Legislative Priorities

Coal Leaders Discuss Cap-and-Trade, EPA Concerns

Chris Hamilton and Michael Carey warn that pending federal "cap-and-trade" legislation and increased U.S. Environmental Protection Agency intervention will cripple the coal industry.

Hamilton, president of the West Virginia Coal Association, and Carey, president of the Ohio Coal Association, brought their concerns to Wheeling Tuesday during a Wheeling Area Chamber of Commerce Business/Coal Forum Luncheon at WesBanco Arena, where Wheeling Mayor Andy Mckenzie and chamber President Terry Sterling welcomed attendees. Hamilton focused much of his attention on what he called "the EPA's assault on coal and war on mountaintop mining."

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Web Sites Update

The West Virginia Coal Association website, www.wvcoal.com, yielded another superb month.  The page had visitors from over 68 countries and territories totaling 5,269 visits, overall.  The site experienced over 12,000 individual page views with 78% of the visitors arriving via search engines.
 
The Friends of Coal website, www.friendsofcoal.org, again surpassed the previous month with over 2,600 visitors from across the globe.  Each visitor had 3.61 one-visits, which means people continue to come back and visit us.  We were met with over 78% new visits and over 9,600 individual page views.

FOC Golf Classic

In conjunction with the Bluefield Coal Show, there will be a Friends of Coal Golf Classic at the Fincastle Country Club in Bluefield, VA on September 15th.  Contributions will benefit The Wade Center.  The Wade Center exists to promote and nurture the growth of the children, teens and young adults of the Greater Bluefield community through practical programs and mentoring relationships.
            For sponsorship and participation information contact Cathy Buzzo (This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it.) or The Wade Center at www.wadecenter.com.

Wagner Joins MSHA

Dr. Greg Wagner, formerly the head of NIOSH’s division of respiratory disease surveillance has joined MSHA to serve as the political Deputy Assistant Secretary.  During his time with NIOSH, Greg was a vocal advocate for, among other things, the need to reduce miner’s exposure to both coal mine dust and silica.  Greg was one of the principal authors of NIOSH’s criteria document recommending a halving of the respirable coal dust standard and has written extensively on mine worker respiratory disease.  In his new position, which does not require Senate confirmation, Greg will be the principal advisor to the Assistant Secretary and will serve in that role when required due to the absence of the Assistant Secretary.

Special Session This Week

This week’s Special Session of the Legislature, as called by Governor Manchin, approved a change to the State’s Unemployment Compensation law so unemployed West Virginians could receive jobless benefit payments for a longer period of time.  The law change enables the State to capture federal jobless funds.
  1. Stream Buffer Zone Rule Update
  2. New Members
  3. Committee Chairmenn
  4. Waxman-Markey

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