Nome, I think it very, very important that clarification be made to your explicit statement, "...what she had been told was that permits were in place for mining and they are not."
Therefore, Cooky, please clarify if Nome is accuratly reflecting what you were told.
I am asking since in order to be told that "permits were in place for mining", then the permit application was already developed and already submitted and already approved by the appropriate authorities.
To the best of my knowledge, and based on what I have gleaned from the company, the permit application had not been and has not yet been submitted to the authorities.
How could you have been told the permits were in hand??