Opening of Rock Creek mine moving forward

Two representatives from Revett Minerals Inc. gave a presentation Wednesday in Thompson Falls as to the status of the Rock Creek Mine they plan to open in north Sanders County, saying they only want to be “good neighbors and part of the community.” Part of their contribution to the community will be the addition of about 300 new jobs.

Bill Orchow, Revett president and CEO, opened the presentation to a meager crowd in the Thompson Falls High School gym. He said their plan Wednesday was to present where the company is with the Rock Creek project, give an update on the Troy Mine and answer any questions members of the community had. He said the Rock Creek project is in the litigation stage of the process.

“We're in court right now,” Orchow said. “That's where we need to be.” Orchow said litigation is just one of the necessary steps a mine inevitably goes through before beginning operation. He said the judge should make a decision soon and hopefully they will be on the ground late spring or early summer.

Orchow also gave a brief insight into the history of Revett Minerals and how they came to be involved in Troy and Rock Creek. The company formed in April 1999 in Spokane by a few individuals who had an interest in silver. They purchased both the Troy mine and the Rock Creek site, which is located east of Troy. Revett focused on Troy first because they decided getting that mine up and running would be the way to start covering their costs.

In 2003 Revett received a favorable Record of Decision for the development of the Rock Creek Mine from the U.S. Forest Service and the Montana Department of Environmental Quality. That decision is the permit to develop and is under challenge in court.

Orchow handed the floor over to Carson Rife, vice president of operations for Revett, who explained the timeline for Rock Creek, illustrated the mining methods and discussed the environmental safeguards. Rife said that because they are dealing with the same rock characteristics as with the Troy mine, they have about 20 years of monitoring data they can refer to.

As for the environmental safeguards, the company is required to apply a number of protection practices, built in thanks to studies that have been done since 1987. One safeguard is a bear mitigation, or relief, program designed to benefit grizzly bear habitat. Rife described the bear mitigation program Revett is implementing as “extensive.”

“It's more than just an offsetting plan,” Rife said. “It's a total recovery plan for the ecosystem.”

Rife and Orchow said the program is probably more comprehensive and large-scale than compared to the amount of damage they will do to the land with the mine.

The next step for Revett at the Rock Creek site is to conduct an evaluation audit and come up with a revised technical and economic feasibility study. That process is projected to take about two years. The larger construction of facilities would then take another couple of years and Orchow said it should be about four to five years before the company is actually producing a product.

Orchow said the hiring of the 300 positions would happen steadily as the company moved along in this four to five year process. He said the jobs would be “high-quality” with good pay and benefits. Orchow said they are telling people salaries would run at about $45,000 per year but that number is probably low because of a worldwide demand for mine workers, and he expects salaries to be higher than that.

Orchow said the important thing for the members of Sanders County to know is that their mining process is “clean” and necessary.

“What we do is produce a product that is needed,” Orchow said. “If people believe we need the product then we should mine. The issue is not mining, you've got to look beyond.”

Orchow and Rife expect some of the jobs will be taken by people outside of northwestern Montana but they expect most of the hiring for Rock Creek will be from Sanders and Lincoln Counties.

Orchow and Rife are working out the details for a community meeting in Noxon similar to the one Wednesday. They expect to hold the meeting in late April and will announce the date and time when they have it scheduled.