Leggett: Potential Pebble Mine development in Alaska only threatening area's salmon, trout

I don’t know how much you know about Alaska and its politics, but what you should know is that things are really screwed up in the 49th state, and I honestly believe they’ve gone too far. Are they crazy?

I’m talking about the Pebble Mine, which has been on the drawing boards for years and started out being fought by virtually everyone with a stake in using the lands and water of southwest Alaska for recreation.

You couldn’t go anywhere without seeing signs featuring a circle with a slash through it and the words “STOP PEBBLE MINE.” The people of the state were almost universally opposed to the mine, which had been on the drawing boards for years and was predicted to be the ruination of the trout and salmon fishing in southwest Alaska.

Things bounced around for several years, with an early move by then-President Donald Trump putting the mine back on the list for approval and then it being taken off again. Last week, though, the Alaska version of Mr. Toad’s Wild Ride broke loose again when the state sued the Environmental Protection Agency and asked the U.S. Supreme Court to intervene and order the mine be given approval once again.

Here’s the only thing I can say about that: Are they crazy? Think about the salmon and trout of the Bristol Bay region, where the mine would be located in the literal mouth of the rivers where mine proponents have said they’ll dig deep into the gravel and silt in search of gold and copper.

I realize that some people have invested huge sums of money into planning and getting approval for the mine so they can install solid gold toilets in their solid gold bathrooms. To hell with the fish that are going to die due to polluted water and that have been migrating to that very spot for thousands of years.

And I freely admit that issues such as this generally break down into camps for and against, but does anybody really think that potentially ruining the finest fishing in the world is worth taking this chance with nature? Environmental disaster is lurking out there in the dark underground of the river deltas.

It’s palpable and real, with too much desperate pushing to see it through to the end. Are they crazy?

I fish there and I truly don’t like it. It’s stupid and just another in a long line of disasters engineered by people who care more about their personal pocketbooks than whether another bison is left on the prairie or a beaver is left on a mountain river.

Are they crazy?

This article originally appeared on Austin American-Statesman: Alaska's salmon, trout populations being threatened in Bristol Bay