Republished from the May 26 Journal-Opinion

The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency will be hosting a community meeting May 30 at 7 p.m. at the Corinth Town Office in Cookeville week to provide a Pike Hill mine site update and to introduce the wildlife experts performing the bat studies.

Officials want people to avoid the mine site at night when they begin trapping bats to tag them with electronic monitors. Starting late June/early July and into August they will be driving around tracking bats using radio antenna.

Pike Hill is not the only copper mine in Orange County undergoing a cleanup this summer.

The Ely Mine in Vershire near the West Fairlee town line is also getting some attention from regulators … and the restless?

In a posting to the town’s listserv earlier this month, West Fairlee Selectboard Chair Delsie Hoyt reported that activities at the site this summer are attempting to document the historic mining-related features and artifacts. But on May 12, vandals struck:

“The port-a-toilet thrown into the creek, processing screens for the archeological work damaged, pin flags had been removed, and hubs (GPS grid points) kicked over.”

“What was the point?” Hoyt asked. “The mindless destruction of a few only adds to the delays in this critical clean-up and to its multi-million-dollar cost which will be shouldered by state and federal taxpayers.”