KAMLOOPS — Mayor Peter Milobar and Councillor Tina Lange are coming to the end of their Ontario and Quebec mining town tour.
Councillor Denis Walsh has already returned to Kamloops.
Milobar and Lange are in Sudbury, Ontario today, after visiting Timmins, Ontario and Malartic and Val d’Or, Quebec.
Milobar says the group has learned lessons.
“One thing that has resonated all the way through is that any remediation, or mitigation needs to be really spelled out. There needs to be procedures in place if those targets aren’t met, and even if those targets are being met but still creating an impact what is the phase two of those efforts,” said Milobar.
Milobar adds it’s clear mines placed near communities do not operate the same as mines that are not close to urban areas.
Meantime, Kamloops Councillor Denis Walsh says his visit to a pair of mining towns in Eastern Canada hasn’t budged his opposition to the KGHM-Ajax copper-gold proposal.
Walsh returned yesterday, two days ahead of colleagues Tina Lange and Mayor Peter Milobar.
He says he was most interested to see how Timmins, Ontario and Malartic, Quebec dealt with dust.
Walsh notes both communities are protected from shifting winds.
“They have a policy agreement in Timmins that when the wind blows toward the city the mine stops blasting, and stops some of their activities, if not all of them. In the case of Malartic, it’s legislated by the provincial government the wind issue,” Walsh told CFJC Today.
Walsh notes studies have shown 75 per cent of winds over the Ajax site would blow into the city, and he doesn’t believe an agreement limiting blasting when the wind is doing that would be forthcoming.
He also says Malartic and Timmins are both economically dependant on their mines, but the Kamloops economy is much more diverse.
