Still extracting the details

RICHMOND

It was one of dozens of questions asked Thursday, but the answer underscored how the decision to lift Virginia's ban on uranium mining will likely be made: How many lobbyists work for conservation groups and how many work for Virginia Uranium?

Chris Miller, president of the Piedmont Environmental Council, said his group had two or three lobbyists. Patrick Wales, a project manager for Virginia Uranium, didn't venture a guess.

"We do have lobbyists," he conceded, "and quite a lot of them."

The company does have a lot of them. Fifteen, according to the Virginia Public Access Project.

But that's only part of the story. Records posted at vpap.org show the company has spread $150,650 to political action committees and candidates since 2008. State Sen. Dick Saslaw, the Democratic majority leader, is the biggest beneficiary, with $13,000 in contributions, including $10,000 in 2011.

Earlier this year, the company spent close to $200,000 to take some lawmakers on "fact-finding" trips - one to a former uranium mine in France, another to an active mining operation in a remote region in Canada.

Those trips likely didn't include much information about why mining uranium isn't a good idea at Coles Hill, which is upstream from Lake Gaston, a source of drinking water for about 1 million people, most in South Hampton Roads.

Thursday's forum, sponsored by the Garden Club of Virginia, offered an opportunity to hear directly from experts on both sides of the argument during a series of panel discussions at the University of Richmond.

Unfortunately, despite the 250 people there, only a few of the 140 men and women likely to decide whether to permit uranium mining attended.

The rest missed a discussion that featured scientists and industry experts volleying on the economic, social and environmental impact of uranium mining.

They missed a back-and-forth on the risks and benefits, discussion of mining elsewhere and how lifting the ban will require significant investment from the state to draft and implement a new regulatory structure - a noteworthy point given the governor has already signaled lawmakers should expect another tight budget year.

They also missed a chance to hear from Paul A. Locke. He's chairman of the National Academy of Sciences committee working on a report about uranium mining in Virginia.

The report, to be released next month, will be lengthy and technical. It won't include recommendations, but lawmakers have said they expect to use the report's findings to decide during the next General Assembly session whether to lift the state's ban.

It's unlikely, however, that they'll be able to do so. Locke told me that making sense of all of the findings in the report will take considerable time.

For someone like him - an attorney and scientist with degrees from Yale, Johns Hopkins and Vanderbilt - "a month would be pushing it," he said.

"It's going to take a while because it's very complex stuff," he said.

Which means lawmakers expecting to make a decision next year will need information from experts, people who are versed in the details of mineral extraction, its environmental impact and the economic and social costs and benefits.

Del. Manoli Loupassi, a Republican in the 68th District, which includes part of Richmond, recognized as much after sitting in on part of the forum Thursday afternoon. He was still undecided afterward, but he said it was worthwhile hearing from panelists with expertise on the risks and the rewards of uranium mining.

Still, he said, he left with a nagging thought.

"It's hard to know who's getting paid by whom."

Shawn Day is an editorial writer covering the General Assembly for The Virginian-Pilot. Email: shawn.day@pilotonline.com.