I'll call Westbrook Town Board
meeting of Monday, February 9th,
2026 to order.
I pledge allegiance to the flag
of the United States of America
and to the Republic for which
it stands, one nation,
under God, indivisible,
with liberty and justice for all.
All right,
number three is act on
minutes of the January 12th,
2026 board meeting is printed.
All in favor say aye.
Okay, act on
January Treasury's report.
All in
favor say aye.
Aye.
If you and who feels
submitted for paint.
There's a couple things on there
that we haven't talked about.
That return of check fee was for
what?
He had closed his account,
but he didn't know why he said it.
Well, so,
otherwise, that's it, I guess.
What do we got?
I want to talk to them about
that really true
value bill because I
Know about everything on there, but
I don't understand stand, but they
got a new
Question John yeah
If she was a check
back, okay,
don't make the most we pay bills
one one seven zero one
Okay, next
thing we got is an update from Green
Light Meta on progress at
Denison.
Okay, can you hear me okay?
Do we want to dim the lights
here a little bit so people can see
the board a little better?
That looks good.
Everybody see it?
All right.
So thank you for allowing me
to come in and talk to the town
board.
As you will recall, I was here
with a couple other folks from Green
Light Metals about a year ago to
this day to give
you kind of an introduction to Green
Light Metals and talk about
the drilling that, at that time,
we were planning out at
the bend site in the Schwamm
again National Forest.
So today, I'm going to.
Recap a little bit of
the information we presented last
year just to kind of bring everybody
back up to speed and
then talk about the results
from our drill program last
summer and What the plans
are coming up for this year for
additional drilling out at
the Bend site
I always tell folks from
the public that just because we're
drilling Doesn't mean that we're
going to be developing a mine out
there in a year two
years. It's going to take us time to
drill out this site and
see if it's economically viable
and as we're doing that we're
going to be doing other work in the
state. So we're years away
from ever from being
at the point where we would actually
start the permitting
process with the DNR and the
federal government on an actual
mine out there.
So that gives us a lot of time
between now and then to engage
with public town boards.
We met with the on the board.
We've done some open houses where
we invite the public in to
present what we're doing, what we
know, give people an
opportunity to ask us questions
about what the process looks like,
what a mine looks like, whatever's
on your mind.
We want to hear that stuff because
we're then able to take that into
account with regards
to the activities that are taking
place out there.
So, to recap,
why are we...
Exploring for these types of
metals. So at Bend,
it's a known copper resource.
It also has good economic
grades.
We're very reliant on
foreign sources for many
critical metals.
So copper is a critical metal
at the U.S.
Federal government stage.
We get most of our copper from
foreign sources and
you also hear about rare
earth elements.
Rare earth elements are primarily
coming from China these days.
So all of these metals are critical
for our economy.
Just the basic economy,
health care, infrastructure,
the electric grid, et cetera.
And when we start looking at other
needs that we are going to face as
a society, electric
vehicles use a lot of copper.
If we're talking about data centers
and building out the electric grids.
For that aspect of the
economy that's going to grow.
We need more copper
Recycling is good.
We want to recycle it.
So again, it's very fundamental
to clean energy technologies
AI Defense needs are
further increasing
And that's driving the need for
all of this exploration that is
taking place around the country
What we refer to as
Wisconsin's Pinokkian
volcanic belt
is the fluids and the
materials that settled out on the
ocean floor that
provides these critical metals
such as copper, zinc, gold,
silver, and potentially tellurium.
We may have mentioned that last
year. Most people haven't heard of
tellurum.
So we as a country and
as a state and as a society,
as a community, we need to be
looking at the exploration and the
development of these metals.
We need to do it in a way that's
economic, and we need to
it in way that environmentally
protective and sustainable.
And so sustainable development
of these minerals is
what our guiding principle is about.
Whether it's at Wisconsin.
Current projects that we're looking
at are four,
and they're shown on this
map here.
And we refer to those as
Lobo and Lobo East, which
is located over here
in the southeastern part of
Oneida County.
We have another gold
copper resource.
