Crowsnest Pass can’t survive on tourism

By Letter to the Editor on August 5, 2021.

Editor:
I am writing in support of the clean coal initiative for Alberta, specifically the Riversdale Grassy Mountain project in the Crowsnest Pass, Alberta. Alberta is a resource province and this area of Alberta is a great source of metallurgical coal needed in the production of steel. The world needs steel.
Wouldn’t it be better to source that coal from an environmentally and ethically responsible company that will also reclaim the land from an existing coal mine?
The Crowsnest Pass needs industry! We cannot survive on tourism like Banff and Canmore.
We need our young people to move back here to revitalize our community. We need more higher paying jobs for them to come back to. We do not need mayors from other towns and cities in Southern Alberta determining what is best for us. Riversdale Resources has contributed a huge amount of dollars in this community.
They have donated to many user groups and reinvented our local golf course.
Since they are a Category 4 mine, we trusted the process that Riversdale has gone through the past several years to get this project up and running.
Little did we know that we would be sacrificed and used as a political football to satisfy a bunch of environmentalists who have no ties or investment in our community.
I am imploring you to show both sides of this issue and report the actual facts regarding selenium mitigation being practised in the Alberta and B.C. coal mining industry.
June Vastenhout
Crowsnest Pass