The town's adoption of Western Excelsior Corp.'s Fugitive Particulate Control plan was held off until the mill's air permits are processed. The town board will also write a letter to the Colorado Department of Health and Environment to ask for a written comment period, as urged by environmental group Concerned Citizens of Riverside (CROR).
The plan has already been approved by CDPHE. The department is processing air quality permits for Western Excelsior.
Temporarily abandoning the typical board meeting format, which keeps a time limit on citizen comments and discourages a back-and-forth between citizens and the town board and CROR also hashed out grievances against each other at the June 24 town board meeting.
Both sides indicated their frustration with a lack of constructive dialog: CROR feels their requests and complaints are going unanswered; and the board feels like CROR won't be satisfied until they shut down the mill - action the body doesn't have authority to take.
Before the discussion, members of CROR one by one spoke out against the seven options that Town Administrator Andrea Phillips drafted based on feedback she received from the town board workshops, saying they appeared to "have been written by someone who works for Western Excelsior, not the town."
The options ranged from adding vegetation and a berm to capture more particulates to more extreme measures like paying to move Western Excelsior. One option entailed a plan to monitor air quality - a frequent request of CROR.
"We're trying to work with residents and the company, and every option in my report is completely torn apart. It seems like the residents are not willing to have an open and honest discussion," said a frustrated Phillips. "This is something that keeps me up at night. ... I'm trying very hard to find some good solutions."
Mayor pro-tem Todd Kearns echoed Phillips' sentiments.
"There is not a person sitting in this room that does not want a good outcome from this. It's hard when it feels like we're being a little bit hung out to dry by the CROR. ... I think that at some point we have to establish better dialog with the three groups."
CROR president Chip Tuthill explained that the board didn't want to see Western Excelsior closed, and it had no personal complaints against the board but that the options seemed to ignore the group's repeated requests.
"We're not against the board, we're not against Andrea. What we're pointing out is that the entire staff report didn't include the ten months of comments that CROR had submitted. That report solely projected the interests of Western Excelsior. What we really want to see at this point is the town to adopt a wait-and-see attitude," said Tuthill.
