My name is Beverly May and my family has lived here on Wilson Creek in Floyd County Kentucky for five generations. Now Miller Brother’s Coal Company is trying to move into our community and mine the ridge top above the right side of Wilson Creek. Their plans include three valley fills, which would bury the headwaters of Wilson Creek and Big Fork. Two families have sold their land to Miller Brothers and a few others, mostly absentee owners, have leased their land for strip mining, but the majority of the 94 families who call Wilson Creek home are fighting to save our homes and our safe and quiet community, and we would really appreciate your help.

Our community has come together to file a Lands Unsuitable for Mining petition with the state Department of Mining Reclamation and Enforcement (DMRE). So we, the Floyd County Chapter of Kentuckians For The Commonwealth (KFTC) along with the residents of Wilson Creek and Big Fork, would like the DMRE to say that the Wilson Creek watershed is unsuitable for surface mining. We fear that mountain top removal mining will cause increased flooding, blasting damage to our homes, possible deep mine blowouts or landslides, loss of our water wells, and destruction of our road, just as it has in so many other east Kentucky communities.

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The deadline for comments has passed.  Please check back later for updates on this issue.

• On Friday, November 18, at 10 AM, a three-judge Court of Appeals panel will hear oral arguments from James River Coal, the Energy and Environment Cabinet and the Appalachian Citizens Law Center (representing Beverly May and those who intervened on behalf of the Bev and her community). This is scheduled to last 30 minutes. This will all take place at the Court of Appeals, 360 Democrat Drive, Frankfort.  KFTC members are invited to attend in solidarity.

Additional Information

Floyd County is one of the twelve major coal-producing counties in eastern Kentucky. Since 1980 Floyd County coal production has dropped by over 45% from over 5 million short tons in 1980 to just over 3 million short tons in 2005. During the same time period, the number of mining jobs has decreased by 82%.

In the last 30 years here in eastern Kentucky we have seen a decrease in the amount of deep mined coal and an increase in the amount of surface or strip-mined coal. Strip mines use large bulldozers and high explosives to blow-up the mountaintops and push over the rock and dirt into the nearby valleys and streams. This requires far fewer miners than traditional deep mining, which helps explain Floyd County’s persistently high unemployment rate. This also explains why the Big Sandy River, which Wilson Creek flows into, is the most polluted river in the state.

With help from KFTC, we have already succeeded in bringing the residents of Wilson Creek and Big Fork together to get a commitment from the Floyd County Judge Executive to not allow coal trucks to haul coal from the mine out on the curvy one-lane county road that runs along Wilson Creek. Many my neighbors work in the coal industry but have had the courage to fight with us because they know the damage mountain top removal inflicts on nearby communities.

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We know from hard experience living in eastern Kentucky that a large mine can devastate a community. Homes can be severely damaged by blasting, water wells are lost, dust from coal trucks and the mine itself can make it difficult to breath and flash flooding is a worry every spring. Flooding is already so frequent and severe around here that the Army Corp of Engineers is relocating the neighboring town of Martin. Life can get so miserable for strip mine neighbors that families get discouraged or intimidated and leave. My worst fear is that Wilson Creek, were so many families have lived together in friendship and peace for generations, will become one of those ghostly, empty places.

We’ve been lucky because we have worked closely with and learned from the nearby community of Hueysville. We’ve seen first hand the problems they have had since Miller Brother’s Coal Company surrounded them with large surface mines.

You can click here to read past blog articles about the problems residents of Hueysville have had with Miller Brother’s Coal and a lack of state support enforcing mining regulations.