water pollution control will actually lead to more employment to help fill the void of energy jobs lost. According to the same Economic Policy Institute report, the MATS will lead to the creation of 28,000 to 158,000 jobs by 2015 even when the loss of industry jobs due to regulatory measures is considered.

In light of this consistently positive data on the benefits of measures taken to protect the environment and human health, it is troublesome that lawmakers are willing to push the corporate interests of the fossil fuel industry over the protection of the nation’s health by limiting the level of toxins power plants can pump into our air and water.

At this point, any dismissal of the EPA’s regulatory benefits as they pertain to environmental and human health is misguided. Any insinuation that the rules are costing more money or jobs than they are worth, can only seem to be intentionally obtrusive in order to make it easier for coal and oil companies to pollute the environment at the expense of the public’s well being.

An updated and expanded report is a potent reminder that coal's decline isn't going away and policymakers should accept the challenges, just as many people already have. Click through to read the report's key findings.

The litany of voices pointing to the writing on the wall for the Central Appalachian coal industry continues to grow. They’re saying the same thing in almost every way imaginable, and have been for some time.

Watching coal production decline and demand shift as other energy sources out-compete coal domestically, it is vital that policymakers in Central Appalachia begin implementing policies and investments aimed at building a foundation for economic alternatives in coal-producing counties. A report released this morning by the consulting firm Downstream Strategies is a pretty good reminder why.

“The Continuing Decline in Demand for Central Appalachian Coal: Market and Regulatory Influences” expands on a January 2010 study and provides a detailed look at the challenges Central Appalachia faces, further making the case for the urgent need to act.

As the report’s lead author, Rory McIlmoil, who recently joined Appalachian Voices’ staff as energy policy director, points out:

Numerous factors influence demand for Central Appalachian coal, each of which has had — and will continue to have — a significant impact on the local economies where the coal is mined. In 2010, we recommended that state and local leaders take immediate steps to help diversify coalfield economies. To a large extent, that has not happened. However, it is vital that public officials begin making the political and financial investments necessary to build the foundation for new economic development opportunities in coal-producing counties.

Few of the report’s findings should come as a surprise. Here, however, they are collected in one place, perhaps increasing the likelihood that lawmakers will finally begin the dialogue necessary to build the foundation McIlmoil and so many others realize is needed — and perhaps reducing the likelihood that industry acolytes will deny the report out of hand. For example, the report points to a precipitous drop demand by the electricity sector from 2006 to 2011, and mentions that coal-fired power plants have been and remain the most important purchasers of Central Appalachian coal.

Across the Southeast, the imminent retirement of dozens of coal-fired power plants is already impacting production. According to the report, Central Appalachian mines shipped coal to 137 power plants in 2011. Thirty of these plants are scheduled for retirement by 2016.

Counties in eastern Kentucky, where severance tax revenues are likewise in a long-term decline, are most vulnerable to the retirements. Eastern Kentucky mines accounted for approximately 60 percent of all Central Appalachian coal shipped to retiring plants in 2011.

The steady decline in Central Appalachian coal production has far outpaced predictions. Graph from Downstream Strategies report.

Partially because of this dependency, three counties in eastern Kentucky — Knott, Letcher and Pike — are classified “highly vulnerable” to the factors examined in the report. Wise County, Va., is also classified as highly vulnerable and ten coal-producing counties in Virginia, West Virginia, Kentucky and Tennessee are moderately vulnerable.

Read the report’s key findings here.

So far, too many policymakers have channeled their energy to reducing regulation however they can and stoking anti-environmental-regulation sentiment in the meantime. They lose their breath claiming the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency is waging a “war on coal” that has led to job losses and exacerbated an ongoing economic crisis in the region. The report, however, shows how fighting federal policies aimed at protecting public health and the environment will not save the coal industry. Instead, these efforts distract from the deeper economic challenges that make coal-producing counties so vulnerable in the first place.

The keys to prosperous future for Appalachia go far beyond the coal buried in the ground. And even if coal-mining employment remains close to current levels, the potential for an economic revitalization driven by the coal industry is crumbling.

Efforts to build a foundation to transition the Appalachian economy must focus on a broad set of initiatives ranging from education and workforce training to community health and small business support, and there are examples in every corner of the region.

But there are economic opportunities that can be developed over the short-term that will have an immediate economic impact with significant benefits for local economies. Energy efficiency is one such area where the economic return on investment could be substantial, creating thousands of jobs and supporting new and existing businesses while saving people money that can be reinvested locally.

Whether or not elected leaders and candidates heavily supported by the coal industry will move beyond the tired rhetoric that has received so much attention remains to be seen. But residents of Appalachia aren’t waiting. They’re not just calling on their legislators to support diversification anymore, they’re demanding they contribute to it.

