Two Eastern Oregon Mining Association members - Ed Needles and Joe McBroom - are currently charged with unlawfully maintaining a residence in the Wallowa-Whitman National Forest, Whitman Ranger District (the Orion site) because they have recently refused to post the required operating bond.

If convicted, each defendant faces up to six months in prison and a fine of $5,000. The indictment is an embarassment to the EOMA, who oppose illegal mining activities of any kind and particularly those conducted by members. But it is more than that.

-- The background on bonding --

The EOMA has worked successfully with the USFS for years to agree on reasonable bonding requirements.

The Forest Service has listened earnestly and the EOMA has been able to decrease bond amounts for members dramatically as a result. They have also signed the current bonding MOUs (Memorandums of Understanding) and the District Ranger has been extremely cooperative in approving many preliminary plans as Notice Level Work - which allow miners to complete their testing and make decisions about how to proceed with their formal mining Plan of Operation.

-- How it escalated to conflict --

Fact: Needles and McBrooms' Orion site already violates several Forest Service directives outright. House trailers on the property (not mobile travel trailers) have never been removed seasonally - as the USFS requires - and a scattered accumulation of junk litters the claim.

And now the miners have refused to post bond based upon the advice of Art Sappington, another EOMA member, who wishes to challenge the authority of the entire U.S. Government based upon his experience as a self-taught, amateur mining law expert.

Ironically, the USFS originally approved the Plan of Operation and the occupancy when Carlon McBroom was alive, but rescinded that approval when Ed Needles and Joe McBroom failed to post the operating bond. In short, the train wreck they're headed for is completely of their own making.

-- The real tragedy --

Everything the EOMA has worked hard to gain in cooperation with the USFS is jeopardized by the Orion case. What the defendants and Sappington fail to comprehend is the liability they represent to the entire organization. They are too focused upon their own, self-serving goals to care about the negative impact of their activities upon other small miners.

These people don't want to mine. They want to sling rocks at Goliath. And in doing so, they would willingly sacrifice years of hard work the EOMA has invested establishing a productive and cooperative relationship with government agencies.

It does not matter if they are right or wrong in their legal sideshow. Not at all. Even if they were to succeed totally - beyond their wildest dreams - in squirming out from under the heavy weight of a federal indictment, the damage that they would bring to the Eastern Oregon Mining Association would be permanent and irreparable.

If I were a fanatic environmental activist, I'd gladly hold a fund-raiser for Sappington. I'd love the Orion case. I'd use it to finally and fatally pit small miners squarely against big government and rejoice when they go down in flames.