Mine’s jobs promise lags

“The whole thing makes me mad. Big company didn’t look out for little community.”
—Peter Goodwin, Former NYCO CEO

Five years ago voters changed the New York Constitution to give an Adirondack mining business the right to dig in the state Forest Preserve, in part to save local jobs.

So far, it hasn’t worked out that way.

Since the 2013 vote, NYCO Minerals has sold its operations and assets to an industrial-minerals conglomerate called Imerys. This Paris-based company has not taken advantage of the opportunity afforded by the constitutional amendment and instead has laid off or reassigned workers at its mine in the town of Lewis, angered union representatives, and irked people concerned about the economic vibrancy of the region.

“The whole thing makes me mad,” said Peter Goodwin, NYCO’s former president and CEO. “Big company didn’t look out for the little community.”

READ PAST ARTICLES:
APA PANEL VOTES
TO ALLOW DRILLING
IN WILDERNESS

Others also are troubled by the developments, including several elected leaders who campaigned for Proposition 5 at NYCO’s behest. The proposal, which passed 53 percent to 47 percent, authorized the state to give the company two hundred acres in the Jay Mountain Wilderness in exchange for other lands of equal or greater value. It was sold as a job-saving measure, but critics argued that