Quarry ‘battle isn’t over’

By Jean Cole

March 29, 2008 08:00 pm

— Editor’s Note: This is the first in a two-part series about the impact of a rock quarry to be located in Tanner.
An effort to stop a rock quarry from locating in the Tanner community failed this week but the battle isn’t over, said one local official.
Limestone County Commission Chairman David Seibert said Friday he is working with the local legislative delegation “on some similar legislation” to the bills that failed to make it out of a Senate committee Tuesday for a vote on the Senate floor.
“There is more legislation that hasn’t come around yet,” Seibert said. “Although I wouldn’t want to comment on exactly what it is, it would be something similar.”
Rogers Group hopes to get a permit from the Alabama Department of Environmental Management in Montgomery to open a rock quarry off Laughmiller Road in the Tanner area. The company wants to close its existing quarry in the Cross Key community in eastern Limestone County to be closer to its customers.
Opponents have said it would cause noise pollution and property damage due to blasting, and water and air pollution from dust. They have also said blasting could drive away wildlife at nearby Swan Creek Wildlife Management Area and trigger a shutdown of nearby Browns Ferry Nuclear Plant. Tracy McLin, who lives off Laughmiller Road, garnered more the 1,000 signatures of people opposing the quarry.
The first attempt to stop the quarry through legislation failed. The Legislation 1 Committee voted Tuesday against the bills sponsored by Sen. Tom Butler, D-Madison, and co-sponsored by Sen. Arthur Orr, R-Decatur.
One bill would have allowed the Limestone County Commission to regulate rock quarries within the county and outside Athens city limits. The other would have prevented blasting within 10 miles of a nuclear plant. (Rogers Group has said it has two sites closer to nuclear plants than this site would be.)
Voting for the measures Tuesday were Orr and Sen. Harri Anne Smith, R-Slocomb.
Voting against the measures were committee chairman Sen. Zeb Little, D-Cullman, Sen. Lowell Barron, D-Fyffe, and Sen. Hank Sanders, D-Selma.
Speaking in favor of the bills were Seibert; Reps. Mac McCutcheon, R-Capshaw, and Henry White, D-Athens; and Athens Mayor Dan Williams.
In a move that irked Limestone County officials, Morgan County Commissioner Stacy George attended the committee meeting and spoke favorably of Rogers Group and the quarry it created in Lacey’s Spring, which is in George’s district. Some Limestone residents and several local officials thought George should have stayed out of Limestone County’s business.
“I have gotten a lot of calls about it,” George told The News Courier Friday. “If I offended people up here or the commission, I didn’t want to do that,” he said. “I wasn’t for or against the legislation. It doesn’t matter to me whether they build a quarry or not. I was just sharing information about the company – that they have been good to us. They are the best thing that’s ever happened to Lacey’s Spring. I would not be in support of them if I hadn’t dealt with them.”
George supplied a press release, with Rogers Group letterhead, listing the company’s various donations within his district. Some of them include giving $3,000 cash to a fire victim; donating five loads of limestone material to be auctioned during a benefit; donating more than 200 tons of limestone material for newly constructed Little Gethsemane Church; giving gift cards to Lacey’s Spring School Parent-Teacher Organization/Talented and Gifted Program to increase participation; paving Parks Chapel Road at a cost of $200,000; holding a community luncheon at B&J Family Restaurant for more than 400 people; spending $7,200 a year to maintain Lacey’s Spring Community Ball Field.
He said Rogers Group did not ask him to come to the meeting. He said he was in Montgomery already to speak with legislators about his displeasure over the passage of electronic bingo.
George said he has accepted a total of $1,000 in campaign contributions from Rogers Group – $500 in 2000 and $500 in 2004.
“That is not why I spoke about them,” he said. “I want Limestone County to know that they should demand these things if they put a quarry here.”
Butler could not be reached for comment Friday on the new legislation the delegation is creating.
Currently, Limestone County leaders cannot control whether a company builds a rock quarry, a high school or any other facility in the county, as long as it meets environmental regulations, because the county does not have home rule. Home rule would give the county zoning control. Limestone voters rejected the idea of home rule in 2004.