MINE CLAIM DWARFS CEMEX QUARRY STEMS FROM A 19TH CENTURY LAW.

Byline: Susan Abram Staff Writer

ANGELES NATIONAL FOREST - One of the largest claims of public land by a mining company sits on 4,000 acres within the Angeles National Forest, just 5 miles south of the proposed Cemex Inc. sand and gravel quarry, a Washington, D.C.-based environmental group said Monday.

For the last 40 years, a Los Angeles-based sand and gravel company called Triangle Rock Productions has paid about $100 per acre each year to continue its claim on the land. But according to the federal Bureau of Land Management, officials from the Angeles National Forest and the environmental group, no massive mining plans have been submitted like those approved by a judge last week for the Cemex mine.

Land was claimed there by a former company under the 1872 Mining Law, a law that the federal government passed to help build the American West. But Environmental Working Group members hope their research will reactivate legislation to rescind the law, saying that companies both foreign and domestic are destroying valuable natural resources, and paying little in taxes.

Triangle Rock is a subsidiary of Vulcan Materials Company, which mines sand and gravel on a few hundred acres of land northwest of Santa Clarita, hauling about 1 million tons a year, said Steve Bear, resource officer for the Angeles National Forest.

``This Triangle Rock company is the biggest sand and gravel operation that we have in the Angeles Forest Service,'' Bear said. ``I think they'd like to stay there for a couple of years.''

Officials from Triangle Rock did not return phone calls Monday.

The company's contract to mine was awarded 40 years ago, when previous owners PW Gillibrand owned the land, Bear said. The contract is expected to expire in 2009. Bear called the company one of the most responsible he has seen.

``They have an access road in there and they are doing some more drilling. Their intention is to apply for a mineral contract, but we have total discretion,'' he said. ``We can decide to approve the plan. Our position is we support wise use of the natural resources, but again those are up to public scrutiny.'' Sand and gravel are mined for use in making cement to serve Southern California's booming construction industry.

Researchers for the Environmental Working Group sifted through 125 million records hidden in government databases to discover which companies and individuals own mineral rights to a total of 9.3 million acres of public land in the West, rights claimed under the 1872 Mining Law, which is still active in the United States.

For 84 cents an acre, more than 28,000 companies and individuals have gained control of metals and minerals on these public lands. These low prices leave ``multibillion-dollar cleanup bills for taxpayers,'' according to the group.

``If land is open to mining under the 1872 Mining Law, you can stake a claim,'' said Dusty Horwitt, analyst for the group. ``Unless the land is withdrawn from the mining law, then an individual can go on the land as is. You generally go on the land and stake the claim by driving a post in the ground. This is a taxpayer rip-off of epic proportions. We hope that this investigation can restart the debate on comprehensive mining reform.''

Susan Abram [phone]

susan.abram(at)dailynews.com

CAPTION(S):

map

Map:

400-acre Cemex site

4,000-acre mining site