Earlier this session, SB 649, a version of the American Legislative Exchange Council's (ALEC) "Environmental Good Samaritan Act" was introduced in West Virginia. The bill is actually pro-mining legislation that provides immunity to mining companies, in exchange for allowing others to do voluntary reclamation of the land and water that the mine had earlier damaged. The bill releases mines from legal liability for harm they might do to people or the environment, and dictates that a mining corporation can not be the subject of a citizen suit. It acknowledges that mining and oil and gas extraction have caused serious pollution that threatens environmental and human health, safety, and welfare, but then asks every legislature to find that their "state does not possess sufficient resources to reclaim all the abandoned lands and to abate the water pollution." ALEC seems to believe that industrial pollution should be remediated not by the state or the company that produced it, but rather by the victims. A "good Samaritan" helps others, but this bill is written for mining companies to help themselves.

Ran 6/21/04