MCCUNE, Kan. (AP) - Coal mining, a boon to southeast Kansas, left in its wake more than 350 abandoned mine sites in Cherokee, Crawford and Bourbon counties.
Using mining company reclamation money available for the past 20 years, the Kansas Department of Health and Environment has teamed up with the Kansas Department of Wildlife, Parks and Tourism and begun checking off the highest priorities for cleanup - $10 million in projects to date. Some of the work is on private land, but much of the work has taken place on public land.
Wildlife officials say there have been many benefits from the effort beyond just improved safety: The work in Southeast Kansas also has improved access and habitat at what has become a hot spot for outdoor enthusiasts - the Mined Land Wildlife Area, The Joplin Globe reports (https://bit.ly/1k2YQi1 ).
At 14,500 acres, it is one of the biggest pieces of public land in the region. It contains 1,500 acres of surface water and 13,000 acres of land - nearly all of it surface-mined for coal from the 1920s through the mid-1970s.
The pits are home to largemouth bass, walleye, crappie, trout and more, and some pits are managed to favor certain species.
Native and cool-season grasses dominate 4,000 acres, with the remaining 9,000 acres of land covered with bur oak, pin oak, walnut, hickory and hackberry, and a thick understory of dogwood, honeysuckle, poison ivy and blackberry.
All told, the Mined Land Wildlife Area attracts 300,000 visitors per year.
Improvements to the land are mandated by the federal government, via the 1977 Surface Mining Control and Reclamation Act, and are financed by mining companies that pay a tax of 31.5 cents per ton for surface-mined coal, 15 cents per ton for coal mined underground and 10 cents per ton for lignite, a softer coal.
The federal government then distributes 80 percent to states such as Kansas that have an approved reclamation program. The remaining 20 percent is used to respond to emergencies such as landslides, land subsidence and fires, and to carry out high priority cleanups in states without approved programs.
To obtain the funds, Kansas was required to submit an inventory of projects. Because the majority of coal mining in the state was done in the three-county area, officials look to Southeast Kansas as a place to spend the money.
“We looked for hazards and ranked them,” said Murray Balk, section chief with the KDHE’s surface mining section based in Pittsburg.
Hazards left over from the mining era include dangerous highwalls at pits, some next to county roads, as well as vertical openings (shafts), polluted water and even old tipples, where coal was emptied from mine cars.
Past reclamation projects have included spending $520,000 in 2008 along Kansas Highway 102 to feather steep banks and improve roadways, as well as add boat ramps, plant native grasses and make other improvements. About $1 million was spent in 2009 widening and straightening two miles of roads in the units known as Quail Farm, west of Pittsburg. That project also added three boat ramps at one strip pit, 3,000 tree seedlings, native grasses, an improved dam and spillway, and an intermittent stream.
With the Pheasants Forever organization, the state wildlife department also planted a food plot and feathered the edges of what had been steep strip pits, creating a mile of fishing access.
In 2012, a $1 million reclamation project in an area known as the Whitmore pits improved nearly a mile of interior roads, added three boat ramps and created better public access to nearly a mile of strip pit shoreline. It also added 37 acres of native grasses and wildflowers, 950 tree seedlings and a parking area.
In a current project, $3.5 million is being spent on the Deer Creek pits in Cherokee County. The work involves filling a portion of the pit, which means a loss of 20 surface acres of water, in order to remove a highwall hazard near a roadway. It also will include a new boat ramp and parking area for public access.
Those 20 acres will be replaced by the creation of a wetland and a pond adjacent to the pit.
“There is habitat gained through these projects,” said David Jenkins, site manager of the Mined Land Wildlife Area. “It definitely will mean improved diversity. We’ll have a little bit of everything there.”
Two other projects are in the design phase, and another awaits funding that would be used to realign interior roads.
For some anglers, the reclamation work is welcome.
Tom Pebley, who lives near Kansas City, recently drove to some of the public pits near West Mineral to fish and camp.
He already had channel catfish on his stringer and was hoping to add crappie. “This pit’s nice, but on some of the pits, the edges are too steep. I like flat,” he said.
Sam Moore, a student at Pittsburg State University, said he visits the Whitmore pits about three times a week when the weather is nice.
“I’m a student. I don’t have a boat,” he said as he cast for crappie and bass. “I like the improvements because you have good access on foot. You can have pretty good luck out here as long as you come at the right time of day. Fishing is all about timing.”
But not everyone likes the projects, some of which have been identified at private pits. At a recent public forum in the town of Cherokee, one of the common complaints from those in attendance was their fear that the reclamation work would hurt fishing.
“You’re tearing up fishing habitat,” said Don Scales, who worked for coal companies from 1968 to 1993.
Jenkins, the site manager, said decreasing the size of a fishery doesn’t mean fewer fish.
“And ironically, all of these projects increased fishing access,” he said.
Bob Jones, who owns 250 acres, said he was approached about 25 years ago by representatives of the two state departments about reclamation work at some of his seven strip pits.
“They wanted to fill some of it in. I refused,” he said. “They were going to spend $3 million on it. I told them just put up a guardrail. I fought with a lawyer over it. They’re worried about saving a life, but I say it’s going to make 10 million more mosquitoes. And that’s going to cause West Nile virus.”
Jenkins replied that in a natural wetland, there are enough natural predators that mosquitoes won’t be a problem. And Balk said guardrails on roads near the highwalls are a temporary solution that can in time slip and deteriorate.
Jenkins said that in the years since other projects have been completed, he has documented increased diversity in the area. He said that three or four years after the completion of Deer Creek project - expected to be finished later this year - visitors should expect to see the same there.
“I feel like we’ve put our best foot forward on these projects,” Jenkins said. “It means more fishing access and improved wildlife habitat. We’re doing this for future generations; these are lasting improvements.”
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Information from: The Joplin (Mo.) Globe, https://www.joplinglobe.com
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