It's on private land, private
minerals that we lease that's
referred to as.
And that is located east
of Wausau.
And then the one local here in
Taylor County is what's referred to
as Bend.
And as many of you know, there was
historic drilling at Bend.
We are accumulating that data.
We've got access to that data and
we're building off of the
exploration work that was
historically done at this deposit.
I mentioned sustainable operations.
Our commitment to all communities is
to provide critical metals necessary
for low carbon green energy,
securing the U.S.
Supply chain, and bolstering
the resiliency of local,
state, and the national economy.
We're gonna do that by focusing on
enduring benefits that
flow to the local communities
that extend beyond one mineral
deposit.
So, if full system.
Fostering business entrepreneurship.
So any mine is going to have to have
a lot of services that
are provided to that
operation.
And we want those to come from the
local economy.
So we will develop programs
to foster business entrepreneurship
that can provide those services
to the economy.
It's all up to 85% would
come from the local area.
So northern Wisconsin, this area
around. Medford,
and Westboro.
And that's if we get to the point
where we actually develop a mine.
We don't know if we're there yet.
We want to produce critical metals
that are consistent with Wisconsin's
labor, environmental stewardship,
and public transparency.
So we want input
from diverse local...
Communities, whether it's the
business community, or if it's
an environmental community that has
concerns about the project.
We want to hear from everybody so
that we can take that into account
on how we actually design
a project when we get to that point.
Our policy is to have an
open door.
The project is located in
this area right here in green.
And this little yellow area that you
see there, about 600,
700 acres, that's
the area that we're targeting for
doing the exploration drilling
activity.
I mentioned that we completed one
drill program this past summer.
And to do that,
this is the forest road right here.
We developed a little trail
system that went
in and accessed these
little gray areas which were the
drill pads that we
cleared the ground and set
the drill equipment up on.
All of this activity that we did
last summer, all this drilling
activity.
Was fully permitted by the
Wisconsin's and the geologists that
were doing the work welcomed them
into the site and took whatever
questions that they wanted
to ask.
So that program was completed
in about 12 weeks
or it was planned for 12 weeks.
We completed it in about 10 weeks.
There was over
7,000 feet of permitted
drilling
The project completed about
6,700 feet of drilling.
It was at three sites and
six holes that were drilled.
We were permitted for eight.
We only drilled six of them.
We had authorization
to disturb up to about 0.64
acres as part of that
activity.
The total disturbance was about 0,3
acres.
Here's a couple photos of
the drilling operation.
So coming off of the forest road, we
put down drill mats.
These are heavy-duty industrial mats
that heavy equipment can drive
over to
prevent rutting and stuff like that
of the forced surface.
This is the actual drill rig.
So the crews are out there drilling.
They're going 24 hours a day.
So there's a a couple crews they
trade off.
And that drilling operation goes 24
hours a day.
It's not that big of a rig.
It's like a half-size
semi-trailer with the
drilling equipment in there, and it
drills at an angle.
Most water wells, you're drilling
vertically, so you'll see
the drill tower sticking straight
up.
Here, if you went out to the site,
you would see the drilling tower
right here, and it's
going down at an angel.
And you'll why we do that in a
moment.
This is a picture of the geologist
logging the exploration core.
So as that exploration core comes
out of the core barrel, it's
broken up.
It's put into these boxes and
then the geologists take it back
to the core facility.
We have to abandon the boreholes,
which means you've got to stick a
rod down to the bottom and
pump cement down to the bottom
of the hole and fill it up from
the as we're pulling that drill rod
out.
And the steel casing then eventually
comes out and then we
have to reclaim the entire site
so we have to re-grade it,
put topsoil back on and
then re-vegetate it.
All of those activities are
bonded.
So before we do any drilling
we have post financial assurance
to the DNR and
that financial assurance stays in
place for at least a year until
the DNr certifies that fully
reclaimed and stabilized.
So with this drill program,
I mentioned we do the assays on
the core.
And here we've got a
picture of this very colorful
looking rock.
And what you see in there is these
little veins of where the copper
mineralization is.
So here's a picture the
cut core that gets sent out to
the lab for assay.
