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Serving Northern St. Louis County, Minnesota

Missing the real issues

Unrelenting focus on PolyMet drowns out discussion of far more important issues

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Given the almost singular focus on PolyMet Mining’s proposed copper-nickel mine near Hoyt Lakes in this fall’s political races, one might believe that the region’s economic future somehow hinges on its approval. It doesn’t, which is why other, far more important, issues should get the attention they deserve.

Whether PolyMet Mining’s proposed copper-nickel mine near Hoyt Lakes opens, or not, will make very little difference to the economic future of our region. It’s worth recalling that in 2001, when LTV Mining permanently shuttered its taconite mine located adjacent to PolyMet’s NorthMet deposit, it laid off 1,300 miners. PolyMet, if it opened today, would employ just 300.

Back in 2000, when LTV employed 1,300 miners, no one claimed that the Iron Range’s economy was thriving— far from it. Yet somehow, hope springs eternal that the coming of PolyMet and its 300 jobs will herald an economic renaissance to rival the glory days of taconite.

Still the politicians make virtually every political campaign that shows up on the Iron Range this season a referendum on PolyMet. Never mind that virtually every candidate out there, from county commissioners to congressmen, says they support the project, with caveats that vary only slightly. The GOP candidate for attorney general even cited it in attacking Attorney General Lori Swanson in a recent radio spot— as if she, somehow, had something to do with the whole thing.

Most DFLers, from Gov. Dayton to Congressman Nolan to Sen. Franken, say they want to see the mine open, but that it must be done right, i.e. without significant contamination and with adequate financial assurance. That’s essentially the same message that members of the Iron Range delegation have been signaling for years.

But that’s, apparently, not good enough according to the Republican candidates who have passed through the area this election season. Most have suggested in one form or another that the permitting delays are all part of a DFL-sponsored conspiracy to delay a final decision until after the 2014 election. The unstated implication of this conspiracy theory is that, following the election, the DFL candidates will collectively change their tunes on the mine.

That is patently ridiculous, but reality rarely stands in the way of candidates hoping to tap that deep, and increasingly rich, vein of cynicism that underlies so much of our politics today.

GOP gubernatorial candidate Jeff Johnson said he’d put PolyMet on the front burner, as if Gov. Dayton has allowed it to languish with inattention. Of course, we saw how effectively the Republican approach worked in 2009. After four years of oversight from the Pawlenty administration, the initial draft environmental impact statement went down in flames. That’s often what happens when your administration views federal pollution regulators, such as the Environmental Protection Agency, as an enemy to be ignored, rather than as a partner to be involved throughout the process. Gov. Dayton, whose administration assumed office less than four years ago, took a more constructive approach and is now nearing the completion of the environmental review, this time with the EPA on board.

As DNR Commissioner Tom Landwehr put it recently, and accurately, it takes less time to do it right, than to do it quickly— because when you do it quickly, you get to start all over again. This is a lesson that some folks figured out with the first misfire. The GOP’s candidates are hoping it’s a lesson most Iron Rangers missed.

This shouldn’t be the central issue of every campaign up here. In the end, neither our politicians, nor those of us who live here, have much to say over whether PolyMet or any other copper-nickel mine opens any time soon. The real decisions on those questions will be made in corporate boardrooms, most likely on other continents, and are dependent on the vagaries of the international economy. They won’t care, or even know, who we elect as attorney general.

In the meantime, we’ve wasted another election season in which we could be discussing real issues. If you don’t like Obamacare, what’s your plan to fix what’s wrong with health care? How are we going to deal with the nation’s growing disparity in income and wealth, which is eviscerating the middle class? How do we guarantee an intact Social Security and Medicare system for retirees and future retirees? And how are we going to fund our roads, our nursing homes, and our schools?

These are the issues that will make a difference to our lives. And they get short shrift as the candidates duke it out over a relative non-issue over which they have very little control.

Talk about a missed opportunity.