Carrying signs with such messages as "PNC is Bankrolling an American Tragedy," protesters marched Monday from Lexington's courthouse plaza to a downtown bank with lending policies they oppose.
The group of about 50 activists, some dressed as "corporate clowns," expressed anger at PNC for allegedly financing mountaintop-removal coal mining. According to the protesters, PNC is the largest U.S. financier of mountaintop-removal coal mining, but PNC would not comment.
PNC has provided funds to companies other banks have dropped as customers, said Martin Mudd, an activist with the organization Kentucky Mountain Justice.
"We intend to keep the pressure on PNC until they make the right decision," Mudd said.
Fred Solomon, spokesman for The PNC Financial Services Group, said, "Our policy is that we do not identify our customers or comment on them." Solomon also declined to comment on the practice of mountaintop removal.
Protester Mickey McCoy, a retired English teacher from Martin County, which was affected by a coal sludge spill several years ago, said mountaintop removal is unnecessary, destructive and poisonous to the water supply.
Some activists went inside the bank branch. John Walker and Austin Lepeard presented officials with a list of grievances and demands and a copy of the book Plundering Appalachia.
"They were very cordial, very nice, very receptive to what we had to say," Walker said.
At the courthouse plaza, the activists listened to songs like John Prine's Paradise, which refers to strip mining by Peabody Coal in Muhlenberg County. They also wrote messages such as "Down With Corporate Clowns" and "People and Trees Need to Breathe" in colored chalk on the sidewalk in front of the plaza.
According to the activists, PNC has provided hundreds of millions of dollars in loans and bonds to six companies that are collectively responsible for almost half of the mountaintop-removal coal mining in Appalachia.
If PNC continues the funding, "we'll be back," Lepeard said.
Bill Bissett, president of the Kentucky Coal Association, said PNC is an association member. Protesters of mountaintop-removal mining should consider the importance of the mining industry, he said.
"While these people dressed as clowns, it is no laughing matter when you consider stopping 40 percent of Kentucky's coal production."
He said initial investments in mining are critical.
"In addition to thousands of jobs and economic development opportunities in rural Kentucky, I would hope these people would allow investors to invest in the positive growth of Kentucky," Bissett said.
