TOWN OF COOKS VALLEY
Special Town Board Meeting
April 23, 2019
The Special Town Board meeting of the Town of Cooks Valley was called to order on Tuesday, April 23, 2019 at the Cooks Valley town hall located at 15751 40th Street at 7:30 pm by Supervisor Dave Clements. Supervisor present by phone was Matt Borofka. Other town officials present were Town Clerk Vicki Freeberg and Deputy Town Clerk Victoria Trinko.
Review of EOG non-metallic mining permit with public comment:
Dave Bokor, representative for EOG, gave an overview of the year and production of the EOG DS mine. The mine was operational May 1 to October 31, 2018 with 622,586 tons of raw frack sand hauled out and 213,835 ton of waste sand hauled back. No sand was extracted from the SS mine for the months of November 2018 through April 2019.
They resumed hauling raw sand on April 15, 2019 from existing inventory and will resume normal mining activity in late April (blasting) with 1-3 blasts per month. They will continue to haul in waste. They are projected to operate through mid to late October 2019 and then move to SS mine. Trucks will run Monday through Friday, 6:00 am – 4:30 or 5:00 pm with 15 trucks.. Planned activity will be concentrated on the north and areas of the mine for 2019. The map shows green and blue areas to be mined. Most of the new ground is exposed so not a lot of overburden. Waste sand will be used to back-fill against the high wall on the west side. No plans for final reclamation are being considered. They will continue to operate water trucks when required to manage dust control and monitor vegetation development/growth.
Vibration monitors were placed at the Larson & Harmon residences throughout 2018. Due to low vibration levels within the standards for blasting, EOG determined it would not continue monitoring.
The mines are required to manage existing wetland area per WDNR requirements, improvements will allow to control and minimize discharge while maintaining quality of water. They have adopted a more stringent plan than required which meets or exceeds the state regulations. EOG will monitor the storm water discharge and this is reported to the DNR. Pond B3.0 was discharged 13 days; pond B8.0 13 days and pond B1.1was discharged 5 days.
Mark Berge commented on how pleased he was with the mine contacting him prior to water release, but he did raise concerns about the released water causing erosion in his pasture. He asked if anything could be done and EOG suggested that Mark contact the DNR with his concerns because it was out of their control. Just releasing water according to DNR standards.
PURFRAC
Dave Rosenbrook told board that the mine had interested parties and were discussing going ahead with plans to start mining. No time frame has been set as yet. PurFrak met with Dave Bokor and reached a verbal agreement but they are waiting for EOG's main office in TX to review the agreement. Dave Bokor was not sure why they had not heard back from the main office yet.
Matt Borofka made a motion to give PurFrac 9 months to complete this agreement (December 23, 2019) . David Clements seconded the motion . The motion carried 2-0. If no agreement is reached by the deadline; then the contract with the Town of Cooks Valley will be null and void.
A motion to adjourn was made by Dave Clements at 8:35 pm. Matt Borofka seconded the motion. The motion carried 2-0.
Typed: April 29, 2019 Respectfully submitted,
Approved: Vicki Freeberg, Town Clerk