[Coach_Owens87]

As Paul Harvey says Here's the rest of the story. If you have ever read any of Ken Wards stories you will notice that they are all one sided, he is anti-coal and this one is no different, Ward only gave a few quotes from Mr. Harden. He is some background on Mr. Harden, John is a minister, and pastor of a church located within site of Hobets Job 21, he is also a longtime resident of this community, he has a degree in Mechincal Engineering, and is very close to having a degree in Electrical Engineering. John talked about how much better the water quaility is now than before the mining started, he also talked about the reclaimation on Hobet's Job 21, the awards they have won, the numerous wetlands created, the hardwood trees that are growing on these reclaimed sites, yet Mr. Ward failed to mention these comments and others, only quoting comments that he could try to put a spin on. As for his comment on the Grand Canyon, he was referring to an active mine site and not a reclaimed site. In case you've never been to an active mine site you can go to any Anti-Coal site they have hundreds of pictures of active sites they claimed to be reclaimed sites, or a active mine site will look similar to a major highway under construction.

Again, the development, if any of land after mining has been completed falls on the land owner and not the coal company.

Good Day

Every issue will have articles released that are very one sided or misleading, I wont disagree there. And im sure that the article I read

Im sure that Mr. Harden is a great person, and it's great that he has accomplished the things he has done is his life. But where not debating his life, were debating MTR. I'm glad he believes the water quality has improved in his community, but that doesn't happen very often. There are hundreds of cases of wells drying up orbeing polluted, and it has been proven that water downstream from mine sites typically have high levels of toxins, and decreased aquatic life.

Winning awards for reclamation doesn't mean much to me. The awards are given from mine companies, there is no way they can put the land back to the state is was before mining, so such awards are meaningless to me.
Destroying thousands of acres of mixed mesophytic forest, and then putting in a small wetlands area, and planting a couple hundred trees does not offset the damage caused during mining, and does not impress me, or change my mind on MTR.

I have been to many active mine sites, I actually visited one today. I had to take photos for a humanities course I am taking.

I oppose the methods used for creating roads in this region, becuase as you already stated it uses the same methods as MTR, although roads don't cause near as much damage as MTR sites. They're re-routing a section of KY 15 in Breathitt county just outside of Jackson, the new route is going to be 4 lanes, and cuts off about 1 mile from the previous route. I dont think this new road was really necessary, and it's a really big eye soar, which makes me hate driving that route when I go to Lex.