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Boom in Red Lake continues to roll along
By CARL CLUTCHEY
Friday, August 1, 2008

Chronicle-Journal, Thunder Bay Ontario

The gold boom that boomed in Red Lake nearly 60 years ago is still boomin‘ big time.
Gold-mining giant Goldcorp, Red Lake‘s main employer, announced Thursday it has acquired for $1.5 billion the right to mine the adajacent Gold Eagle property.
The Gold Eagle property, expected to be in production in the next few years, will create 300 new jobs and bring annual gold production at Goldcorp‘s Red Lake operation to one million ounces.
Goldcorp‘s current workforce at its combined Red Lake and Campbell mine operations is pegged at about 1,150 when contractors are included.
Asked how much more mine life the Gold Eagle property will add to the overall, high-grade operation, site manager Dan Gagnon said: “I think we‘re just seeing the beginning.”
Gagnon, who was leaving the Red Lake operation Thursday to take a management position with one of Sudbury‘s Inco mines, added the seemingly never-ending growth in Red Lake reminds him of the situation in Timmins.
“They‘ve been mining gold here since 1949, but in Timmins they‘ve been doing it since 1909,” Gagnon noted.
One might think that the expansion has caused Red Lake‘s streets to be paved with gold.
But Red Lake Mayor Phil Vinet said his town could benefit much more if municipalities with mines in their backyards were given a share in the hefty income taxes mines pay to Queen‘s Park.
“We won‘t return to the glory days of the 1960s until we have some kind of revenue-sharing plan with the province,” said Vinet.
Many Goldcorp workers don‘t live in Red Lake, reducing the number of people who pay residential property taxes, he added.
There may soon be another development in Goldcorp‘s rapid expansion in Red Lake.
The company owns 51 per cent of the Rahill-Bonanza zone, another high-grade chunk “sandwiched” between the existing mine and the Gold Eagle acquisition.
Thunder Bay‘s Premier Gold Mines, which has been actively exploring the Rahill-Bonanza property and has a 49-per-cent stake in it, suggested it won‘t be long before Rahill-Bonanza also is under production.
“If I was Goldcorp, I think I would want to have 100 per cent of it,” commented Premier president Ewan Downie. “We are still drilling it and reporting high-grade results.”