USA TODAY NETWORK - Tennessee
The residents of several communities just east of Strawberry Plains are still looking for answers in their monthslong fight with Nyrstar Tennessee Mines.
Issues began in early November when residents around Charlie Hodges Road near the company’s plant and in the Pinto Ridge neighborhood on the other side of U.S. 11E from Charlie Hodges Road began finding workers on their properties driving in wooden stakes.
Many had received a three-page notice in advance from the company, which mines zinc, stating that Nyrstar owned the mineral rights to their properties and would be conducting tests that involve working on their properties. Some, like Cynthia and Gary Lynn of Pinto Ridge, said they did not get the notice.
“On Nov. 4, two men in an ATV were placing wood stakes and wires on our property,” Cynthia Lynn said. “They identified themselves as Nyrstar contract employees. We asked them to leave … They continued to access our property without permission. Our barn doors were left open on one occasion. Sunday, Dec. 11, at 8:30 a.m. men were working less than 18 feet from our home with cables and metal stakes without our permission.”
Several other residents contacted by the News Sentinel had similar stories. Cynthia Lynn estimates that 600 families in the area have been affected “in terms of mineral rights.”
Sometimes the exchanges got confrontational.
Beth Nelson, who lives on Charlie Hodges Road, had exchanged words with personnel on an earlier occasion when they showed up again on her property on Nov. 7 with a law officer. Later on the night of that confrontation, she sent this email to the News Sentinel:
“At 5 tonight I look up and there are sheriff cars in the field and property which adjoins mine. Then I see a mine geologist in my front field. They had entered after disassembling a gate on my neighbor’s property. I ask them to leave and that I understood they were trespassing on my property. He refused. I spoke with the sheriff deputy then called my county commissioner.
“The (another) sheriff deputy over the area came and told them to leave. The first officer said he was dispatched to ‘keep peace.’”
Residents said they have asked the company to present copies of the documentation showing that it owns mineral rights to their property and have yet to receive any.
“They claim that they have mineral rights to all these properties,” said Cynthia Lynn, “that they purchased these rights in the ‘40s and ‘50s. My warranty deed says something different. We ask to see them and they say go look at the courthouse.”
She said her husband did go to the courthouse and found some documents that “seemed to support mineral rights claims.”
The residents have also been angered by the way they have been treated by Nyrstar.
Cynthia Lynn told of this exchange:
“They contacted me by phone saying basically, ‘You don’t have a choice. We are going to be there (on her property to do the survey), and they tried to explain to me that they had the right to be there. When I wasn’t agreeable, they said, ‘The next time you hear from us will be (through) our attorney.’ I said that would be fine.”
In an emailed response to News Sentinel questions, Nyrstar Environment and Stakeholder Relations Manager Kevin Cook said the company has held mineral rights in the area for a long time.
“Surface exploration activities have been ongoing in the Jefferson County area for over 100 years,” he said. “… The rights were sold outright to a handful of companies as early as the 1940s (for the properties in this study). These rights, with few exceptions, include surface rights and access which is not always the case in the transfer of mineral rights but is spelled out specifically in our agreements.”
He also explained that in some cases the ownership documents held by present owners might not contain information on the mineral rights.
“Unfortunately, for some landowners, their deeds do not reference mineral rights unless they go back to the deed that existed at the time at which the rights were sold,” he said. “We inform them of our ownership of the rights which has always been the extent of our policy and has caused no issues in the past.”
He said the company made every effort to inform owners before the recent testing was done.
“A detailed letter that was distributed prior to the study informed landowner(s) of the current legal status of the mineral rights of their property and gave an approximate timeline for our activities,” he said. “We informed residents of where specifically they could find this additional detail at the courthouse and, in some cases, retrieved those documents personally as a show of good faith where additional concerns existed.”
