Reports from Maine, Canada, Utah
- According to the Mount Desert Islander, Harold MacQuinn Inc. and Freshwater Stone have appealed the Mount Desert, Maine, planning board’s denial of their application for a license to resume quarrying in Hall Quarry. The town’s Zoning Board of Appeals has not yet scheduled a hearing on the appeal. Meanwhile, a number of quarry opponents have filed a “cross-appeal” claiming that the Planning Board should have cited more reasons for denying the quarrying license.
- Kingston, Ontario, Canada, city council rejected a proposed agreement that would have permitted the expansion of a quarry on Unity Road. Council instead passed a motion in opposition to a requested official plan and zoning bylaw amendments, according to the Kingston Whig Standard. The motion that was passed included 19 reasons that justified council opposition to the planned expansion and directed city staff to prepare for a hearing at the Ontario Land Tribunal. The planned expansion has been before the city since 2015 and involves the proposed expansion of Coco Properties Corp.’s quarry on Unity Road. The quarry is currently 57 hectares, but the company applied to expand the quarry to 144 hectares.
- A Utah company has filed a lawsuit seeking to invalidate Salt Lake County, Utah’s, recent ban on mining, according to the Salt Lake Tribune. Tree Farm LLC owns land under Grandeur Peak, where it seeks to carve open a pit for extracting and crushing stone needed in Utah’s construction boom. But before the company could apply for conditional use permits, the Salt Lake County Council barred new mines in the Wasatch foothills. In a suit filed May 11 in Salt Lake City’s 3rd District Court, Tree Farm, owned by Salt Lake City developer Jesse Lassley, contends not only did the county overstep its authority by banning mines, but Tree Farms holds a historic right to mine in Parleys Canyon because property it owns elsewhere in the canyon has been mined for decades.