Attorney recommends no intergovernmental agreement with Howard and Colfax for sand mines
By LeAnn R. Ralph
TOWN OF HOWARD — The Town of Howard’s attorney is recommending not entering into an intergovernmental sand mining agreement between the Town of Howard and the Town of Colfax.
The Howard Town Board had met with the town’s attorney in May to discuss negotiations with EOG Resources, and the attorney recommended not having an intergovernmental agreement between Howard and the Town of Colfax, said Vernon Schindler, town chair, at the Howard Town Board’s June 6 meeting.
Representatives for the Town of Colfax Plan Commission had attended the Howard Town Board’s May 2 meeting to ask if the Town of Howard would be willing to enter into an agreement to extend Howard’s mining ordinance to cover the Town of Colfax.
The Town of Colfax also would be willing to cover the Town of Howard with the Town of Colfax’s nonmetallic mining ordinance, said Johnne Smalley, representing the Town of Colfax Plan Commission, at the Howard Town Board’s May meeting.
Although no one mentioned any specifics at either the May or June meting, presumably the Town of Colfax was asking for protections for the town’s residents because of the proposed 1,300-acre Albertville Valley sand mine in the Town of Howard.
Some residents in the Town of Colfax will be directly across the road from the proposed Albertville Valley sand mine.
The 1,300-acre mine site stretches north and south along the Chippewa County and Dunn County line directly east of the intersection of county Highway N and county Highway A.
The mine site is expected to include a wet processing plant, a dry processing plant, rail car storage area and a rail loading facility.
The Town of Howard’s attorney did not think the agreement would work out very well since Howard and Colfax are in two different counties, Schindler said at the June meeting.
The Howard Town Board does not yet have a developer’s agreement for the Albertville Valley mine.
Lee Boland, Town of Colfax resident, asked if the Town of Howard knew the timetable for developing the Albertville Valley sand mine.
Schindler said the Town of Howard knew nothing about the Albertville Valley mine’s development schedule.
Chippewa County Land Conservation and Forestry Management held a public hearing on the reclamation plan for the proposed Albertville Valley sand mine in July of 2015.
Chippewa County approved the reclamation permit for the Albertville valley mine in December of 2015.
The nonmetallic mine reclamation permit required Northern Sands, the company that was proposing to develop the mine, to complete an assessment of the biological resources at the mine site along with an inventory of the seeps, springs, wetlands and surface waters located within the mine boundaries and adjacent properties.
The original deadline for submitting the reports was July 31, 2016, although the deadline was subsequently extended to December 31, 2017.
Members of the Howard Town Board have expressed hesitancy in the past about issuing a nonmetallic mining license for the Albertville Valley sand mine if Paul VanEijl of Northern Sands were involved in any part of the operation.
The Howard Town Board has since been assured that Red Flint Group would be the mine operator, even though VanEijl had signed the nonmetallic mine reclamation permit.