And we did get very positive
results out of this drilling this
last summer. So we
were testing other areas.
Of the potential deposit that
hadn't been explored before, and we
were finding very good
mineralization in these
previously unexplored areas.
Significant copper-rich mass
of sulfide mineralization in three
holes, three through five.
We identified a mineralized
trend that was extending to the east
of the main deposit area.
So that main deposit was the
area that had previously been
explored.
So what that's saying is we're
extending the known
extent of mineralization.
That's what we wanna see when
we're holes.
And all of this colored stuff is
different strata of rock.
I mentioned that this was a volcanic
system, so it's different types of
volcanic sediments that had been
built up on the ocean floor.
And then this whole thing was turned
on its side due to things
like plate tectonic type stuff.
And what we're interested in here
is this kind of reddish-purplish
zone right there.
That's the area where we see the
really good concentration.
Pony is where the mineralization is.
So that's what we are targeting with
the drilling.
Throughout the duration of the
drill program last summer, it
was visited by lots of people.
So a lot of people were interested
in it. And here you see some of the
environmental group that's
formed called Friends of the Yellow
River.
And they were on site numerous
times.
And then local government,
tribal people also showed up.
And any time someone showed up,
the drill crew.
The geologists that were out there,
they would welcome them into the
drilling operation, show them
how the equipment worked, how things
were being performed,
and show them the core and answer
whatever questions they had.
This picture on the right is when
the DNR was on site.
And this picture on left is
a group of local Native
Americans that came to the
site under the banner of
a protest.
And we said, why don't you come on
in and we'll show you what we're
doing.
And we spent about four hours with
them, just taking questions,
showing them around.
It was very cordial conversation.
Focus on reclamation activity.
So once we get done with
the drilling, we have to reclaim the
site.
So that photo I showed you earlier
with the drill mats that were laid
down, this is what the
area looked like immediately after
we removed the drill mat
and regraded the area
prior to seeding
and revegetation.
Again, this is an actual
drill site.
You see a pipe that's still
sticking up in the ground.
And that pipe, we didn't fully
abandon that hole because we came
back and we
slide instrumentation down that
hole for Asian activities.
So based on the positive results,
the company was able to raise about
$11 million in
additional cash,
people that invested in the
company.
And that's what we're using
now to fund the next stage
of exploration at this particular
deposit,
to the site, to do additional
drilling on this blue little
square box.
And that'll be starting,
the equipment will probably be
coming in later this week.
So in order to do that,
we had to go back to the DNR and get
more drill permits.
We had to back to Forest Service
and get an additional authorization
to do an additional growing.
All of that stuff just came in as
of today.
We got the final authorization from
the U.S. Forest Service.
We got that DNR permits about
two weeks ago.
And so the
equipment to do the additional
drilling on this block will
be going to the site this week and
anticipate that those
drill rigs will be up and running
maybe this weekend
or sometime early part of next week.
We hope.
To get the drilling on this
block done before the frost
starts coming out of the ground.
We also have these other areas,
this area outlined in
green and this area
up in here and this area up and here
where we also want to do some
additional drilling.
In order to do that, we have to get
the same series of permits from the
DNR.
But with the Forest Service and the
federal government, we have get a
different type of permit.
And that's because the minerals
we're drilling into in those,
in these three areas
are federal minerals.
The minerals underneath the ground
here are private.
They're with Suline and we lease
those.
So because we're gonna be drilling
into federal minerals, we
have to go through a different
permitting process.
We expect that
that process will be
completed, I'm
gonna say April, and
we'll be back out there
probably in May to drill
these three areas.
Any questions?
Yes. Can you, just with your finger,
I can't see where the river is on
there in relation.
Yeah, it doesn't show up real well
here, but it's, I'll
probably have to take my lens.
It's basically going up through
and around like this.
So I think this area right here is
actually on the other side of the
river.
It would be on the...
North side.
Yeah.
Permit before you can enter those.
So that's kind of where we're
at.
We're still drilling once we
get done with this.
