Looking back
A look at some of the headlines gracing the pages of the Observer-Reporter and Waynesburg Republican this week in Greene County history:
DEP rules mining
damaged dam
The state Department of Environmental Protection has determined longwall mining at Consol Energy Inc.’s Bailey Mine was responsible for ground movement that damaged the dam at Duke Lake at Ryerson Station State Park.
DEP had initiated the investigation following a decision by Allegheny County Court in a lawsuit filed by the state Department of Conservation and Natural Resources against Consol seeking $58 million in damages for the dam.
A court order, issued in October 2008, directed DCNR to file a claim with DEP under the state’s Bituminous Mine Subsidence and Land Conservation Act for damage sustained at the dam.
DEP said its decision came following an extensive analysis. “These findings were based on concrete information from Consol, the Department of Conservation and Natural Resources, DEP files and months of site observations,” said Michael Terretti, DEP’s director of mining operations.
” Consol spokesman Joe Cerenzia said the company was disappointed in DEP’s decision.
“Our position is that we don’t believe (the damage was) mine related and we intend to appeal the decision to the state Environmental Hearing Board,” he said.
The 62-acre lake was drained July 29, 2005, after inspections by DEP and DCNR revealed expanding cracks in the 45-year-old concrete dam. A month later, DCNR removed part of the spillway to prevent water from backing up in the lake bed during heavy rains.
Raina Rippel, director of the Center for Coalfield Justice, said with the decision the group felt justified in its belief damage to the dam was caused by subsidence.
“All along we felt we knew this was related to longwall mining,” Rippel said. “Obviously, we’re not surprised (with the decision) and we feel the results are well overdue.”
•
Messages to alert
students to delays
CARMICHAELS – Students in Carmichaels Area School District no longer will have to turn on a television or radio to learn whether school is canceled because of poor weather.
They soon will get the information through a telephone call, e-mail or text message as a result of a new messaging system approved Thursday by the school board. The board approved a contract with One Call for the automated calling system at a cost of $2,652 for the first year.
The program will notify students and staff of emergencies, school closings and delays as well as provide information on, for example, sports team practices or meetings, technology administrator Mark Batis said.
The messaging service has the ability to contact each student in the district in less than six minutes, he said. Batis said the district is now drafting a letter to parents to explain the program and get relevant information regarding contact numbers or e-mail addresses.
Greenpeace climbers
get jail
WAYNESBURG – Greenpeace activists continued to condemn Allegheny Energy’s Hatfields Ferry Power Station even as Greene County sheriff’s deputies cuffed them and led them to jail Tuesday.
On June 23, six members of the environmental organization broke into the Hatfields Ferry facility, climbed a smokestack and unfurled a 2,500-square-foot banner that read, “Warning: The Bush Energy Plan Kills. Clean Energy Now.”
On Tuesday, they pleaded guilty to misdemeanor charges before Greene County Judge H. Terry Grimes. The protesters will spend at least the next five days in the county jail.
“This (sentence) does nothing to change the conditions that caused our protest in the first place,” Joshua Raiser Cohn of Portland, Ore., shouted to supporters as he was led from the courtroom.
Greenpeace used the power plant between Carmichaels and Masontown to illustrate its argument that the Bush administration favors polluting businesses at the expense of clean air.
Raiser Cohn will serve the most time, 30 days to one year in jail, because he has a prior conviction stemming from another Greenpeace protest.
The punishment could have been more severe, but Greenpeace reached a plea bargain with District Attorney Marjorie Fox, who agreed to drop a felony charge of criminal trespass. In exchange, the protesters pleaded guilty to three misdemeanors – reckless endangerment, failure to disperse and defiant trespass – and one summary offense, criminal mischief.
•
County workers vote
down contract offer
WAYNESBURG – Greene County employees represented by Service Employees International Union Local 668 voted Wednesday to reject the county’s latest contract offer.
Members of the union under the master bargaining unit rejected the offer by a vote of 40 to 3, SEIU business agent Rose Cindrick said. The master bargaining unit includes about 65 employees in court-related and administrative offices. Their contract expired Nov. 1.
Cindrick said she intends to notify the county of the vote and request additional bargaining sessions. The union is currently not considering a strike. “We believe we can settle this across the table,” Cindrick said.
Issues that continue to concern the employees include proposed changes in Article 18, Section 6 of the current contract, employee health benefit contributions and wages.
Employees in the master bargaining unit held an informational picket in front the county office building Tuesday to call attention to the issue involving Article 6.
Employees say the article provides them with some protection against large increases in employee health care contributions. The article addresses changes in health care plans, requiring any changes in a plan to be “equal to or greater than the present plan, at no additional costs to the employee.”
Raises approved
for county employees
WAYNESBURG – Greene County department heads and their top deputies received raises of $1,100 at a salary board meeting.
The 40 employees involved are non-union personnel at the supervisory level and are not covered by the contract negotiated recently with Local 585, Services Employees International Union.
County commissioners said both the $1,100 annual raises and the 50-cents-per-hour raise union members received equates to an average increase of 8 percent.
Included in the raise were such people as the jail warden, public defender, chef assessor, tax claim bureau director, maintenance supervisors, registration office director and supervisory people in the commissioners’ office as well as their deputies.
Officials meet to aid
landfill problem
A Regional Department of Health official recommended that a countywide feasibility study be made to determine the best way to handle the disposal and other refuse in Greene County.
The recommendation was made by Elias E. Nickman, solid waste coordinator for the nine Western Pennsylvania counties which comprise Region V.
Nickman said that while the 16 existing landfills in the county do not comply with new state regulations, the health department would be willing to go along with marginal operations for a while so long as steps are being taken toward a solution to the problem of providing adequate refuse disposal.