Central Comal County residents are about to meet the “new neighbor” grassroots activists have warned them about for years.
The Texas Commission on Environmental Quality (TCEQ) on July 8 greenlit Alabama-based Vulcan Materials Company’s plans to turn the former Eric White ranch into a 1,500-acre open-pit limestone quarry between Bulverde and New Braunfels near State Highway 46 and FM 3009.
TCEQ approved the company’s Water Pollution Abatement Plan (WPAP), ending years of regulatory wrangling between Vulcan Materials, Stop 3009 Vulcan Quarry and Preserve Our Hill Country Environment (PHCE).
The proposed quarry site is situated entirely over the Edwards Aquifer Recharge Zone (EARZ), which provides drinking water for over two million people and thousands of farmers in South Central Texas.
Milann Guckian, whose retirement property shares a fenceline with the quarry site, said these groups would meet with attorneys this week to file a motion to overturn and discuss the next steps. TCEQ has 45 days to rule.
“We were fully prepared for this to happen,” she said. “…Moving forward, if the MTO is unsuccessful, citizens’ only recourse will be through the legal system.”
Jack Bonnikson, Vulcan’s communications director, declined to comment, saying the regulatory filings speak for themselves.
In a statement, Guckian criticized TCEQ’s lack of transparency during the permitting process, accusing it of “blatant disregard” for the county’s water supply and the health and welfare of Texas Hill Country residents.
She said all public comments and requests for a public meeting to discuss the Vulcan WPAP were ignored, including those by elected officials, attorneys for PHCE, the Texas Water Company, 789 citizens, the Greater Edwards Aquifer Alliance (GEAA), Hill Country Alliance (HCA), Texans for Responsible Aggregate Mining (TRAM), and the Groundwater Research & Education Aquifer Team.
Guckian said according to TCEQ Executive Director Kelly Keel, the statutes and rules governing a WPAP do not include an opportunity for a public meeting.
“The TCEQ’s Edwards Aquifer Protection Program (EAPP) brushed aside public concerns for more in-depth research and studies on the highly sensitive Edwards Aquifer at this location without granting the opportunity for a public meeting,” she said.
Vulcan Materials is the nation’s largest producer of construction aggregates like crushed stone, sand and gravel. The company’s products are used as base materials under highways, parking lots and railroads; for water filtration and erosion control; and for buildings and infrastructure.
On its website, vulcancomalquarry.com, the company said it is committed to investing in the future of the county and operating in a safe, socially and environmentally responsible manner:
“Located in one of the fastest-growing large counties in the nation, the Comal Quarry is strategically positioned along Highway 46 to responsibly support the local economy and meet the growing community needs, including infrastructure and transportation safety improvements.”
All Vulcan is destroying a beautiful peace of ranch land where new communitys are being built and all they want to do is make a big hole in ground and money in there pockets. They don’t care about the land it’s profit. Once there damage is done there is no recrelemention
The ink hasn’t yet dried on our deed of trust for a property that is beautiful and in an incredible neighborhood and school system… then we learned about this proposed Quarry and we’re dumbfounded by the damage this will cause. Our health is at risk. Our access to any water, let alone clean water, is a huge question now. I don’t know how we can live, let alone raise our children in an environment so contaminated. And the devaluation on a property we just purchased in good faith… I can’t even wrap my mind around this. The cost to comal county in loss of tax revenues will show up in budget cuts to our schools and EMS systems. We’ll lose teachers and programs for learning, and response times for emergencies will go up as fewer resources are available to respond. We came to Texas to be near family and join a community that would help us raise healthy and smart children. We did not come to Texas to lose our investment, our health and our future. This Quarry must be stopped. Please reach out to your legislatures, the governor and the members of the TQEC. Someone has to listen to reason. Please help. We’ll do our part.
You are facing a government bureaucracy that only cares about their policies that were probably written many years ago . Most of these bozos are lifetime unelected appointees that would simply prefer to not get involved…. too much work on their part and they do not have the intestinal fortitude to buck big money. The majority of these bureaucrats are basically 9 -5 yahoos.
Do you understand that Vulcan has already probably spread a great deal of money around in their preliminary prep work to get this property. They have lobbyists whose job it is to visit politicians and arrange ‘”contributions”. They have a very large staff of “advertisers” to work up very pretty multipage pamphlets and present multimedia presentations to politicians over expensive lunches. Vulcan’s big wigs live in Birmingham, AL and most probably have never been anywhere in Texas except possibly to Austin to wine and dine politicians.
I would tend to believe that none of the Vulcan people nor any of the politicians live in this area and are not dependent on the Edwards Aquifer for their potable drinking water.
if you want to get elected government involved you have to show them that there is a significant number of people that want to bring common sense to Vulcan’s greed for this specific land. That sitting on top of the Edwards Aquifer Recharge Zone is not the place. The entire Hill Country is sitting on Limestone.
You need to check-in with the “Opposition Leadership” in your community and see what is going on currently for sure to get grounded in the situation.
But the above article states that the Edwards Aquifer “provides drinking water to over two million people and thousands of farmers” . If that is true, you indeed have a 2,000,000-man Army at your disposal. If you can get 20,000 or 30,000 signatures on a petition to “Save the Edwards Aquifer Recharge Zone for Your Children and Your Grandchildren” (or some such title), you would be well prepared to visit the appropriate politicians from a position of power and confidence and DEMAND their attention and intervention.
Politicians love the lobbyists and the “monetary contributions” and “Entertainment” that the corporate lobbyists bring to them. But, they love even more an opportunity to “shine” and to be a “hero of the people” in a very public way. They love to be reelected. Talk to the media. Start a major Facebook campaign. Don’t sit and wring your hands. Get mad. Build an Army of like-minded folks. I enlisted in the US Army at 18 years of age in 1966 and served 8 years. One thing I learned early on was that with a good team of like-minded and very well motivated people, we could move mountains…. and we did in places none of us had ever been before and none of us older than 20.
I can well assume that you have invested in something other than a starter home, You have family with children. I think you are already very well motivated. Now all you need to do is to get mad and get to work.
JUST A QUESTION:
Since this has been ongoing for several years……….just a question, Did the real estate agent you used inform you of this open and pending problem? If not, there may be some legal ramifications there.