Appalachian Voices’ Energy Savings program focuses on expanding energy efficiency initiatives and programs proven to create jobs, save money and provide environmental benefits.

A word cloud created from workshops and panel sessions at the conference show the prevalence of positive thinking and themes. Courtesy of Kentuckians for the Commonwealth

I had never been to Harlan County. Sure, I’ve heard the songs, seen the movie, and know the stories, but nothing compares to being there, driving the Kentucky back roads, stopping in local shops, talking to folks.

It’s beautiful country, especially in April with the redbuds blooming and the bright greens of spring blushing up the mountainsides. It’s a friendly place – people went out of their way to make me feel welcome.

It also has more than its share of economic troubles. This is coal country, after all, where big companies haul out the black rock and most of the profits along with it. Harlan County and most of the surrounding counties have a poverty rate in the range of 20 to 28 percent.

This is not news to people living here. They know it, they live it, and they are looking at a million different ways to change it, to create Appalachia’s Bright Future. This was the name of the three-day conference in Harlan, hosted by Kentuckians for the Commonwealth a few weeks ago. It brought together more than 200 people from eastern Kentucky and beyond for an extended conversation about creating a just economy in the region. There was much discussion about what that even means, and while attendees each had a slight variation, several common themes emerged:

1. There is no silver bullet. There is no single industry or company that will turn it all around. Which is a good thing, most agreed, because a root cause of the region’s woes is being too dependent for too long on one industry.

2. There is no magic wand. No one is going to come in “from the outside” to rescue Harlan, or the rest of Appalachia’s’ coal country.

3. It’s about “leadership in place.” The future lies in nurturing home-grown entrepreneurship. Unlike a generation or two ago, young people today want to stay here, and many people who moved away want to return. This profound sense of homeplace was evident throughout the conference.

4. It’s about community and resilience, improving the quality of life and opportunity for everyone, collaborating with neighbors down the street or two counties over so that all can benefit.

5. It’s also about honoring coal miners and their families, those who have sacrificed in untold ways to help build our nation and power our modern lives, who deserve all the opportunity and benefit of a “just economy” as well.

“For me, transition starts in my community and works outward,” says Todd Howard, a Kentucky farmer and board member of Community Farm Alliance.

“Our biggest challenge is imagining ourselves differently and believing it’s worth it. And if we can do that, we still have a whole world out there to convince,” said Gerry Roll, director of the Foundation for Appalachian Kentucky.

A just transition, said Sue Tallichet, chairwoman of Kentuckians for the Commonwealth, means finding a way to thrive, not merely survive, to protect and not just exploit our natural resources, to build worker power through local cooperatives and other means, and to build political power.

The conference brought in speakers from across the U.S. and beyond to share tales of transition in their communities. In the Pacific Northwest, towns once wholly dependent on logging are shifting to conservation management of their forests and diversifying their economies. In Canada, with the near collapse of some Atlantic fisheries, the Maritime provinces are branching out into biofuels and ocean “farming.” In Arizona, members of the Navaho (Dine) tribe are fighting a power company and the coal industry—and their own governing council—to end the environmental damage on their lands and move to cleaner energy sources.

The keynote speakers for the conference were Hywel and Mair Francis from the coalfield region of South Wales – he, a labor historian and current member of the British Parliament, and she, a founder of a women-based community development program there. They described how this once industrialized area is now a mountain-biking tourism mecca.

Perhaps even more inspiring were the tales of Appalchian entrepreneurship and vision, the individuals and groups of people determined to bring about positive change for their communities. In Whitesburg, one young woman taught herself online how to bake and opened the Summit City Lounge in an historic building, which has now blossomed into an art gallery and music venue. There’s the Elkhorn City Area Heritage Council Inc., a non-profit dedicated to preserving the history, culture and natural beauty of the area. There are ample examples of stream restoration projects, programs to help lower-income families weatherize their homes and save money, reviving healthy forests, and on and on.

“We know a whole lot more than we think we know about the way forward,” said Justin Maxson, president of the Mountain Association for Community Economic Development. “We have many more assets to build from than we often believe. And despite our many challenges, including rapid changes to our local and regional economy, there are innovative people providing hopeful examples all around us. What we need now is to knit these pieces together with a vision for Appalachian renewal and help grow them to scale.”

So, well done, Kentuckians for the Commonwealth. It was an inspiring weekend that will help tremendously to amplify and grow a conversation that has been happening on the ground for a long time.

For more reflection from the Appalachia’s Bright Future conference read this excellent piece from Daily Yonder