Congresswoman Shelley Capito has joined with co-sponsors Barr, Shimkus, Lummis, Stivers, Wagner, Johnson, Griffith, Whitfield, McKinley, and Latta to introduce the Coal Jobs Protection Act in the House.  The bill number is H.R. 1829.

The bill proposes controls on the EPA in order to prevent the withdrawal (veto) of permits after issuance, as occurred with the Spruce permit.  A companion bill in the U.S Senate is being sponsored by Senator Mitch McConnell.

The WV Board of Coal Mine Health & Safety promulgated an "Emergency Rule" designed to close a major loop hole in the State's mandatory drug testing program.

The Board's "Emergency Rule", which becomes effective on July 1, extends the reporting and decertification requirements in current state law to all individuals who fail a drug or alcohol test prescribed under state law.  Heretofore, only cases involving a positive drug test that resulted in discharge, were reported to the Office of Miners’ Health, Safety & Training for disciplinary action and suspension of mining certification privileges.

The Association filed comments earlier this week regarding the proposal from the federal Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) to add streams to the 303(d) list of impaired waters for the State of West Virginia.

EPA published a notice in the Federal Register on Monday, April 8, 2013 in which it proposed adding 255 additional stream segments to the list of impaired waters for the State of West Virginia.  On March 25, 2013 EPA notified the state by letter that it was partially disapproving the state’s proposed 303(d) list of impaired waters.  EPA’s partial disapproval was based on the state’s decision not to place additional streams on the list of impaired waters for biological impairment using the West Virginia Stream Condition Index (WV SCI).