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38 <br />1 case. The citizen withdrew their complaint. Our <br />2 evidence w ent away. <br />3 This is something that we do rather <br />4 routinely, and frankly, the industry has argued <br />5 that we sh ould over the years, and I think they <br />6 benefit fr om that practice. <br />7 If the board today finds that we were <br />e outside of our authority to do that, we believe <br />9 that would be a major precedent shift for the coal <br />l0 program. I might add that there are instances <br />11 through ti me where the operators instantly get on <br />12 the record to request for a board hearing. That's <br />13 done rathe r routinely. We then progress through an <br />14 assessment conference and violations are either <br />I5 upheld or they're vacated and then the hearings are <br />16 withdrawn- <br />17 So I would just like to emphasize as you <br />18 hear the legal arguments back a nd forth maybe <br />19 please u nderstand that what we did is something <br />20 that we do very routinely and i s routinely done <br />21 with the support of industry. In fact, sometimes <br />22 the OSM and citizen groups don' t like the fact that <br />23 we've do ne this. <br />24 So this is a bit of a shift for us. <br />25 Although I understand the very valid reasons for <br />