Bolstering the Clean Kilgore Coalition to Fight a Toxic Mine in Southeast Idaho

At first glance, Kilgore, Idaho doesn’t reveal much. It’s beautiful, no doubt, but beyond its distinctive, white-painted-brick general store, a shuttered Forest Service camp, and the Centennial Mountains rising to the north, it’s a rural, agricultural Idaho town. Miles of fences neatly corral cattle and sheep in waving fields of grass; herding dogs balance precariously on flatbeds as residents trundle down gravel roads.

But on the second (and third and fourth) glances, which I’ve had the good fortune to take this summer, my first as the Greater Yellowstone Coalition’s Idaho Conservation Organizer, Kilgore shows many sides. Those ranchers, the ones with border collies surfing on their trucks, and their families have worked this land since westward settlement came to Idaho. Long before that, Indigenous Tribes collected obsidian for tools in Bear Gulch, and significant cultural resources like the Nez Perce Trail and Battle of Camas Creek site are close by. Atop Monument Peak, a hive of rock structures, cairns, and sheepherders’ monuments commemorates military veterans and fallen soldiers.

I’ve been lucky to explore this corner of the state this summer, but the reason I’m spending so much time there is less fortunate. Junior Canadian mining company Excellon Resources is seeking to build an open-pit, heap-leach, cyanide gold mine in the hills above West Camas Creek. The mine would physically obliterate Monument Peak and threaten the cold, clear streams that power the area’s long-running agricultural economy. In my role, I’ve been ramping up the Greater Yellowstone Coalition’s campaign to stop that from happening.

Junior Canadian mining company Excellon Resources is seeking to build an open-pit, heap-leach, cyanide gold mine in the hills above West Camas Creek. (Photo GYC / Emmy Reed)

A growing number of Idaho hunters, anglers, farmers, ranchers, outdoor recreationists, families, and conservationists have joined the Clean Kilgore Coalition to protect the precious water, land, and outdoor heritage that Excellon’s toxic gold mine would threaten.

“The Kilgore project is another example of an ill-sited mining project that will place our most valuable natural resource, clean water, at risk for the sake of corporate profits,” said Nick Kunath, Conservation Director at Idaho Rivers United.

The coalition, founded in 2021 by the Greater Yellowstone Coalition and Idaho Conservation League, this summer added Idaho Rivers United, Friends of Camas National Wildlife Refuge, the Mountain West Recreation Alliance, the Sierra Club of Idaho, and the Henry’s Fork Wildlife Alliance to its ranks.

“Idaho Rivers United is proud to be a member of the growing coalition fighting to stop this project before it starts,” Kunath added.

Coalition members have spent this summer across Eastern Idaho, meeting landowners and elected officials, knocking on doors, and attending community events to raise awareness and build grassroots support for this work. The growing coalition hopes to enact a county-level cyanide mining ban to protect Clark County’s precious water resources, and to ask Congress to permanently protect these lands from hardrock mining.

Nestled in the Centennial Mountains, Kilgore is a small agricultural town where ranchers graze cattle, generations of Idahoans come to recreate, and elk, grizzly bears, and wolverines reside. Excellon’s gold exploration project threatens to irrevocably destroy the very things that I’ve been discovering make Kilgore special. One of our biggest tasks this summer has been to bolster the Clean Kilgore Coalition, and I’m thankful that statewide and local groups see this as a worthwhile fight.

“An important piece of the Friends of Camas' mission statement is to preserve and protect the refuge and its resources, which this mine could directly threaten,” said Jess McDermont, a Friends of Camas National Wildlife Refuge board member. “Joining the coalition puts us in concert with organizations across Idaho and shows the interconnectedness of the work to protect Idaho's public lands and wild places. Collectively, we have the power to stop this mine.”

This exploratory drilling project led by financially unstable, Canadian mining company Excellon Resources is located on 12,000 acres of Forest Service land and could lead to 10 miles of new roads, 140 drill pads, and 420 exploration drill holes on the mountainside above West Camas and Corral Creeks. The resulting open-pit, heap-leach, cyanide gold mine would threaten the cold, clear creeks that recharge the Eastern Snake Plain Aquifer, the only source of clean drinking water for 300,000 Idahoans.

The threat of cyanide pollution in the aquifer means Excellon’s mine would affect not just Kilgore, but all of Eastern Idaho. Our wildlife, water, and way of life is far more important than a gold mine.

Thank you to the folks who have supported this important work. To get involved in the Clean Kilgore Coalition and learn more, please visit protectkilgore.org.

— Tom Hallberg, Idaho Conservation Organizer (Driggs, Idaho)