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INTRODUCTION <br />The North Fork Pit is to be a small wet sand and gavel operation to mine no more than 255,000 <br />total tons from a total permit azea of 9.97 acres, creating a lake of 6.6 acres along the first terrace of <br />the North Fork of the Gunnison River. The azea is a flat meadow immediately south of the River <br />immediately downstream and west of the town of Paonia in Delta County. The North Fork Pit permit <br />land is on a private pazcel owned by Cecil and Patricia Farnsworth who have leased the land and <br />water rights to United Companies for the sand and gravel mining. Cecil and Patricia Farnsworth <br />have operated two river harvesting 110 gavel pits very close to the proposed permit azea. One is <br />known as the Faznsworth Gravel Pit #2 (M-1982-154) and is permitted immediately east of the <br />proposed site and the other is known as the River Bottom Pit (M-1992-100) which was permitted <br />under the River Bottom Land Corporation on the Farnsworth property. Delta County has already <br />approved the proposed operation for the creation of the lake on the Farnsworth property as an <br />extension of the permit for the Famsworth #2 Gravel pit. Delta County specified that the total <br />production from the original Farnsworth #2 Gravel Pit and the new operation could not exceed <br />70,000 tons per yeaz. For this reason, the United lease with Farnsworth specifies that Farnsworth <br />cannot mine any material for the time that United is mining the North Fork Pit (a maximum of 4 <br />yeazs). This condition is also a stipulation of this permit. Extracted material from this wet pit would <br />be transported across a small bridge only during low water conditions to the processing area of the <br />River Bottom Pit. The final products would then betaken to mazket from the existing Farnsworth <br />entrance along Highway 133. <br />The gavel is approximately 24 feet thick below a layer of topsoil of 3"-12" thickness. The current <br />land use is irrigated field and dryland range but the post-mining use be a) wetlands for wildlife <br />habitat and b) lake for wildlife habitat and recreation. The final lake will after mining only be 6.6 <br />acres in size and can be mined without damage to the environment or threat of capture by the river at <br />a later date. We also believe the site provides a local strategic supply of building materials in an azea <br />that is seriously low on future gavel reserves. <br />North Fork Pit March 04 1 <br />