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Company offers fee to Jacksonville Jackson Creek Sand Co. has offered to pay the city of Jacksonville in order to clear the way for the company to haul gravel through the historic city�s downtown. The 5 to 6 cents paid for each yard of gravel hauled through the city would be set aside in a construction fund for a truck bypass. This may be the first time a gravel company has offered to compensate the city for use of its streets, said land-use planner Mike Lanier, who represents the mining company. Jackson County hearings officer John Eads listened to testimony Monday in a hearing continued from August. The city of Jacksonville requested the hearing after Jackson County staff approved Jackson Creek Sand Co.�s plans to extract 500,000 cubic yards of hard rock from the old Opp Mine located on a hillside just outside the city limits. Eads is expected to either uphold the staff approval, add conditions or deny the plan sometime during the week of Dec. 11. On Monday, the mining company submitted an engineer�s report that showed changes in how it would haul hard rock off the mountain. Earlier plans to pave Jacksonville Reservoir Road and realign its critical intersection with Mary Ann Drive were scratched because of costs to condemn and purchase property and complications in building the new roads, Lanier said. Jackson Creek Sand Co. no longer plans to use Jacksonville Reservoir Road to haul rock, but plans to use the old Opp Mine Road built in the 1860s, which enters Highway 238 about 300 yards away from Mary Ann Drive, LaNier said. One of the owners of the mine, Medford attorney Bob Robertson, filed a lawsuit in federal court Friday asking Jackson County and the city of Jacksonville to pay $50 million for the mine property and the aggregate it contains. It was likely the first lawsuit filed since the approval of Measure 7, which allows property owners to ask for compensation for land-use restrictions. Mail Tribune Home | Ottaway Newspapers, Inc. | Dow Jones & Co., Inc. | Privacy | Contact Us Copyright � 2000 Mail Tribune, Inc.