LANSING – In the wake of the Kennecott Mine controversy in the Upper Peninsula, the impartiality of the Office of Geological Survey is under fire.

Marvin Roberson, a forest policy specialist for the Mackinac chapter of the Sierra Club, said the objectivity of the Department of Environmental Quality (DEQ) agency has been in question for a long time.

“We have felt they are too pro-extraction [of resources] for a while,” he said, adding that the agency has strayed from its role as a regulatory arm of the DEQ.

The office is under fire for its handling of a permit application filed by the Kennecott Eagle Minerals Co. to mine nickel near Marquette.

The Office of Geological Survey is a DEQ agency that is responsible for overseeing the use of geological resources for economic and social benefits while protecting economic value, property rights and the environment.

In addition to issuing mining permits and enforcing environmental laws, the agency regulates oil and gas permits, and mineral wells and drafts geological maps.

Roberson said the state’s permit process he helped to write is effective when used properly.

“The process has been abused from the beginning. If the agency is not going to follow the rules of the permit process, then it is all meaningless,” he said.

Russ Harding of the Mackinac Center for Public Policy agreed that the impartiality of the DEQ seems always in doubt.

Harding served as DEQ director for eight years before joining the nonpartisan free-market-oriented think tank based in Midland.

“The Kennecott permit situation is very damaging to the state’s regulatory climate,” Harding said.

He continued, “The law is very stringent in its environmental requirements, and environmental groups participated in its drafting and supported its passage. These same groups complained when DEQ applied the law and came to the conclusion that Kennecott met the requirements for a permit.”

DEQ later reversed its approval after the disclousure that two documents were withheld from public viewing.

The documents contained critical information on the structural integrity of the mine as determined by David Sainsbury, a DEQ contractor on the mining team.

Harding said, “I can only draw two conclusions. One, the DEQ is incompetent and did not conduct a thorough review, and two, political pressure was applied on the Granholm administration by environmental groups that resulted in DEQ finding a reason to pull the permit. In either case, Michigan is ill-served,”

According to the Sierra Club’s Roberson, a planned external investigation into why the documents were withheld has been canceled. Instead, the DEQ has said it will investigate the situation internally.

“They are only investigating the two documents without looking at the wider problems. They are not looking into the accusations of bias,” Roberson said.

Roberson also said that complaints from the Sierra Club apply only to the Office of Geological Survey, not to higher-level officials of the DEQ.

The Mackinac Center’s Harding said the controversy over the mine project and the overall permit process points to a legitimate public policy debate about how stringent environmental requirements should be.

The agency’s permit practices for oil and gas have also been questioned by environmental groups, he noted.

Harding said, “My experience with Geologic Survey was that they were professional and impartial in processing permits. It is important to remember that if an oil and gas company meets the requirements of law, they are entitled to receive a permit.”

Harding added that most environmental groups don’t like oil and gas development and look for ways to use the permit process to stop development.

“The Geological Survey is charged by law to encourage the development and conservation of oil and gas resources. If environmentalists do not want the development of oil and gas, they should take their case directly to the Legislature rather than continually trying to subvert the permit process,” he said.