Other activities that the company's
looking at is to do some airborne
geophysics in areas around this
area so we can look at
additional drill programs in the
future.
So we're still in the early stages.
What we would likely do,
it's not a guarantee, but what we
would like likely do is once
we finish this drilling,
We get all the data in and
we're able to put it into databases
and import and see it.
We could also provide it in hard
copy format for you.
People would prefer that.
But it'll have a lot of technical
data. It'll have lot of geologic
models in there and all that type of
stuff.
But if you're into rocks and that
type of stuff, you'll find it
interesting.
Is it okay if I ask a few more
questions?
So full disclosure, I worked for the
Forest Service for 35 years.
Sure. I've written biological
evaluations for previous drilling on
the mine. I worked here as a
wildlife biologist from about 1990
to 2011.
So just full disclosure. Yeah, sure.
I'm well familiar with the site.
I've been to the drilling rigs.
I know what that's all about.
How are you looking to access
the area that's going to be
on that north side of the Yellow
River? Is there established roads?
Is there going to new road building?
How's that?
Well, I always say that we're not
building roads, because people think
when you're building roads you're
actually bringing gravel in and
stuff.
So what we're doing with
any of these things, we'll be coming
off the
road right about here.
All we're really doing is taking
out a few trees, as you know, under
the approval of the Forest Service,
so any tree we cut down, we take
that out, and we're
building kind of an initial trail
into these areas where
we can set up the drill rig.
Are you gonna map that the whole
way?
Uh... If we're doing this would be
done in the summer so we would be
madding that yes
There could be a lot of...
Which is pretty routine for a lot of
projects. Now, if you went back 30
years, a lot of people weren't
doing that, but it's just the
way.
Yeah. Yeah.
First time when I was,
whichever company it was at the
time.
The water level in the Yellow River,
I know you guys take water from the
Yellow river to the drilling, what
is there in the permit that
maintains a minimum flow
in the yellow river to protect
mussels and whatever other
aquatic life there is?
Well, there's actually a fair amount
of, I don't know if there's a
limitation on flow that we
have to comply with, but we
are looking at the flow
in the river. Last summer, there was
pretty decent flow through the
river, so when we took the
water out, we weren't affecting the
water level or anything like that.
It's actually pretty small
volume of water that we're actually
using for the drill programs,
but we will be looking at those
issues. I know some folks have
a concern this winter
Remember that.
There could be very little flow
in the river because of how
cold it's been, the thickness of the
ice. My experience,
I actually live on a river,
is that even with
those thick ice sheets that
you see on the river, and you can
get some pretty thick ice there,
there's still flow underneath that
ice.
So there's no minimum flow though
that's mentioned in terms of you can
take water out as long as there's
this kind of
Not that I know of.
I'd have to look at the fine
print in the permit, but I don't
believe that's in there.
But if we think it's going to be
challenging to get water out of
here, or we think is going to have
any harm, we can go to other sources
of water. There's a reservoir a
little further down stream,
or we could come into town and just
go to a local
fire hydrant or contact
fire department and get water that
way, which I've seen done.
So, we will be looking at that.
Rest assured, we
don't want to do anything that
is going to upset people or cause
any type of harm.
And if we think that there's going
to be a concern there, then we'll go
to a different water source for
that.
And then drilling, I don't think, is
really a concern.
But if there were to be a mine,
what kind of protections are there
going to be for Indian farm?
It's a really significant cultural
resource. I'm sure that
the tribes have talked to you about
it.
Yeah, so what we see here,
and that's that farm is,
is
What we see here is if
we develop a mine there, it might be
about 100 acres in disturbance
that we would need to mine that.
What we would like to do is...
Process the ore from this
type of a deposit at a regional
mill facility.
So instead of wherever we
find mineralization that we
want to mine, instead of putting a
mill there, which means you got to
put a tailings facility there,
which increases the footprint of the
operation, all we do
here is mine.
And we take that ore and we
transport it to a railhead and
then that gets shipped to a mill
that's constructed along a rail.
Line, so it's not out in the middle
of the National Forest.
And I've worked on projects
that have done that.
