LOUISVILLE, Ky. (AP) — A Virginia consulting company seeking out-of-work coal miners says it is moving forward with plans to place workers in hundreds of jobs at idled mines in Virginia and Kentucky.
Eddie Estep, president of Professional Contracting in Norton, Va., said in a telephone interview Thursday he has already placed about 50 miners in jobs.
Estep said his company has fielded about 3,000 applications over the past month. His company is working with a group of investors who will control the mines, he said, though he declined to name the investors or give specifics about the locations of the mines. He said the investors own mines that are idled.
Estep said he hopes to fill about 800 jobs at mines in the two states.
“It can be a little less, but it can be a lot more, too, depending on what the investors want to put into it,” he said. “There’s a lot of mines shut down. Reopening mines is the quicker way to put people to work but it takes time through federal laws and state laws to do it.”
Speculation about the jobs had focused on Alpha Natural Resources, which closed four mines in January, costing the region hundreds of jobs. The Whitesburg Mountain Eagle reported Wednesday that Bristol, Va.-based Alpha wasn’t involved. A spokeswoman for Alpha said on Thursday the company has no business arrangement with Professional Contracting.
Estep, who helps companies find labor and also trains miners, said news reports this week that the jobs don’t exist were untrue.
“I’m not playing games with this. If they want to stop the rumors, call me,” he said.
Estep said one of the investors, Daniel Bunn, had recently pulled out. Bunn owns two mines in Pike and Knott counties in Kentucky.
There are about 100 jobs at each mine looking to hire workers, and Estep said he didn’t expect there to be any permitting issues with the mines.
“Eight-hundred people is not an overnight adventure,” Estep said. “It takes time to process applications.”
If an operator wished to resume mining at an idled mine in Kentucky, they would have to notify the state Division of Mine Reclamation and Enforcement’s regional office, according to Dick Brown, a spokesman for the state Energy and Environment Cabinet. Brown said if a transfer of mine ownership were involved, the state’s Division of Mine Permits would have to approve applications but it likely wouldn’t happen until a purchase is finalized.
Mark Spicer, an out-of-work miner who lost his job as a greaser at a Martin County surface mine in January 2012, drove from Perry County in Kentucky to the Professional Contracting offices on Monday to apply for one of the jobs.
Spicer said the building was full of applicants and he filled out paperwork, had his picture taken and was told to wait about two weeks.
“They told us when they would start viewing them, then they’d call us for interviews,” Spicer said. He said he wasn’t told what coal companies were interested in hiring.
Estep said he has worked with about 50 mining companies and has been in the coal mining industry for 35 years. He was listed as an instructor with the state of Virginia’s Board of Coal Mining Examiners on the state’s Department of Mines, Minerals and Energy website.
