from villain to victim: the coal industry’s new image in appalachian kentucky

From Villain to Victim:The Coal Industry’s New

Imagein Appalachian Kentucky

Al CrossDirector, Institute for Rural Journalism and Community Issues

Associate Professor, School of Journalism and TelecommunicationsUniversity of Kentucky

Dimensions Of Political Ecology conference on Nature and SocietyMarch 2, 2013

Kayford Mountain, West Virginia

Photo by Vivian Stockman, Ohio Valley Environmental Coalition, via Southwings

HARLAN

LETCHER

Carsey Institute surveys

n =1,000 n = 1,020Margin of error: +/- 3.1 percentage points

Have conservation or environmental rules that restrict development generally been a good thing for your community, a bad thing, have they had no effect? % of respondents who think conservation/environmental rules/zoning laws have generally been a bad thing for the community 2007 2011 Harlan 19% 30% Letcher 16% 35% Total 17% 33% For the future of your community, do you think it is more important to use natural resources to create jobs, or to conserve natural resources for future generations? % of respondents who think resources should be used to create jobs rather than conserved 2007 2011 Harlan 40% 49% Letcher 35% 54% Total 37% 52%

Possible reasons for changes

• Local factors unknown to us (not found by follow-up reporting)

• Great Recession (began soon after first survey; high unemployment still lingers; coal jobs and purchases are key to local economies)

• Obama administration actions• Reaction by other elected officials• Reaction by the coal industry

63,000 of these plates were on private vehicles as of February 2013.

Another measureof shift in viewsabout coal

Big Sandy Plant of Kentucky Power (American Electric Power), Louisa, Ky.

Who’s a miner?• Tradition: Miners are miners, and operators

are operators, labor unions reinforced that• Miners’ unions have largely left the region• Industry is on the defensive economically,

from natural gas, and politically from Obama• Industry has played the political victim and

responded with PR efforts that have created a sense of regional solidarity

• Many area residents might now accept business publications’ label for coal companies: “miner”

Slides from Downstream Strategies study of Central Appalachian coal

May 2013