Valentine Mining Company Fails Again: Lawrence County Rejects Spearfish Canyon Gold Mine Proposal

The Lawrence County Commission shows some good sense and again votes down a proposal to mine the rim of Spearfish Canyon for gold. In a unanimous vote Tuesday, the Lawrence County Commission told Valentine Mining Company, LLC, that its application for a conditional use permit was too vague to justify approval:

Commissioner Brandon Flanagan said normally when the county receives CUPs, they contain a lot of detail.

“And they’re supposed to,” he said. “This one is just ‘permit what we got and we’ll figure out the rest as we go.’ I’ve got a problem with that … I think Commissioner Johnson said it perfectly. When Homestake owned the majority of private ground in the Canyon, that 80s permit was granted on a different set of conditions, a paradigm shift.”

Johnson said that the commission has approved a number of similar operations across the county.

“And I’m not sure if any one of them would’ve been at this location, that we would’ve passed it,” he said. “I think some of the same concerns would have been there” [Jaci Conrad Pearson, “Lawrence County Rejects Gold Mine,” Black Hills Pioneer, 2020.11.11].

The commission took public comment prior to its vote: four members of the public spoke in favor, while around 60 spoke against. The commissioners all say they support mining, just not this insufficiently planned mining.

And remember: Valentine has been working on plans to mine in the Canyon for eight years. They’ve had time to figure their plan out.

But maybe we reach a point where we stop squeezing every penny from the earth. Maybe we say that, in some places, we don’t care how detailed or profitable or careful your plan is; we’re just done blasting holes in nature’s beauty. Leave Spearfish Canyon alone: there are other places to dig holes for shiny rocks. In the Canyon itself, there are other ways to make money, like renting cabins and fat-tire bikes.