And the footprint for an underground
development, then, is pretty
small. It's about maybe 100
acres.
And so, environmentally, you know,
that's on the plus side in terms of
less disturbance, but wouldn't
that mean a lot less jobs, too, for
the area if you're shipping off most
of them?
Well we're looking at it from,
we're not, we wouldn't be shipping
it out of state so we would keep
that mill operation in state.
Now we haven't identified where
that mill would go but it would be
in one of the counties in this area.
So in aggregate you would
have the same
labor force for the
operation, it would just be spread
out a little bit.
One of the beauties of doing that is
if you get a regional mill
set up.
You can then process ore from
multiple mines at one centralized
location, and so you're not putting
those mills and tailings facilities
at every mine site.
Makes it much more controllable.
Any other questions?
Some roads that you're talking
about, I know where most of them
roads are out there because I walked
around there and that one was an old
log landing road that's up above
there. That was a
very well put in road before.
That one's all around. One just on the
south side of the river?
What's that?
The one on just the south side of
the river.
It would be on the north side of the
river. Oh, on the North side.
Yeah, that was actually a pretty
good log landing there.
They had a lot of logs in there.
And then it was grabable.
So one of the things that we'll have
to look at and why you negotiate
a local agreement is
before we even get to
permitting, we're gonna be doing
engineering studies on different
ways, different alternatives to
develop this.
That's required, it's not required
by the state, but it is required by
financial exchanges.
And we start out with what's called
a preliminary engineering
assessment.
And that's a high level examination
of how would you develop the
mine, what kind of production rate,
what types of transportation
improvements might be needed for
it. All that, what kind
power, every facet
of the project is evaluated.
As well as the economics,
the tax payments to state
government, local government,
employment taxes, all that type of
stuff. So it's a very exhaustive
analysis of the operation.
And we look at various alternatives.
It provides us kind of
a snapshot of how
this project would need to be
engineered.
You don't stop there and that's not
what you then take into permitting.
You then take the results
of that study and you do a
more refined and higher level
of engineering analysis on
that in a study that's
called a pre-feasibility study.
And it's a
very exhaustive study which looks
at... All of the capital
expenditures, operating
expenditures, labor
force, what you're going to pay
the labor force.
All of that type of stuff, all the
transportation requirements,
everything soup to nuts.
And when we're going through those
studies, we want to
be coming in and talking to you and
other local units of
government, because I think
your input is going to be important
and we want a factor that in.
But we go through those.
Engineering evaluations to
get to a point where we believe
we have a mine plan that
can be permitted.
And part of those studies,
which we do before we ever
get into the permitting process,
is to look at all the environmental
regulations at state
level, local level, federal level,
and design the project to
meet all those environmental
requirements for
how the project's instructed,
how it's operated.
And then how it's closed and
how it has to be monitored after
it closes.
So it's a very exhaustive study.
Counties wouldn't be in talking to
the local community at this stage
and factoring
that stuff in at an early stage
before they got to the permitting
process.
It would all happen after
they got into the permiting process.
We don't think that's a good way
of doing business, so we
want to do a lot of our homework
before we get to that point.
We'll be out there, as I said,
probably next week drilling.
And if you want to stop out,
you know where it's at.
Geologists will be out, they'll
be more than willing to take
questions from you, and if anything
comes up, you know how to contact
me.
Same guy did before.
Yeah, yes, yeah.
So if he needs something, he'll
call.
Yeah, Eric will be out there, he's
kind of running the whole thing.
All right, thank you for
your time.
Thank you for coming.
Scott Kluge was our congressman.
He used to work at channel 27.
He was the anchor there.
Oh really? For congress.
Oh wow. He's the last Republican to
serve Madison.
Oh, wow.
That was all the way up
from terms because I believe in
term limits of my own choosing and
he did he ran for four otherwise
he could have had that seat a hell
of a lot longer.
Yeah
I'm sorry.
It's getting there.
What? What?
It's like really wrapped,
it's like folded three ways.
It's just those lights are creating
crazy lens flares, but
I'll make it work.
Yes.
We'll do it.