A New Balance Sheet for Community Decisions

By Jennifer Scott

Communities in the Maritimes have repeatedly been forced to sacrifice much of what they value in order to follow the promise of jobs. Articulate and intelligent people across the region have put their lives on hold to assemble credible and well-researched cases opposing development projects that don’t make sense. They question promises that don’t come through. They struggle to find information and seek honest answers. It is a reactive and highly discouraging process.

The energy (and money) expended by both proponents and communities to oppose each other could be better spent creating a positive vision for the future of each community. A future based on meaningful work that doesn’t sacrifice the true basis of the rural economy: fish in the rivers, trees in the forests, farms on the land, clean water, and culture.

In Hants County, this struggle comes into sharp focus where nearly a third of the Avon Peninsula (which includes the communities of Avondale, Belmont, Mantua and Poplar Grove) is slated for conversion from forested watershed, to a gypsum strip mine. The strip mine company, based in Chicago, wants to expand its present operations, and extract at least 50 million tonnes of additional gypsum from an area zoned as Agricultural Priority One. Several thousand acres nearby have already been strip mined. There has been little if any significant reclamation, and a thousand acres more are now at stake. Farms, homes, streams and roads have been swallowed up by the strip mines, and many residents question whether the tiny peninsula can sustain yet another one.

COMMUNITY INVOLVEMENT
Revitalizing the rural economy depends on innovation, entrepreneurship, local food production, and a respect for the rural landscape. This is among the best farmland in Nova Scotia, and perhaps the greatest concentration of working farms in Hants County. The agricultural priority zoning was passed in 1991 after spirited public meetings. Residents agreed to compromise for the greater good, to retain the traditional agricultural life of the area. Residents knew where they stood. They were willing to make a few sacrifices (for example they were restricted in selling parcels of land for housing) to achieve a greater good (keeping farms in the community).

The strip mine proposal, on the other hand, is an example of a process that does not involve the community in a meaningful way. It is difficult to get clear answers from the proponent, and the destruction has begun even before the proponent has applied to the Department of the Environment. When people started to ask questions about the proposed strip mine, doors started to close, and public servants could not give specific answers.

People on the Avon Peninsula recognize the potential benefits of the proposal. Gypsum is extracted to make wallboard and other products. They recognize that people need meaningful work. They are willing to make some sacrifices to achieve the common good. But in this case, the apparent sacrifices are far too weighty compared to the apparent benefits. This is not a case of “jobs vs the environment”. Do we choose a kind of economic activity that will maintain and enhance the environment we all depend on, or pretend that the environment has no value and that it makes sense to literally mine it out to serve short term interests? The community deserves a clear and honest accounting of all the costs and all the benefits associated with the proposal.

The rate of gypsum extraction in the current operation has now increased to two million tonnes per year. The rate of extraction would likely increase even further in a new strip mine. And every tonne extracted means the permanent loss of more landscape, its inherent values, and the ecological goods and services it provides to the region. The gypsum will be extracted at a rate greater than ever before, using fewer employees per tonne than before, without processing any of it locally.

This is not about creating jobs and getting maximum value for every precious tonne extracted. The expansion of the strip mine into the Peninsula is about extracting as much of the resource as possible, in as short a time as possible, to make the maximum profit for US shareholders. It may make business sense for the shareholders, but given the erosion of common assets it would cause, it does not make common sense.

IN A RUSH
Part of the rush to extract gypsum could be associated with the silting up of the Avon River. Gypsum is shipped from strip mines to Hantsport – located on the Avon River -- for loading into boats bound for the US. This is an area well known for its incredible tides, so boats have to come in, load, and be gone before the tide diminishes the river water level. Recently gypsum bulk carriers have been running aground in the Avon River. This is serious.

Recognizing this river silt will eventually make it impossible to load gypsum at Hantsport, the strip mine company has taken the following measures: increasing the loading capacity and shortening the loading time in Hantsport; reportedly buying quarry trucks of over 200 tons capacity; running close to continuous shifts of workers; increasing extraction capabilities; and now using bulk carrying ships of greater capacity and shallower draft. This total technological enhancement will allow new rates of extraction even greater than the current rate of 2 million tonnes per year.

Meanwhile, many residents of the Peninsula want to know how the resources in the presently operating strip mine can be used to greatest benefit before any new proposal is tabled. They want to see a sustainable plan that will benefit current employees and show good stewardship and reclamation of present strip mine areas. Residents want honest and clear plans for any new development proposals, and they want to have some power to be part of decision-making that affects not only their own lives, but also common goods such as water, air quality, ecological services, noise levels, community social fabric, and indeed gypsum.

SKEPTICISM
There is some skepticism about the new proposed strip mine. The proponent has stated on record that it will create no new jobs, but only maintain the current workforce when the existing mine is exhausted in 2012. But employment is only a third of what it once was, while extraction rates have increased. Many residents feel that if the proponent is allowed to start a new strip mine now, the end result will be a ruined peninsula and no new jobs.

The insatiable US demand for gypsum will likely focus attention on the even richer gypsum deposits in the farmlands of Mount Denson, around Hantsport and further down the Annapolis Valley toward Wolfville. How many farms and communities will have to be sacrificed before we say: “Enough!” Before we have the humility and foresight to understand that further extraction will undermine the ability of future generations to make a living. Given the heavy toll associated with gypsum mining, our society needs to focus attention on using the resource more wisely.

A very good example of wise use comes from the recent renovation of an old building in Halifax. The Ecology Action Centre bought the building, gutted it, and re-used on-site materials like old ceiling panels and fake wood panels to rebuild the walls. On top of this, they made plasters with a variety of materials including earth, straw, and gypsum, to create a stunningly beautiful interior. The drywall used was made of synthetic gypsum—a byproduct of the cleaning process used by coal fired generating plants. Drywall made of synthetic gypsum is identical to that made of mined gypsum, it costs the same, and is available in Nova Scotia. The renovation was a courageous, creative, and empowering process—that used far less gypsum than a typical construction or renovation.

It is time to take a courageous step. Communities must not be blackmailed into giving up precious assets in order to create jobs that are out of step with our new understanding of the environmental basis of economic prosperity. Job predictions are often highly overestimated, and the costs associated with proposals are often underestimated or ignored entirely. A new balance sheet for community decisions is needed right away. In fact, it was needed right from the beginning.


This article was originally published in Rural Delivery May 2007 31(10): 10-12. OACC wishes to gratefully acknowledge permission from the author to post it on our website.

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Posted May 2007