OVEC Action Alert - July 13, 2002

Big Push on Overweight Coal Trucks

Sample Coal Truck Letter

Big Push on Overweight Coal Trucks

Latest Overweight Coal Truck poll: 

TELL LEGISLATORS NO WEIGHT INCREASE FOR COAL TRUCKS  Yesterday, the United Mine Workers and environmental groups delivered 15,000 “No Weight Increase!” postcards addressed to Governor Wise, who couldn’t bother showing up to receive them. What about the at least 10 people who have been crushed to death by coal trucks since 2000? What about the already pummeled roads and bridges? What about the $6.5 BILLION needed to upgrade make our roads and bridges so the candle handle 60-ton trucks? What about ALL the laws the coal industry so arrogantly breaks? What about the will of the people?  Click here for Gazette story. 

State legislators have been flooded with e-mails, but some dismiss those e-mails as form letters.  Click here for Gazette story. 

SO, LET’S CALL THEM WITH THIS MESSAGE: ENFORCE, BUT DO NOT INCREASE THE CURRENT, WEIGHT LIMITS ON COAL TRUCKS. If you are outraged at idea of a near doubling of the current weight limits, let them know about your outrage. (Currently it’s 65,000 pounds for state roads and 80,000 for federal highways. The Gov. and the coal industry will “compromise” at 120,00 pounds!) As former US Congressman and Secretary of State Ken Hechler says in his radio ads, tell your legislators coal industry profits are not worth even one child’s life!

You can leave a message for Gov. Wise at 1-888-438-2731, or at 304-558-2000, but not until “regular office hours.” The Governor apparently doesn’t want to hear from us on weekends.

You can leave a message for your Senators and Delegates at 1-877-565-3347. Better yet, you can find the numbers for direct lines to their Capitol offices: Click here for Delegates --  Click here or Senators.

Even better yet, look in your local phone book for their home phones and call them at home today and tomorrow, as they won’t be in their offices until late Sunday.

When you check the two sites above, you’ll see that many legislators have their own personal e-mail. You could write them a letter (sample letter below), e-mail it, and then hand-deliver a copy to their offices after tomorrow’s prayer vigil.

REMINDER: COMMUNITY INTERFAITH PRAYER SERVICE ON OVERWEIGHT COAL TRUCKS  Please attend an interfaith prayer service at 2 p.m. this Sunday, July 14, led by Reverends Jim Lewis and Jeff Allen. We’ll meet by the west entrance to the State Capitol building, at the door closest to the Governor’s capitol office. Legislators will be meeting in a special interim session in which they are expected to address the overweight coal truck issue.

If prayer isn’t your style, please attend anyway and meditate upon the subject.

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SAMPLE COAL TRUCK LETTER (many thanks to the OVEC member who sent in most of this letter)

Dear ____________

I realize that you are under intense pressure from both the Governor and the coal industry to support a bill that will nearly double the current weight limits on coal trucks.

I hope that you and all legislators will listen to the voters, instead of to the usual coal industry cry that the end is near if the industry has to begin obeying the laws already on the books.

I hope you have been listening as coalfield residents have been sharing their horror stories, horror arising from the simple act of getting on the road to go pick up the kids, go to work, or go shopping. People fear for their children’s lives as they go to school. At least ten people have been crushed to death by coal trucks since 2000. How angry and terribly sad relatives must feel when they loose a loved one because laws are not being enforced. How outraged are so many of us to think that the Governor supports raising the weight limit to accommodate an outlaw industry! Coal companies hire people to drive these huge trucks for a pittance. In order to make a decent day's pay, these drivers must overload and speed. Meanwhile, industry executives walk away with huge salaries irrespective of market conditions.

West Virginia taxpayers pay for the infrastructure destroyed by these behemoth coal trucks, and coal community citizens pay dearly in deaths, injuries and pollution (add to this the horrors they suffer from mountain top removal). As you know, a Department of Highways official says it would take $6.5 BILLION to upgrade our roads and bridges so they can handle 60-ton trucks.

Are renegade coal industries always going to rule the politics of West Virginia? Are West Virginia taxpayers always going to subsidize coal industry profits? Are there no truly honest, caring legislators who will break with the status quo?

Are we going to continue to be a third world-like state that allows extraction industries to take, take, take, and destroy, destroy, destroy until there is nothing left but huge wounds on the once beautiful mountains and huger wounds on the psyche and souls of citizens?

I hope you will do the right thing and vote against increased weight limits for coal trucks.

Sincerely, _________

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