University of Iowa graduate students says frac mine in Winneshiek County would have economic impact ranging from $750,000 to $2.8 million

What would a frac sand mine mean for Winneshiek County's economy?  Graduate students in the University of Iowa's "Iowa Initiative for Sustainable Communities" have been working this semester to try to come up with an answer to that question.

IISC representatives held a teleconference Monday morning with the Winneshiek County Board to disclose their preliminary figures.

The group says a frac sand mine and processing facility would add anywhere from 18 to 58 new jobs.  The reason that's such a wide range, said graduate student Mitchell Brouse, is that it's uncertain how many truck driving jobs would be created.  Frac sand mined in NE Winneshiek County would have to be trucked to a railroad line--in Calmar or Prairie Du Chien or New Albin or Winona.  The longer the drive, the more drivers that would be required.

The IISC also is doing three other studies--one on the costs of frac sand mining, another a legal analysis of regulatory options for frac sand mining and a third involving mapping of potential sand mining sites.  The results on those studies will be released next spring.

However, county supervisors discussed some of those costs on Monday, with supervisor Dean Thompson asking questions about part of the University of Iowa study that showed a drop in property values for properties surrounding any frac sand mine--as much as 25 percent for properties next to the mine, but an average of an 8 percent drop for property within 5 kilometers.

County supervisor John Logsdon also asked about where frac sand mines could fine people to fill the new jobs in light of housing shortages in Winneshiek County and a tight labor market.  "These jobs would be hard (to fill)," he noted.

Maps created by the graduate students showed the potential for frac sand mining is in the northeasternmost corner of Winneshiek County, where sand deposits are of the kind of sand needed in frac oil extraction.