ENFORCE22447

• Permit No: M2000053
• IBM Index Class Name: Enforcement
• Doc Date: 7/8/2005
• Doc Name: formal complaint letter
• From: dmg
• To: daneil ellison
• Media Type: D
• Archive: No

' •:~• ~ aood~
Frank E. Ruybalid - o z 3 " ~,
Attorney at Law o~~
134 W Main St, Suite 35 Trinidad, CO, 81088 Phone [phone] Fax [phone]- ~ `S
June T7, 2005 ~ . ' , ~ N 8
Daniel Ellison, Chairperson _ ~ -~ ~ ~ v , ~ '~'
Colorado Mined Land Reclamation Boazd JUN 2 3 2005
Division of Mineral and Geology ~ o .~ o
1313 ShermanSt.,Room215 ~ - sivr~a,.oi,::,:.:1 i:,,rNa~~•~1 ~
Denver, CO 80203.
• ~, ~ ~
RE: Mine pernut # M-2000-053, Las Animas County, Colo.
Encroachment on historic Penitente Church cemetery `
DeazMr. Ellison,• _
lease accept this letter and the accompanying materials as a formal complaint
P about the operation of the Castillo Gravel Pit, Mine Permit-# M-2000-053, at
which the Las Animas County Road and Bridge Depattnient is extracting gravel for
road and road base construction thrqughout Las Animas County. 'This gravel pit,
situated near the unincorporated village of Valdez on Colorado. Highway l2,'
approximately 13 miles west of Trinidad, Colo., is immediately adjacent to a
rudimentary Penitente Church~cemetery in which several ancestors and~siblings of -
my client, Mr. Toby Espinoza of Trinidad, are buried.
It is Mr. Espinoza's and my belief thaf the encroachment of the mining
operations threatens to disinter several of the grave sites, and that those sites are `
jeopardized by the erosion of the surrounding azea now that the overburden, or
topsoil, has been removed. Also,~it appears that equipment operators from the Road
and Bridge Department have knocked down a barb wire fence protecting the
cemetery, aad that they aze.now driving "cross country".across the grave sites, to
the point of evearing fire ruts into the ground immediately over several graves.
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