Listen to me here folks. I live in this area. Been here 22 years. I also wrote your IR / CEO this morning .
This entire mess locally with Gastonia (20 miles south of Hickory, NC) area, is stupid ! People here are stupid. County Commissioners are stupid as well... NONE are Independent free-thinking people...I do not know how else to say it, but I have fought to exist here the last 22 years in my own small construction industry business..
YOU folks from "Down Under" have no clue how backwards this region is and they like to keep it that way... SAVE yourself the headaches that will last years trying to get any sensible results..
It is a TaskMaster & Slave mentality still alive and well in this region and most of NC. Unless the State can control something , they will not allow it to happen- period ! The legal system in most counties is designed to keep things that way too...
As I told your CEO, perhaps you need to look into a merger of sorts with LAC (Lithium Americas Corp.) which is a Canadian firm, yet has massive mining acreage out in Nevada only 2 hours away from Elon Musks' largest TESLA MFG plant as it is! And Trump Admin gave them allowance to proceed with addition mining on Native/Federal Lands just prior the election change happened. They also have a Venezuela mining operation expanded big time with expected increase in $$$ from that later this year as well.
Trying to do anything here in NC, especially in the Catawba, Alexander, Mecklenberg County region that makes sense for all people, is like trying to pull your own teeth out. Why nothing changes here for generations, and the ONLY ones with most wealth are relatives/heirs of the old landowners who came here and is generational wealth passed down, while keeping residents and others caught in low wage jobs and careers- How they control them... Those old landowners "kin" today are the ones who get elected as County Commissioners, Judges and lawyers in local legal system, etc. etc etc..
I screamed at local Channel 9 news reporter this am, running the meeting results here from yesterday, at how stupid people are to not want high paying jobs and careers from this mining operation which YOU still need State approvals, local rezoning allowance and permits for. THEY will keep you tied up in litigation for years trying to get such here to drain your wallets for the legal practitioners in this region.
I warned you all. I live here. I am not from here originally and well traveled. But this situation gets me so damn angry about how stupid so many are here against this, yet they demand "alternative energy or battery powered cars" and have no idea you first, have to mine the product and process it, to be the lithium ion batteries they are demanding we need more of !!! One reason NC is/has been a massive welfare State for some time, and Democrat controlled. ONLY 2 times in history, since reconstruction, has there ever been a Republican Governor too...
