If no action to comply with notice has been taken, a request for revocation will be submitted. On Feb. 9, DEP Director Michael Castle revoked Century's permits. The action prohibits further mining on the site and blocks Century and its officers from obtaining future mining permits, DEP officials said. But the permit revocation won't do much to clean up the mess Century left behind, said John Ailes, deputy chief for the DEP Office of Mining and Reclamation. Limestone quarries and other noncoal mining operations are exempt from most environmental rules in West Virginia.
Operators have to obtain permits.
But they don't have to post reclamation bonds or follow any guidelines for cleaning up their quarry sites. In January 1994, the state Supreme Court ruled that the DEP does have authority to deny quarry permits that threaten adverse impacts on neighboring communities. The court ruled in a case in which then-DEP Director David C. Callaghan had rejected a proposal for a quarry near the West Virginia University experimental farm in Kearneysville, Jefferson County. During arguments on the case, then-Justice Richard Neely commented on seeing the Century quarry on his way to Canaan. In its ruling, the Supreme Court also held that DEP had authority under state law to write regulations to better police quarries.