He acknowledged that “some of the contact information we received was out of date and throughout the process we learned that a small portion of the residents affected by this study were not properly notified despite our best efforts. For that Nyrstar Tennessee Mines would like to extend its sincere apologies.”
Cook also answered concerns about what will happen should zinc be found:
“Zinc mining in East Tennessee commonly uses the room and pillar mining method, with no planned disturbances to residences as mining depths are over 1,200 feet and carried out in accordance with state and federal regulations.”
Nyrstar human services official Janie Wallace said the company finished the surveying project at the end of 2016 and is no longer surveying in the area.
The affected residents, however, are not ending their demands for answers.
They have held several meetings attended by about 30 people to determine a course of action. Some have also attended several Jefferson County Commission and Industrial Development Board meetings to express their concern.
The Nelsons have taken the added step of hiring an attorney, Chuck Fisher of Chattanooga, and set in motion a legal effort to get Nyrstar to prove its mineral rights ownership on their property.
This is done by filing a “complaint of claim of abandoned mineral interest.” In this procedure, the person filing a complaint must place a notice in a local publication once a week for three weeks then the other party is given 60 days to show that it has legal claim and has not abandoned its mining interest.
The Nelsons posted the notices in the Standard Banner newspaper, based in Jefferson City, and expect the deadline for a reply to be either Feb. 21 or 22.
Although residents have complained about disinterest on the part of some elected Jefferson County officials, several officials, notably David Seal, county commissioner for District 9, have been looking into the matter.
“Over the past few weeks I have attended community meetings and met with property owners and citizens who are concerned with their property rights, approximately 30 families in all,” Seal said through an emailed response to News Sentinel questions. “In general, these families believe they have been mistreated and disrespected by the mining industry, its agents and management. After listening to the families openly recount their experiences one-by-one at public meetings, I consider their concerns legitimate.”
He provided the News Sentinel with a list of residents’ comments as well as audio recordings of 911 exchanges on the matter.
He said Nyrstar has done little to communicate with anyone, refusing to attend commission meetings or work sessions.
Commissioner Russell Turner said he talked by phone with several Nyrstar representatives to discuss the residents’ complaints.
“They agreed there were lessons learned on both sides,” he said. “They had to get 580 letters out to people. It was a challenging project.”
He added that people often don’t comprehend the significance of mineral rights.
“There are quite a few property owners in Jefferson, Knox, Grainger and other counties who don’t understand mineral rights and that mining operations do have a right to come above ground and do exploration. At the same time, there is such a thing as common courtesy and letting people know they are coming.
“They (the company) mentioned they are always working on public relations and will continue to work at it.”
The disgruntled residents say the company might be telling authorities they will be more respectful, but the residents are not seeing a change.
“Unfortunately they seem to say one thing yet do another,” Nelson said. “The geologist was back on Thursday last week -- on property 'removing' stakes without notice to the owners.”
Residents said they now have another concern. They said blasting, which they believe is being done by Nyrstar, is causing windows to break and foundations to crack in some homes in the Ashley Oaks subdivision.
Seal said Nyrstar has been receiving a tax abatement from the county that apparently expired in 2016.
He was unsure of the status of the abatement but said he believes reports he has received from residents of poor treatment should be considered when Nyrstar’s tax abatement comes up for renewal.
“In the past, the citizens of Jefferson County, through their elected representatives, have given the mining industry a property tax abatement, last enacted by County Commission on May 26, 2006, for a period of 10 years,” Seal said. “It is my opinion that, at the absolute least, our mining industry should exercise respect for citizens and their property to demonstrate their appreciation for the property tax abatement, and that the behavior of the mining company toward citizens and their property be taken into account when any future tax abatement is considered.”
Such rebate requests are vetted by the Industrial Development Board, which decided whether to bring them before the County Commission for what Seal called "an up-or-down vote."
Several calls and an email to Industrial Development Board Chairman Larry Masters concerning the tax situation were not answered.
865-259-7770
Service Areas
