Although a payroll of 600 may not sound like much to a person from the populous eastern states, this is "make-or-break" for many western communities.

We have invested about $241 million to date and expect to invest an additional $147 million through 1997 for a total of $388 million. Supplies and services are purchased from a variety of local and out-of-state providers, many of whom are independent business people to which our purchases are an important part of their livelihood. Annual purchases average approximately $66 million per year. These annual contributions to the economy are shown below:

The final item of our direct contribution to the Nevada economy is the payment of local and state taxes, including sales and use tax, property tax and net proceeds tax (a tax on mining income). Annual taxes have averaged a bit over $4 million, and the annual amounts that have been paid or expected to be paid are shown on the following chart.

Our employees paid about $7.4 million/year in Federal withholding taxes (including the company's share of FICA) and personal income taxes, but since these leave the region, these taxes are not part of the state-wide impact. Nevertheless, this revenue is a direct contribution to the Federal Government. These taxes are exclusive of corporate income taxes, which are dependent upon the company's overall profitability and not directly tied to mining at these specific locations. Employee paid taxes, which can be viewed as the government's direct income from mining, were approximately $3100 per acre of land disturbed by mining in 1990. This is the government's real income from its lands.

The total direct contribution of our activity for the period 1981 through 1997 is below:

Economic impact does stop with our direct payments for wages, supplies, equipment or taxes. Each of these dollars continues to circulate through the economy as each recipient spends the money for his or her personal needs or to buy gods and services from other businesses. A number of economic research groups have attempted to measure the indirect or induced economic activity associated with a primary producing industry such as a mine or factory. The U.S. Department of Commerce's Regional Impact Multiplier System (RIMSII) is often used in this effort, and the Western Economic Analysis Center (Marana, Arizona) has completed several studies in Nevada and surrounding states which also attempt to measure the indirect impact. Our understanding is that these two organizations use different estimating procedures and thus end up with different multipliers. However, the point is that there is a significant indirect (also called an induced or secondary) increase in economic activity that results from the establishment and operation of a mining operation as the money paid directly by the mine for wage and supplies circulates and recirculates throughout the state.

Using multipliers provided by these two organizations, we have calculated the total impact, including the indirect increase in economic activity that results from our mines in the Independence Mountain Range, for the period of the start of production in 1981 through the presently projected mine life ending 1997. (As a technical note, this assumes that all supply purchases and capital are to Nevada-based firms. This is not the case, and so some of the economic impact actually occurs in other states.)

Regardless of which model one chooses to accept, the bottom line is that our operation, employing some 600 people, is a powerful economic engine for the State of Nevada and, for that matter, the United States.

None of this economic activity would have occurred if the explorationists had been denied access to public lands in the early 1970's. The attached map shows the land ownership in the Independence Mountain Range and the location of individual ore deposits. Private holdings in the area are quite small and are mostly cattle drive corridors along flowing streams. All the mineral deposits are located on public lands.

One of our greatest concerns with HR 918 is the considerable discretion of surface managing agencies' local managers to approve or disapprove where mineral exploration can take place. We are, of course, firmly established in the Independence Mountains and our permits allow us to continue our operations. But this begs the question, "What of the deposits yet to be discovered that may have the same economic impact as our operations shown here?" What will be the status of unidentified deposits in, say, the Steens Mountain of Oregon or the Sawtooth Range of Idaho or the Tobacco Roots in Montana? Will exploration and development move forward on a schedule similar to ours during the 1970s and early 1980s, or will the areas be closed to exploration by the "de facto withdrawal" feature that is implicit in HR 918?