...copper-nickel ore is underground
Dear Editor:
We appreciate the love of the Boundary Waters Canoe Area that Alison Rosengren described in her commentary that recently appeared in the Duluth News Tribune. We like fishing and camping adventure as much as she does. Perhaps even more. As evidence, we point to the fact that we have chosen to make our lives here. We have lived on the edge of the BWCA for years.
Writing as an assignment for her college in Chicago, Ms. Rosengren fails to appreciate that real people live in the Arrowhead. We have had the opportunity to build prosperous lives here, but only a select few can build a prosperous life based on serving the visitors from Minneapolis, St. Paul, or Chicago, who only come here to vacation.
The rest of us need the kinds of jobs and economic development offered by modern mining operations where starting jobs annually pay $70,000 to $80,000 and generous benefits. That is why many of us who appreciate the opportunities that tourism offers our region also support projects such as Twin Metals Minnesota’s underground mine. The economy of healthy communities in Northeastern Minnesota is dependent upon mining, tourism, and the forest products industry.
Like almost every industry, mining is more protective of the environment today than it was. Alyson and her dad don’t drag canvas tents into the wilderness in birch bark canoes. And the Twin Metals miners won’t be blasting canyons in the wilderness with sticks of dynamite and polluting our air and water.
The underground Twin Metals mine will be built mostly by machines operated by highly trained, and highly paid, technical professionals. Unlike other proposed mines, the copper-nickel ore is underground, and the tailings will be safely stored mostly underground where it came from.
Wilderness visitors and natural resource based industries are the foundations that built Northeastern Minnesota. By working together we can continue to protect our clean water and offer jobs that enhance the economies of our region’s communities.
Gerald M. Tyler
Up North Jobs
Dan M. Waters, Owner
Canadian Waters
