Coffee mine proposal clears information adequacy stage – by Julien Gignac (Yukon News – September 5, 2018)

Yukon News

Yukon Environmental and Socio-economic Assessment Board (YESAB) says it now has adequate information about Goldcorp’s proposed Coffee gold mine to proceed to an assessment.

A public comment period opened late last month and will close on Oct. 15, after which the public will have the opportunity to parse through a draft report. This development marks a big shift in a roughly two-year saga.

The mining company had an incomplete proposal package until this point. The board found that the company didn’t properly consult with First Nations, nor did the board have adequate information to move ahead. But now it does.

“The proposal went through a couple of bumps along the way, no doubt,” said YESAB spokesperson Rob Yeomans. “We did remove them from the process for lack of consultation, but they came back with the information they needed and that allowed us to proceed to where we are now.”

In May, White River First Nation (WRFN) formally requested the project be put through a panel review, the most rigorous level of assessment in the territory. Yeomans said that is currently being considered. “A panel can be struck at any point in the process,” he said.

For the rest of this article: https://www.yukon-news.com/news/coffee-mine-proposal-clears-information-adequacy-stage/