Celebrating against destructive mining
It is a struggle to write anything that doesn’t sound inconsequential while staring down the threat of a global pandemic and economic shutdown, so I’ll get right to the point:
Our work here at the Greater Yellowstone Coalition continues. Yet the world will be different tomorrow than it was yesterday as it will be every day for the near future. How do we adapt to a new future without losing sight of where we’ve been?
On March 12, 2019 President Trump signed the John Dingell Jr. Conservation, Management, and Recreation Act (S.47) into law. This sweeping bi-partisan act was heralded as one of the biggest conservation victories in decades.
Including more than 100 individual place-based bills, one of the bills included was the “Yellowstone Gateway Protection Act” which permanently protects 30,370 acres of public land from hard rock mining on the border of our nations “best idea” and the world’s first national park and the river that bears its name – Yellowstone.
When a notice from the U.S. Forest Service of a proposed gold exploration project appeared on June 2, 2015, it looked much like the many that have come and go every 15 years or so. But the Greater Yellowstone Coalition did some digging of our own and discovered a massive project being shopped to speculators that could one day rival the largest, and dirtiest, gold mines on the planet. By the end of the month, our Executive Director at the time, Caroline Byrd, unequivocally directed our team, “We need come out both guns blazing” to address this existential threat to the integrity of Yellowstone.
Together with other local and national partners, citizens, landowners, and the business community we quickly got to work. And despite tremendously long odds, less than four years after it began, we did what many campaigns might take a decade or career to accomplish: a mineral withdrawal resulting in permanent protection of public lands. Regardless of the blue and red politics that went into the creation of the Yellowstone Gateway Protection Act, the biggest lesson of this was really about the power found in the word “Yellowstone.” Perhaps no other place in the world sparks our imagination and passion more than Greater Yellowstone – the wild heart of North America.
Passage of the Yellowstone Gateway Protection Act was a crash course in classic organizing while seizing unique pivotal moments and certainly a reason to celebrate. The notion of celebrating is far greater than pouring back a pint together.
Marshall Ganz, from the Harvard Kennedy School and a legendary contributor to the organizing campaigns of Ceaser Chavez and Barack Obama, correctly observed, “Organizers do just three things: they meet, they act, and they celebrate.” This simplification may seem surprising at first, but it couldn’t be more accurate.
As advocates and organizers, we celebrate to build power. What did we learn from the roller coaster of experience? How do we realistically take stock of those pivotal moments that were manufactured out of hard work and strategic planning versus those resulting from mere coincidence – or sheer luck. What does this learning tell us about the knowledge, people, and culture we can bring to bear on the next campaign?
This is the celebrating, this is the style of work, we’ve been doing at Greater Yellowstone Coalition over the past year and will continue even as other uncertainties unfold almost daily in the face of COVID-19.
Despite the success of the Yellowstone Gateway Protection Act, the threat of gold mining remains on private in-holdings in the historic mining districts next to Yellowstone. Today, over 1,500 acres of patented mining claims remain open to development. Some-day commodity prices and technology will catch up to that ever-present gold fever and the greed of a few. Yet the geochemistry never changes and the low-grade “dirty” gold found here will always pollute in perpetuity. Even the smallest mine or failed project could undo the tremendous effort and capital put into the Yellowstone Gateway Protection Act and an entire ecosystem.
As we all focus on staying healthy and safe with our loved ones, it’s important to remember the ecosystem, and the threats to it, continues to function. The Greater Yellowstone Coalition has been fighting inappropriate gold mines our entire existence. It’s in our DNA. The Greater Yellowstone Coalition continues to work on new solutions to the persistent problems created by our nation’s antiquated laws that obligate hard rock mining as be “the highest and best use” of the land.
In February 2019, the Greater Yellowstone Coalition quietly yet permanently protected 75 acres of critical private land and the minerals underneath it in Emigrant Gulch. This was one of the half dozen ore bodies coveted (and even marketed) by mine promoters. This action protects water, occupied grizzly bear and Canada lynx habitat, and public access to surrounding wilderness.
But for every acre we protected yesterday, the next one tomorrow is that much harder. The Greater Yellowstone Coalition is working with willing landowners, strategic partners, and agencies. In the months and years to come will continue to meet and will continue to act until all of Greater Yellowstone’s lands, waters, and wildlife are permanently protected from the looming specter of dirty gold.
If you’ve supported this work in the past, it’s more important now than ever to let you know, we appreciate you and your commitment. Thank you. If you have any questions about this work and all we continue to do, drop us a line.
Stay safe, stay in touch, and stay home (for now). We look forward to celebrating with you soon.
-Joe Josephson, Senior Montana Conservation Associate
