Office of Speaker, Frontier Applied Sciences officials deny coal talks

WINDOW ROCK

Both the Office of the Speaker and a Scottsdale-based company that would possibly buy Navajo coal deny discussions – preliminary or not – is happening between them.

The Navajo Times reported that Navajo Nation officials are talking to Frontier Applied Sciences about “considering a proposal to buy approximately 700,000 tons of Navajo coal per year in the next 36 months.” As a result, it published the story, “Tribe looking at proposal to sell 700,000 tons of coal” in its April 2 edition.

The Times’ reporting of this came from an exclusive interview with Mark Lewis, spokesman and a board member for FAS.

The Navajo Times stands by its reporting, despite the public outcries from the Office of the Speaker and Mark Lewis, of FAS.

Lewis contacted the Navajo Times earlier this week about the proposal, saying that discussions have occurred with Navajo tribal officials, including the Office of the Speaker.

But since the publishing of the story, both Lewis and Navajo Nation Council Speaker, LoRenzo Bates, now deny any consideration, conversation, discussion or negotiations is happening. Lewis now alleges being misquoted even though the reporter on the story talked with him specifically over the telephone.

In response to the story, Bates issued a press statement stating that the article is “entirely inaccurate and misleading.”

According to Bates, the Office of the Speaker has not engaged in any discussion or negotiations with any parties regarding the selling of coal for a proposed “biofuels/diesel fuel project” near Snowflake, Ariz. Nor has his office received proposals, Bates said.

“Since the release of the news story, our office has contacted Mark Lewis, who is quoted in the news story,” Bates said. “He has confirmed that he did not state that he or any other groups have negotiated with the Office of the Speaker, as reported in the news article.”

According to Lewis’ most recent statement, which is also quoted in Bates’ news release, “Frontier Applied Sciences PR firm the Water Resource Institute was misquoted in the news story ‘Tribe looking at proposal to sell 700,000 tons of coal.’”

Lewis added, “In no way was the briefing provided to the newspaper intended to single out one Navajo Nation office or person, and the news reports misquoted by the reporter.

In spite of his latest statement, according to the Navajo Times’ reporter, Lewis did say that talks with Navajo officials were “very preliminary” in which he noted that Anthony Peterman, legislative staff assistant, is aware of the proposal.

Peterman is a coal advocate, having been in on the discussions of the creation of the Navajo Transitional Energy Company, in which this reporter first reported on the story, in January 2013. The Times attempted to get a response from Peterman for this story, but was told by spokesman Jared Touchin that he’s on travel.

Bates’ news release also disputes how the Times’ story reports the Office of the Speaker not responding to a request for comment, denouncing the reporting as misleading.

“My staff was in contact with this news reporter who wrote this particular news article and arranged for an in-person interview; however, the reporter did not show up for the interview at all,” Bates said. “The Office of the Speaker has issued a request to have the story retracted.”

However, in a Tuesday interview with Bates regarding another story the Times published entitled, “Public wants settlement monies to be used for roads, scholarships,” Bates was also asked by this reporter about the coal proposal. At that time, Bates said he didn’t know enough to talk about it and that he would get back to this reporter about the subject.

Also in the interview, the reporter told Bates that his spokesman, Touchin, had set up an interview with Peterman, on Wednesday at 9 a.m.

According to Touchin, Peterman was aware of the interview. From the media inquiry Tuesday to Wednesday, Peterman brief Bates on the proposal for a response, Touchin said.

After a 9 a.m. appointment was set, Touchin then began texting the reporter about changing the time of the interview. Correspondence between Touchin and the reporter then resulted to an 8 a.m. interview, Wednesday, April 1.

It is true that the reporter failed to show up at the scheduled interview time, but that was because he had also been assigned to unhealthy tax food, or Healthy Diné Act of 2014, that took effect, also Wednesday.

From missing the scheduled interview with Bates and Peterman, the reporter then notified Touchin for a prepared statement to along with the coal story. Touchin had until noon to prepare a written statement, but failed to generate one.

In a separate email to this reporter, dated April 2, Lewis went on to say that some corrections needed to be made, including that 700,000 tons of coal sought was 800,000 tons per year.

But according to a March 30 email from Lewis, the press release he passed along said, “FAS Fuels expects to use 700,00 tons of Navajo coal per year in the next 36 months.”

Other aspects of the story Lewis wanted corrected or clarified was “coal could come from Navajo or other excess resources” and that briefing of the proposal occurred with state and Navajo leadership, and not one particular office.

“We also said this was early in the process and FAS fuels could not make any discussion for 36 months,” Lewis said via email on April 2.

The last statement runs contrary to what Lewis said in the phone interview Wednesday and the March 30 email he sent to the Times, in which FAS Fuels expects to use 700,000 tons of Navajo coal per year in the next 36 months.

Lewis went on to say the story didn’t focus on the bio mass aspect of the project, which is the primary purpose of the proposal.

The Navajo Times did contact NTEC spokesman Erny Zah for its April 2 story for a response to see if they had been aware of the proposal.

“We are not involved in this project,” Zah said in an April 1 email.

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