I had barely hit the “publish” button on my last post, announcing a Senate committee hearing on Joe Pizarchik’s nomination to be director of the U.S. Office of Surface Mining Reclamation and Enforcement than an alert dropped into my e-mail in-box from the Ohio Valley Environmental Coalition …
OVEC is encouraging its members and supporters to oppose confirmation of Pizarchik to the OSM(RE) post:
Why Joseph Pizarchik Should Not Be Nominated to Head OSMRE
Dear Coalfield Citizens,We are deeply disappointed and concerned that President Obama has nominated Joseph Pizarchik to head the federal Office of Surface Mining, Reclamation and Enforcement (OSMRE). This is a direct blow to the heart of all citizens living in the coalfields throughout the United States – and a victory for coal operators.
Mr. Pizarchik has promoted:
-Valley fills burying streams under piles of coal refuse;
-Destructive longwall mining;
-Decreased citizen participation – and formats for public hearings and forums that are restrictive to citizens;
-Decreased transparency and accountability for the decisions of mining officials;
-The dumping of toxic coal combustion wastes into coal mines, often directly into drinking water supplies, without safeguards; and
-A bonding program that fails to guarantee reclamation of the land or prevent water pollution from coal mining operations.
We need your immediate help in opposing this poor choice to head this important federal agency. The confirmation hearing for Mr. Pizarchik is scheduled for Thursday, August 6, 10:00 am.
Please join us in emailing the US Senate Energy and Natural Resources Committee asking them NOT to confirm Mr. Pizarchik as Director of the Office of Surface Mining, Reclamation and Enforcement (OSMRE).
Thanks for joining with us opposing this poor choice to head OSMRE.
(The above was excerpted from an e-mail by Lisa Graves Marcucci of the Environmental Integrity Project and Aimee Erickson of Citizens Coal Council.)
Remember the easy-action link here.
Subscribe to the Coal Tattoo
[...] This post was Twitted by 304blogs [...]
Please check your facts. None of the above is true about Joe Pizarchik, with the exception of the fact that it is his picture.
I don’t know Joe, but I know many who do know Joe.
I believe Joe is very capable of doing the job…and, hopefully, that he will do it — others have really tried but where unable.
(By the way: You have to be nuts to want that job.)
http://groups.google.com/group/bob-mooney/web/joe-pizarchik
Calling Joe Pizarchik a “coal miner operator insider†is an insult to every family who has had someone working in a mine to support them. Joe is not involved in mine safety and environmental issues pertaining to mines because it was an easy career path or for personal gain. He grew up on a farm with members of his family working in the mines. He knows the importance of mine safety first hand.
Joe is an avid outdoorsman. We disagree about hunting (I hate guns), but we agree that stewardship of the land is critical and that being responsible about our use of what is given to us on this Earth. He uses what he hunts and not for hanging on his wall.
At family gatherings, Joe and I are often off in the corner, isolated as the lawyers in the family. I always enjoy these conversations. I talk about my work in civil rights, disabilities and education law and domestic violence. Joe talks about his passion for environmental projects. Yes, it is true that Joe is married to my sister, but I think we would have eventually met and become friends anyway.
Shortly after he helped the Families of Flight 93 establish a system to prevent the remains of their loved ones from being contaminated by water from abandoned mines, http://www.depweb.state.pa.us/news/lib/news/2008_fall_incommon.pdf Joe told me of the incredible danger posed to the streams and rivers of Pennsylvania by water collected in abandoned mines. Since that time he has worked tirelessly to devise a solution to the problem that is workable.
Since he lacks a magic wand to clear out this drainage, he has to work with government agencies (and this was during the Bush administration) as well as mine owners and operators to restrict and eventually remove this serious threat to our streams and rivers. If he is able to make every stakeholder invested and accountable, how does that make him a bad candidate to do this on a national level, given his successful with experience in working on a state level?
In short, there is no proof linking Joe Pizarchik to any of these allegations – so why not let the President have his nominee, who he sees as a “pragmatic innovatorâ€, give us a shot at real environmental change we can believe in?
Penelope A. Boyd,
Thank you for sharing both your sense of Joe Pizarchik as an individual and for providing specific details about his accomplishments.
As Robert Mooney says, it’s a thankless job. If Joe really does have conservationist and environmentalist sensibilities, it would be a welcome change to see that translated into departmental policy.