The Finale

[Danoinark]

Thanks to everyone who mailed letters, passed the word, and crossed their fingers.

From News reports in Arkansas.

State environmental regulators have upheld a decision to reject permit requests for two companies seeking new gravel-mining operations along Crooked Creek.

Marcus Devine, the director of the Arkansas Department of Environmental Quality, issued his final order late Monday. The applicants still can appeal the decision to the Pollution Control and Ecology Commission.

In October, Devine recommended denying the in-stream gravel-mining permits to Guy King and Sons Inc. and Mountain Home Concrete Inc. for three sites around Yellville. He cited existing pollution and flaws in the applications.

At the time Devine said the denial sent “a strong message” that the department was “committed to protecting our natural resources and this creek in particular.”

James Stephens, chief of the department’s Mining and Reclamation Division, said Wednesday that the department’s reasoning “still came down to our site visits and the determination that there wasn’t enough gravel within the high water mark to be mined.”

Gene Dunaway, an attorney who requested a hearing on the permit requests, called the department’s decision prudent “in light of the damage we’ve seen in the past from gravel-mining activities.”

“To degrade our streams for good sand and gravel is not a good bargain,” said Dunaway of Mountain View and president of the Friends of the North Fork and White Rivers.

Tommy D. Johnson, who lives in Bruno and is a proponent of gravel mining along the stream, said Wednesday that the decision didn’t surprise him. “It’s a stacked court,” said Johnson, who has complained that property owners have become too cowed by environmentalists and other outsiders who have become vocal opponents of gravel mining on the stream.

He said that he worries that the state agency will place further restrictions on property owners, such as limiting runoff from farms.

The debate between property owners and conservationists has gone on for years.

Considered one of the best smallmouth bass fisheries in the nation, Crooked Creek flows 82 miles through Newton, Boone and Marion counties.

Attempts to get state protection for the stream by designating it an extraordinary-resource water failed twice. The state Pollution Control and Ecology Commission in 2000 imposed stricter limits on gravel mining in an effort to limit the effect of such operations on Crooked Creek.

Because Crooked Creek was declared an impaired stream in 2004, Arkansas can enforce more stringent regulations along it, officials have said. The state’s list of impaired bodies of water is updated every two years and approved by the federal Environmental Protection Agency.

They contend that additional mining operations could raise water temperatures along the creek and thereby impair fish reproduction.

Dunaway said it was unfortunate that the state couldn’t protect waterways before they become impaired.

“They know these activities are destroying our stream, but they don’t have the power to do anything about it,” he said of regulators. Referring to the damage on Crooked Creek, he said, “I’m fearful we’re going to see this happen to other streams.”