Printed in the May issue of Mining Engineering magazine:
SAFETY SHARE: Across the country we have experienced the Spring tornados and rains. Many SME members are avid campers, hikers and love the outdoors. Recently, in Kentucky a young mother of three, camping with her husband and sons was killed when a large tree limb fell onto their tent during a storm. High waters made rescue difficult because of where they had placed their campsite. The take away is to check your surroundings and anticipate hazards to the best of your ability when in the outdoors.
Since the SME Annual Conference & Expo in February, I have been traveling to many other meetings on behalf of SME. PDAC in Toronto, Platts Coal Properties and Investments in Florida, AUSIMM’s PACRIM conference in Hong Kong where Dave Kanagy and I met with our GMPA partners, the Minnesota Section meeting and the St. Louis Section’s annual dinner. Each of these meetings has helped the focus of my year as president and provided fresh input of ideas and suggestions.
When I attended the Minnesota meeting, I flew into Minneapolis and drove to Duluth. Along the interstate a billboard caught my eye, that asked is “Sulfide Mining Right for Minnesota?” Below that statement was www.MiningTruth.org. When I checked out the website I found it was far from the truth. Attending various presentations at the meeting, I got a feel for the issues faced in that part of the United States, which are very similar to issues I have
seen in my experience and heard about in other parts of the country. The Minnesota section scheduled a session on business ethics “Promoting ethical cultures and preparing leaders to make ethical decisions” to fulfill a requirement of state licensure boards.
During a question and answer session after her presentation, I asked the presenter, Rev. Dr. Karen Schuder, how do we as engineers and scientists, who are bound by professional codes of conduct, deal with activists who use the tactics of fear, exaggeration and misinformation by making outrageous and untrue statements that are repeated so often that they begin to be accepted as fact by many in the public, and especially in the media. The answer given was somewhat circular logic, but the bottom line is that we as professionals must continue being ethical in attempting to gain the public’s trust.
The Sierra Club was started with a noble purpose. I have friends who are members probably as do many other SME members. Unfortunately, as we know, the Sierra Club, and many other groups, have engaged in successful, but unethical campaigns against virtually all new major mining projects in the United States by painting doomsday scenarios. I have questioned the ethical nature of many of their tactics. A friend recently posted something on Facebook that the Sierra Club had originally posted, which said, “What does your activism mean to you?” with a nature photo and a quote from Alice
Walker, “Activism is the rent I pay for living on the planet.”
I don’t think that the Sierra Club or any other group has an exclusive on activism. We in the mining sector are very good at “preaching to the choir.” There is nothing wrong with calling ourselves activists for our profession. In the end it is the right and ethical thing to do. Visiting several local sections has also reinforced my thought that local sections are very important in our quest to improve the public perceptions of mining. Tim Arnold, 2016 SME President, and I are kicking off an ad hoc committee to study how SME can better serve the local sections and improve the value to members. My other challenge to the local section members is to be an activist to help us counter the widespread misinformation. Local sections are the front lines in these battles. I feel that everything SME is doing is helping in the public perception of mining arena. It is a message that I am trying to spread at each of the meetings that I attend.
Both Jessica Kogel and John Marsden have discussed this issue in their columns over the last two years, asking members to be an advocate or a voice for mining. I have to echo their suggestions and continue asking members to be engaged. Nothing like this happens overnight. The goal this year is to develop better strategies for SME and its members to use. We already have many of the tools.
Until next month, be safe out there.