Ulterior motives of mining foes

To the editor:

As a longtime worker in the Danville/Pittsylvania County area and as a Southside Virginia resident, I read with interest the opinion column written by Ben Davenport Jr., "Foundation: Let’s study reports" (Jan. 15, page A8). Writing as chairman of the Future of the Piedmont Foundation, Davenport touts what he sees as his organization’s good works and then, in a single blow against every Southside wage earner and worker, he declares that his proposes that the General Assembly establish a commission to study the study and then come up with another report.

How long would Davenport and the other "economic developers" have us put off this tremendous economic boost to our area and, more to the point, why do he and his big-business pals really want to stall it? The answer is not complicated.

It all goes back to the same cast of characters the public met when Danville Regional Medical Center was sold to create the $200 million Danville Regional Foundation that is now controlled by some of the same folks who sold the hospital. They were known as "The Boys at the Bank," and we all know how well the hospital sale worked out for us. We were equally stunned when the DRF last year handed out more than $500,000 to pay a North Carolina consulting firm to study the uranium project — a flagrant waste of our hospital money since the state of Virginia was already sponsoring a nearly identical study.

So, when the bank boys now tell us that we need to wait another year and study the study of the uranium mine, I have to ask why these "economic development" people are working so hard to delay or kill this thing. The answer, to me, is so obvious that it really is amazing. And it all has to do with keeping our wages low and their profits high.

When this uranium mine goes forward, it is going to hit this crowd hard. A waste truck driver working for Davenport will easily double or triple his pay driving trucks at the mine. A heavy equipment operator in construction work now will also easily double or triple his pay at the mine. Thus, some, if not all, of these men are going to have to pay their workers more to keep them if the mine gets approved.

This, then, is the real reason for their opposition to the mine. My fellow Southside workers, it’s also what’s in it for us. We will be the real beneficiaries of this mine. Our wages and benefits will go up. Our standard of living will go up. We must fight this attempt by these people to keep us down, to keep paying us peanuts. We must get this mine approved.