Cobscook Bay serves as a nursery for the marine food web of eastern New England; it is currently endangered by a proposed poly-metallic silver mine in Pembroke, Maine that poses unacceptable risks of contamination for this relatively pristine region, currently under consideration as a National Heritage area. Known to the Passamaquoddy people as “Dawnland” this is a place renowned for sealife— pollock, cod, haddock, scallops, herring, sea urchins, lobsters and now aquaculture. Historically, there had been over 27 canneries on these shores; these have now closed. Today, the conservation value of this landscape is well understood, as seen by federal investment in the expansion of the wildlife refuge, fish passage, and nearby regional parks and trail systems. These expanding small parks draw tourists from across the country. The state of Maine is now promoting Downeast tourism to ease pressure on Acadia National Park, which was overcrowded by 4 million tourists last year.

We cannot afford contamination here. The economy here is totally reliant on our natural resource base, 10% of residents hold commercial fishing licenses, tourism, logging and forestry, balsam wreaths and blueberries are our biggest employers in very small, scattered coastal towns—we don’t have other industries to fall back on here and cannot afford to ruin the natural wealth that drives prosperity and quality of life. Federal, state and private investment in the expansion of the wildlife refuge, fish passage, connected regional parks and trails system have drawn tourists from across the country; these protected habitats make for healthy rivers and bays that sustain both recreational and commercial fishing.

Far from being a ‘job creator’ for Washington County, the proposed “Big Silver” mine instead looms as a ‘job destroyer’. A foreign corporation, Wolfden Resources LLC, has started preliminary operations in Pembroke with a mere 16 page work plan submitted to the DEP—early-stage exploratory mining is highly deregulated in Maine, but even these early diggings pose a risk to our drinking water, as 1500 foot bore holes may bring water into contact with metals-bearing rocks, and the high sulfur content of those deposits can create sulfuric acid, mobilizing heavy metals into the groundwater. The distance to Cobscook Bay from the proposed mine site is negligible (1.5 miles) and toxic material from the mine is very likely to spill into the local drainage, the local aquifers and end up in the pristine waters of Cobscook Bay.

There are no metallic mines currently in operation anywhere in the world that meet the descriptions now being presented by Wolfden. All are unsafe and many have ended up as EPA superfund sites that have to be cleaned up at taxpayers expense.

Unfortunately, after a 40 year informal moratorium on metallic mineral mining in Maine, the mining law of 2017 leaves much to be desired; among other weaknesses, although mining supporters state that the law bans open-pit mining, the law instead stipulates that open pit mining up to 3 acres per mining operation is permissible.

Cobscook Bay lies along the Canadian border adjoining Passamaquoddy Bay and the Bay of Fundy— each receive fresh water from small, undeveloped rivers flowing into sheltered estuarine bays supporting seaweed, eelgrass beds, clam flats and forested uplands coming right down to the shore. This is one of the most productive marine ecosystems of the Atlantic seaboard and it must be protected for the humpbacks, minke whales, fin whales and significant schools of herring, glass eels and alewives who thrive in this cold nutrient-rich water. Wolfden is exploring and purchasing mining rights in Pembroke, Charlotte and Dennysville--an area of impact that would totally transform our area and its watersheds. The promise of metals this Canadian company claims they can extract from our low-grade ores present an unacceptable risk to the wildlife and ecosystems of this precious region. WE have lessons close at hand, of the superfund site in Meddybemps, the contamination of the Penobscot river from years of chemical industry, the Callahan metallic mine in Blue hill-- these sites have left riverbeds and adjacent seabeds poisoned, costing Maine taxpayers millions of dollars to commence remediation and requiring many lawsuits to get the corporate perpetrators to accept responsibility.

DO NOT LET THIS HAPPEN in Cobscook Bay