A mining company has entered another phase of permit applications this month by making a request to the Lower Colorado River Authority.
Asphalt Inc. submitted the application under the Highland Lakes Watershed Ordinance protocol by LCRA. The application is for “an aggregate processing plant and quarry near Inks Lake.” The proposed site is just outside the Burnet city limit on 71 acres in Hoover Valley at 3221 FM 3509, 3 miles west of Texas 29.
The application comes on the heels a contentious public meeting hosted by the Texas Commission on Environmental Quality in December.
On. Dec. 10, hundreds of residents attended a meeting in opposition, citing noise, dust, traffic and other environmental con- cerns. TCEQ’s decision on their permit request could come sometime this month.
Asphalt Inc. is now in the second leg of moving towards opening a rock crushing plant.
On or about Jan. 2, LCRA deemed the company’s application “administratively complete, meaning all required information has been submitted, and is conducting a technical review of the application.”
The applicant must now notify property owners within 500 feet of the project site or 1,000 feet of the project limits.
The public is allowed a 30-day period for submitting comments. LCRA is accepting public comments through Feb. 7.
The technical review would “determine whether it meets the standard set out in the ordinance,” according to LCRA.
Fermin Ortiz, co-founder of Texans for Responsible Aggregate Mining (TRAM), says water is at stake in the LCRA application process.
“Before any permits are approved, we must require an independent third party study of available water resources and its guaranteed continued availability,” he said. “We have multiple area ranches already having to haul water. Can’t imagine what an APO (aggregate production operations) requiring thousands of gallons per day would do to the area’s water table.
“We should also require an independent third party study of the ramifications of blasting above Longhorn Caverns and the caverns that extend into the neighboring Camp Longhorn. Two iconic and irreplaceable Texas treasures.”
Concerns include the potential 40-50,000 gallons per hour of water needed at the site, he added.
“Different people can be concerned about different facets of the negative impacts, but one thing that everybody will be concerned about is their astronomical use of water,” Ortiz said. “You ask the APOs (about the amount of water), and they say they don’t know."
Supporters of the rock crusher operation contend that the company would create jobs and provide material to individual and commercial customers.
In the previous TCEQ air permit application, more than 4,800 comments were submitted, officials say.
“Here we are right on the cusp of this,” Ortiz said of the potential for the air quality permit decision.
For the LCRA watershed ordinance permit (application #2024-5606), submit comments at https://www.lcra.org.
Mail comments to: LCRA – HLWO Comment, Mail Stop L106, P.O. Box 220,Austin, TX 78767; or submit comments in-person to: LCRA – HLWO Comment, 3700 Lake Austin Blvd. in Austin.
