Proposed drilling near White Pine alarms residents

“Don’t think we don’t share your concerns”

A proposal to drill nine exploratory holes near White Pine, Colo. drew a crowd to the Gunnison County Planning Commission meeting on Friday, September 16.
Tomichi Resources, LLC, a subsidiary of Burnstone Ventures of British Columbia, hopes core samples will confirm historical data suggesting that copper and molybdenum are present in the Tomichi Creek area.

The proposal is attracting attention from residents concerned about the company’s long-term plans. White Pine is located on the east side of Gunnison County near Monarch Pass.
Planning Commission chairman Ramon Reed asked Tomichi Resources to confirm the project scope for the standing-room-only audience. Stephen Glass, president of the Gault Group and consultant to Tomichi Resources, confirmed that nine 2.5-inch diameter holes would be drilled over the course of a year.
Crews would use a track-mounted drill, and once drilling started, three pickup trucks would make the daily trip through White Pine to transport the crew to the drill site. Drilling would take place in the middle of existing roads.
“We designed the drilling program so there would be no new disturbance,” Glass said. But that did little to reassure local residents.
More than 30 people showed up to the public hearing, including Tomichi Park property owner Jim Olsen. Olsen referenced a video clip of Burnstone Ventures president Doug Fulcher, in which Fulcher reportedly stated that a mine would need to produce 60,000 tons of ore per day to be profitable. That, Olsen said, suggested the company had long-term hopes for the area.
“We can’t directly just talk about the nine holes. We do also have to look at what they’re doing down the road because this is cumulative impact. They’re going to be back here again asking to do the next step, so we need to understand what’s going on now and how it affects the residents in the area,” Olsen said.
Most public comments sought to clarify those potential effects. White Pine resident Bart Greer asked whether an escrow account should be set up to monitor and repair the area following drilling. Paul Martinez, a military veteran with post-traumatic stress disorder, said that White Pine is his quiet place; increased traffic would disturb the area’s solitude for everyone.
Crested Butte resident Sue Navy wanted to know what kind of fire concerns the Gunnison County fire marshal might have, and Larry Prewett questioned the wisdom of not doing an environmental assessment even if the Forest Service did not require it.
“Why wouldn’t you just do it” he asked, “and answer a lot of the questions here today?”
Dan Morse, executive director of the High Country Citizens’ Alliance (HCCA), noted that the proposal had generated a high volume of calls to HCCA, and the organization’s research suggested that the Forest Service might not have legal access to cross private land leading to the drill sites.
“While this project itself is somewhat small in scope, I think it does have its own impacts and its own risks and certain of those are not worked out. I don’t think the Forest Service or the State of Colorado have finalized their review process… To the extent the county is able, you ought to consider longer-term impacts of the connected actions… and think about what measures now might mitigate those longer-term impacts,” Morse said.
But at the other end of the spectrum, Kris Weckerling, whose family has owned property in the area since the 1960s, said she had witnessed drilling during the 1970s and the 1980s.
“To address some of concerns people have, in particular with wildlife, my specialty is veterinary medicine. I’m very familiar with animal behavior and we witnessed how the animals would acclimate themselves to the sound and were actually quite curious,” Weckerling said. “I’m in favor of the project from start to finish.”
Steve Metros, born and raised into a Gunnison mining family, also spoke out in favor of the project as a way to bring jobs to the area. He pointed out that the cabins of White Pine were originally built by hard-rock miners.
For over an hour, the crowd gave input, with some members speaking several times and emotion running high. When they finished, Glass and Fulcher responded to their questions one by one.
Fulcher directly addressed the video referenced early in the public hearing; he said he had not seen it but suspected it was filmed at a tradeshow when he was employed on a different project. That project was focused on producing 60,000 tons of ore per day, but it has no relevance, he said, to the Tomichi Creek area.
“The main reason it is not relevant to this project is because… we have only historic data and the reality is that historic data means nothing unless you can verify it,” Fulcher said.
Glass further clarified the scope of the proposal, explaining that the drilling process would be a closed loop: drilling mud would be mixed with lubricant and pumped into the hole with the bit. Any fluids that come out with the core would be placed in a cattle trough to allow solids to settle out. Water would be reused in the next drill hole, and fine-grain sediments would be dried on a tarp and mixed with concrete to plug the holes.
Wildlife experts would be involved throughout the process and any water concerns would be regulated by the state. The company would be required to prove it has legal access to the site, and the decision regarding an environmental assessment (EA) comes from the Forest Service.
“It’s pretty well defined in their regulations, and the concept that this could be viewed by the Forest Service as categorically excluded [from an EA] is because it meets particular criteria in their view,” Glass said.
He also told the audience that development exploration in the region has a positive track record.
“I guess I would look at 60 years of exploration in the same part of the world, and in my view there’s not a detrimental impact. It still has sufficient quality to fire all of the emotions here today,” Glass said.
Given the volume of feedback, the Planning Commission opted to continue accepting public comment until September 30. They will revisit the proposal at an October 7 meeting. But before closing the public hearing, Reed took time to address the White Pine residents directly.
“Don’t think we don’t share your concerns. I think we do because we’re all residents of Gunnison County but the process—it’s not our job today, nor will it ever be, to guess what might take place in the future, and say ‘Gee, what can we do about that?’ What we’ve got to deal with is reality… What’s on the table for us to consider is drilling nine holes… It’s all we can consider at this time.”
He went on to suggest that mines take a long time to develop, and any mining proposal would be carefully considered by the county through its Special Development Project Regulations.
“Something of that scope isn’t going to be fast-tracked—that just isn’t the nature of county government in dealing with something like that,” Reed said.